Love As Divine Touch

Pillars of Creation is a photograph taken by the Hubble Space Telescope of elephant trunks of interstellar gas and dust in the Eagle Nebula

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ope Francis, in his encyclical Dilexit Nos (He loved us), uses the passage from the First Letter of John to emphasize that God’s love for us is primary. Not only did he love us first, but that love encapsulates God's nature. "He who does not love does not know God; for God is love... In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins" (1 Jn 4:8-10). But what is love? Have you ever wondered why love is the greatest among the three theological virtues: faith, hope, and love? St Thomas Aquinas explains why love (or charity) is the greatest of the three. In his Summa Theologica, he articulates that charity is supreme because it alone unites us directly with God, making it the ultimate goal of the Christian life. But we can ask further: what is in love that sets it apart? While faith and hope also unite us with God, Aquinas says that charity does so in a uniquely direct way, but so does faith and hope. What is in love that makes it so immediate? I would like to believe it is the element of touch. No wonder Aquinas describes charity as the “form of the virtues." I would like to put it in a more immediate form: love is the greatest because it is "the touch of the virtues." The form of touch adds a unique layer of intimacy and immediacy.

Secondly, touch is a risky endeavor. During the pandemic, daily operations require us to handle numerous objects. Touch is essential for human connection and accomplishing practical tasks, but it also raises the risk of putting ourselves in danger. No matter the risks, Jesus’ decision to touch lepers and sinners was a powerful act of love to reach out to people marked as "untouchable." But it came with a prize. Jesus became a victim of the “gaslighting tactic” or “character undermining,” i.e., an attack on a person’s best asset or strength, twisted into a negative or used against them. "The Son of Man came eating and drinking, and they said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners’” (Mt 11:16-19). Love stands out as the greatest not only simply through its form as touch but also its direct effect of healing. Touch heals. In his Spiritual Exercises, St Ignatius of Loyola encourages believers to enter imaginatively into the scenes of Jesus’ life inviting intimate connection. One of his greatest legacies is found in the Application of the Senses. Ignatius believed God works through all senses, including touch, to communicate His grace and love. His approach to spiritual discernment embraces the idea that God’s presence can be felt in the ordinary moments of human life. The most spiritually healing act is the human touch. The "composition of place" is simply to put some human touch to one's prayer period. It was first experienced by Ignatius in the Holy Land. While still recovering from his cannonball injury, he made a pilgrimage there, and this journey became pivotal for him. In Jerusalem, he encountered the nearness and closeness of Jesus so profoundly that he wished to remain there for the rest of his life. He felt God’s healing, a touch both soothing and tangible, an experience of God that was deeply personal and close.

Ignatius' longing to be near Christ was so intense that he later encouraged his first companions to return to Jerusalem with him, though this was ultimately impossible. When returning to Jerusalem proved unfeasible, they chose instead to found a congregation, now known as the Society of Jesus. People who go to Jerusalem get what they call a "Jerusalem syndrome." I see this as an extension of every person's desire to be close to Jesus physically. Last year, I was blessed to be in Jerusalem and physically touch the holy sites that Ignatius touched. I met someone who was dressed like Jesus, walking around barefooted. When Ignatius put together the Spiritual Exercises, he had Jerusalem always in mind. His deep longing for the place is immortalized in the pages of the Spiritual Exercises. I have always felt this sense of being transported back to Jerusalem. When I witness retreatants' beautiful contemplative encounters with Jesus, I feel, in a way, that I am there again—walking those sacred sites, sharing in the closeness of Jesus. Each time, it renews that sense of being with Him in a profound, almost physical way.

For my third and last point, I would like to talk about St Gertrude the Great whose memorial we celebrate today. She is mentioned by Pope Francis in Dilexit Nos. She was devoted to the mystery of the Incarnation, in particular to the Sacred Heart of Jesus and to the Eucharist. She was the recipient of many mystical experiences, and her spiritual writings had great influence in later centuries and indirectly contributed to the establishment of the Feast of the Sacred Heart.

The Cistercian mystic can be a retreatant's model of intimate prayer. She writes of a time in prayer in which she leaned her head on the heart of Christ and heard his heart beating. She reflected that the “sweet sound of those heartbeats has been reserved for modern times so that hearing them, our aging and lukewarm world may be renewed in the love of God.” Contemplation is to touch Jesus's heart so that one can feel his heartbeat. Hans Urs von Balthasar writes about the importance of the sense of touch in our contemplation. "Prayer is the realistic attitude." I quote, "Contemplation must not get stuck in the intellect (SpEx 3) for “gnosis puffs up, but love builds up” (1 Cor 8:1). All the seeing and hearing must result in a “touching” (1 Jn 1:1) (SpEx 125), a “getting [near]” to God (SpEx 20); the one praying must be totally taken up with what the divine Person’s are “doing” (SpEx 108).

Fr Pedro Arrupe SJ composed this prayer, "In the Hands of God," after he suffered a debilitating stroke, the effects of which he patiently endured for the final ten years of his life. 

More than ever I find myself in the hands of God. This is what I have wanted all my life from my youth. But now there is a difference; the initiative is entirely with God. It is indeed a profound spiritual experience to know and feel myself so totally in God’s hands.

Amen, Fr JM Manzano SJ