Aflame with the Bridegroom's Love
- SERVANT OF GOD CATHERINE DE HUECK DOHERTY
Everything can be borne between two Masses.
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If every morning we eat the Bread of saints, we will be able to face any kind of day. We will plunge into the sea of fire and come out burning, ready to go forth and light fires of love. You are an empty chalice. Every morning you have to be filled. Every morning you offer yourself, your day, your being, and consecrate yourself as a sacrifice to make up what is wanting in the Passion of Christ (cf. Col 1:24). I eat Christ in the morning, and I am eaten up myself through the day.
Communion is the union of man's soul with God. The source of all strength, our Communions could change the world if the fire of the Holy Spirit were really allowed to fall on the earth, and to renew it through you and me.
Our faith centers around the truth that God loved us first, and all we have to do to be fiery apostolic Catholics is to love him back. If we meditate deeply on the Eucharist, we will distinctly hear the loving, powerful, immense heartbeats of God. We would hear more—we would hear that heart speaking to us. We would hear our hearts beating in unison with his; we would be united with our Lord and our God.
We take Communion, and we communicate with God. At the same time, it is more than communication—it is an invasion by God. To be invaded by God is joy. We plunge into the mystery of love, a reality more real than the air we breathe, than the life we live throughout the day. He kissed me with the kiss of his mouth, begins the Song of Songs. In Holy Communion my Lord and Creator kisses me! No words can describe the oneness of a soul with God in the sacrament of the Eucharist. The great miracle at the marriage feast at Cana, the changing of water into wine, was a prefiguration of the Eucharist. At each Communion, the Lord invites us to his wedding feast. If only we understood and lived by his love, every day would be a honeymoon with God!
When I receive our Lord, I experience the nuptial mystery of man and God. Because we are human and simple and ordinary, he chose the image of marriage. "I am the Bridegroom," says God. I am his, and he is mine. Here begins the kingdom of God. Through the Holy Eucharist, you will fall in love with God. The more you love God, the more you receive God. The deeper your love becomes, the more your heart opens. You and the Trinity are one.
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Acknowledgement
Servant of God Catherine de Hueck Doherty. "Aflame with the Bridegroom's Love," from The People of the Towel and the Water: Restoring the World through Christ in Everyday Life. Madonna House Publications (2010).
Printed in the September 2023 edition of Magnificat. Used with permission.
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The Author
Catherine de Hueck Doherty († 1985), born in Russia, established the Friendship House in Harlem, New York, in 1938, and later the Madonna House in Combermere, Canada. She is author of Grace in Every Season, Soul of My Soul Coming to the Heart of Prayer, Dear Father, Living The Gospel Without Compromise, An Experience of God Identification with Christ — a Road to the Mystical Life, and Catherine de Hueck Doherty: Essential Writing.
