Todo y Nada - All and Nothing: The Spiritual Genius of St. John of the Cross

"To reach satisfaction in all, desire satisfaction in nothing. To come to possess all, desire the possession of nothing. To arrive at being all, desire to be nothing. To come to the knowledge of all, desire the knowledge of nothing. To come to enjoy what you have not, you must go by a way in which you enjoy not. To come to the knowledge you have not, you must go by a way in which you know not. To come to the possession you have not, you must go by a way in which you possess not. To come to be what you are not, you must go by a way in which you are not."

St. John of the Cross, "The Ascent of Mount Carmel"

This has become one of my favorite teachings of the Doctor of Love. Short and sweet, this excerpt and indeed, all of The Ascent, is about continual self-emptying.

I had difficulty reading The Ascent when I first took it up to study it. Deep, spiritual teachings most often go over my head. I read two chapters and put it down in frustration. Several weeks later, I picked it up again one Friday after coming home from work, determined to begin afresh with it.

Something strange happened. I could not put the book down. I finished reading it that weekend.

Something clicked and suddenly I found myself trembling and sobbing uncontrollably.

It was then I discovered the meaning of the teaching. This is part and parcel of the "treasure" that lies hidden in the field. John knew it, lived it, and wrote about it so that we, too, might share this great wisdom.

Love does indeed conquer all. Self-emptying is the way to attain that all-conquering love.

Poor St. John was rejected by his own brothers in the monastery, even imprisoned and scourged by them. He bore it all with patience and love. Sound familiar?

Out of that pain, in that small, dark, damp prison cell, he wrote some of his most beautiful poetry and he wrote another one of his classics: Dark Night of the Soul.

I have a hard time explaining the way St. John's writings make me feel. Read the examples of my own poetry that I post on this blog. Almost all of the spiritual poetry I write, my love songs to Jesus (particularly my Draw Me series of poems), are based on what this great Doctor of the Church has taught me.

Christ is love. The job of someone who desires sainthood (and that should be all of us, though we are all sinners, myself chief among them) is to become Love. To become Christ. St. John of the Cross became Jesus in his suffering and persecutions and he left behind a legacy in his writings to point the way, step-by-step, on how to do it. This is what God whats. This is how we become made in His image and likeness.

St. Paul says in Phillipians 2:5-8 -

Have among yourselves the same attitude that is also yours in Christ Jesus, Who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be grasped. Rather, he emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, coming in human likeness; and found human in appearance, he humbled himself, becoming obedient to death, even death on a cross.

St. John lived this.

So must we.