7th December

​Beverly Lanzetta, Radical Wisdom: A Feminist Mystical Theology (Fortress Press, 2005), 213.
Image: Pavel Lozovikov, unsplash.com/@photolozovikov

'Holy Wisdom, everything we are and everything we have you gave us. The very air we breathe and the eyes with which we see, you fashioned. The mind that draws these words out of silence and etches them into the tablet of time, you made. … Life is nothing more than a longful dialogue with you. Our words are offerings to you; our thoughts are but passing sails on a silent sea, our emotions caught up in the solace of your intimacy. … It is you, Holy Wisdom, who peer into our hearts—you hear our deepest longings and know the triumphs of our souls. Your whole creation is a poem of desire: some days we are a verb; on others, an immovable noun. The syntax of our pilgrimage etches traces across life’s pages and often we do not know how to speak. But we are intoxicated with the beauty of our world …

Take our breath. … May each inhalation and exhalation be a tribute to your glory. May our hearts burn with the passion of your fire and your holiness. Take our souls and use them to assuage the wounds; may they grow stronger to hold more of your love.  Take [our] bodies and make them an instrument of your peace; may our actions be worthy of your mercy. Take us and use us, for we long to give our false selves away. You come upon us so silently and in such deep interiority that often we do not recognize your call. And this is no wonder, since the sound of your words is so holy and the wisdom of your words is so profound that even the purest soul struggles to hold them and bear them in memory. In silence, all that is clamouring and jarring is stilled and we are led to the door of your own solitude. Let us offer ourselves so that our words reflect your Word. … You emerge out of us and we dwell within you.'​
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