* edited 11/30!

Well, my time is not my own, as I often say; life is in perpetual motion around me and the exigencies of each moment are keeping me from the keyboard… Plus, my ISP is quite uncooperative lately.
If you are not a regular, I invite you to explore the comboxes of recent posts for some profound insights contributed by others. I hope to continue the discussion we’ve been enjoying for the last several weeks. And the profiteroles as well ;-)
Meanwhile, a little sharing from a recent burst of rhyme:

Every prayer I cannot pray,
Every thing I cannot say,
Every word I cannot write,
Every secret locked up tight,
Every wound and doubt and fear,
Every silent thing, You hear.

Well, St. Paul started me on this whole thing, so I can't think of a better place to pick up the thread of this thought than the Holy Father's recent comments on Paul's words about the Holy Spirit. We have been discussing this idea that we are created body, created soul, and something else - something Uncreated - and I think we have drawn ourselves to the truth that this Other is the Holy Spirit dwelling within us. And just as we were coming to this, Pope Benedict's Wednesday audience concurred, confirmed, explained in ways for which we were groping. It is worth reading in its entirety, but I will quote it at length:

"[I]n his letters St. Paul ... does not limit himself to illustrate only the dynamic and operative dimension of the Third Person of the Most Holy Trinity, but also analyzes his presence in the life of the Christian, whose identity is marked by him. That is, Paul reflects on the Spirit showing his influence not only on the Christian's action but over his very being. In fact, he says that the Spirit of God dwells in us (cf. Rom 8:9; 2 Cor 3:16) and that "God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts" (Gal 4:6). For Paul, therefore, the Spirit penetrates our most intimate personal depths...

Paul also teaches us another important thing. He says that there can be no authentic prayer without the presence of the Spirit in us...

It is as if saying that the Holy Spirit, namely, the Spirit of the Father and of the Son, becomes the soul of our soul, the most secret part of our being, from which rises incessantly to God a movement of prayer, of which we cannot even specify the terms. The Spirit, in fact, ever awake in us, makes up for our deficiencies and offers the Father our adoration, along with our most profound aspirations. Obviously this calls for a level of great vital communion with the Spirit. It is an invitation to be ever more sensitive, more attentive to this presence of the Spirit in us, to transform it into prayer, to experience this presence and to learn in this way to pray, to speak with the Father as children in the Holy Spirit. ...

The Spirit places us in the very rhythm of divine life, which is a life of love, making us participate personally in the relations that exist between the Father and the Son. ...

Thus let us learn from Paul that the action of the Spirit orients our life toward the great values of love, joy, communion and hope. It is for us to experience this every day, seconding the interior suggestions of the Spirit, helped in discernment by the illuminating guidance of the Apostle."

This is a long way from, and high above, vivisecting spirit and soul!

I am struck (in light of our conversation) by these words:
"God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts" (Galatians 4:6). For Paul, therefore, the Spirit penetrates our most intimate personal depths.

This identifies the "heart," which we considered a possibility for the third element of a trichotomy, as "our most intimate personal depths." As indeed it is.

I don't think Gabrielle will mind if I use her last question to start a new discussion here. It's worth a whole new post -

kt, a couple of things I'd like to ask you. I was wondering if you could explain a little bit about the spirit being vivisected from the soul, and also, is it possible to share with us a little more about the imagery and implications of the word "revenants" in your poem?

Let me start with "revenants," as that is the easier of the two ;-)

The lines preceding are so dense, and they really need to be understood before we get to that particular word.

By cerement the conflagration’s fueled,
what light exposes, heat will cauterize.
Then healed, branded, by the King bejeweled,
freed, enslaved, like revenants we rise.


This fire through which we must pass is a kind of death, a death to self, and it is fueled by all the wrappings and trappings of the "old man" which we are shedding. The light of this Fire reveals to us our weakness, woundedness, sinfulness, and at the same time this woundedness is being healed. It is painful, but there is no other way. This, of course, is a reference to the dark night.

Once we have passed through this Flame, we are "healed" (of our woundedness and sin), "branded" (as belonging to Christ in an unmistakable and indelible way), "bejeweled" (as Christ adorns His spouse with every virtue and grace), "freed" (of our sin and woundedness), "enslaved" (to Love, as our wills are no longer our own and we belong wholly to Him), and we return to life wholly transformed, wholly spiritual.

We have gone through this total self-emptying, this kenosis, this death, and we rise from the ashes (like the Phoenix), aflame and renewed.

As for vivisecting...
On one level, we can say that this little death feels as if the soul is being wrenched from the spirit, or as if there is a "disconnect" between the mind and the soul. The dark night is a painful separating of self from self, of the selfward self from the true self.


But there is a d & m in this topic, and I would like to explore this idea with you - that the human person is a trichotomy of body - soul - spirit, much like the universe is space - matter - time. I would reference St. Paul and Edith Stein here (and perhaps I will add some links when I have a longer minute), but I'm hoping someone more astute than I (Father? Deacon? We need some help here.) can give a better theological explanation. I've said too much already.

Gabrielle's comments on the seventh sonnet summarized so succinctly (I can't resist an alliteration), that I'm using them as a springboard for something else I've been thinking about lately. She said (in case you haven't explored the combox):

H, I looked it up too, and it was what I thought (a censor, for holding the blessed incense), but I read also that it is from the Greek "thyos", meaning burnt sacrifice. The "thyos" sometimes needs a "thurible"; the burnt offering sometimes needs a vessel. To be a "living thurible" - hasn't kt captured the essence of our whole spiritual journey, our "sojourn" on earth, with two words? We can be not only the living containers of the holy incense whose perfume rises to the Lord, but the actual burnt offering itself; living holocausts, living sacrifices.
St. Faustina often called herself a holocaust to the Lord, and she also said, "The bride must resemble the Bridegroom", who was the holy and perfect Sacrifice. Living thuribles. What else could one become, if one follows "the blood-paved path He trod"?

This reminded me (in an indirect way) of a verse in Mark 9:
"For everyone shall be salted with fire, and every victim shall be salted...Have salt in yourselves."

Yes, we are the burnt offering, the holocaust; fill this victim, this sacrifice, with fire.
Salt is purifying and preserving, signifying permanence and cleansing. We are salt - the salt of the earth - purifying and preserving. Salt is good, but if it loses its savor there is nothing that can take its place...
And we shall be "salted" (purified, preserved) with fire - the fire of the Spirit, the fire that consumes and transforms us, that makes our sacrifices pure and worthy offerings.
In the Spirit, we become an unbloody sacrifice, hidden in Him.

This "salting with fire" seems to lead to another implication - that we ourselves are "seasoned" and made clean by this action of the Spirit.

Ok, another poem is pertinent here -

Silversmith
“Cloud and darkness are His raiment…A fire prepares His path.”
Psalm 97

In the turbid dark where unseen sinnings steep
we seek the keys that make us free and whole,
but find a searing sword that pierces deep,
to vivisect the spirit from the soul.
The love He brings to free us must first burn;
to offer holocaust there must be fire.
He is puring flame and we in turn
must immolate our selves upon the pyre.
By cerement the conflagration’s fueled,
what light exposes, heat will cauterize.
Then healed, branded, by the King bejeweled,
freed, enslaved, like revenants we rise.

For He sits as a silversmith, refining,
vigilant till expurgation’s done;
burning off the dross till unalloyed souls, shining,
reflect the perfect image of His Son.