This purification of the soul by interior mortification is not something merely negative. Nor is it merely a matter of avoiding what is on the border of sin; on the contrary, it consists in knowing how to deprive oneself, for the love of God, of what it would be licit not to deprive oneself of.
This mortification, which tends to purify the mind of all that is not of God, is directed in the first place to rid the memory of memories that go against the path that leads us to Heaven. These memories can assail us while we are working or resting, and even while we are praying. Without violence, but with promptness, we will put the means to put them aside, knowing how to make the necessary effort so that the mind is filled again with love and the divine desire that directs our day today.
With the imagination something similar can happen: that it disturbs inventing novels of very diverse types, inventing fantastic stories that do not serve for nothing. It can be said: "Put away from you those useless thoughts that, at least, make you waste your time " Then, too, we must react quickly and return serenely to our ordinary task.
In any case, interior purification is not limited to emptying the mind of useless thoughts. It goes much further: the mortification of the powers opens the way to the contemplative life, in the various circumstances in which God has willed to place us. With this interior silence for all that is contrary to God's will, unworthy of his children, we are able to live a contemplative life.
- Inner purification. With this interior silence for all that is contrary to God's will, unworthy of his children, the soul finds itself disposed to a continuous and intimate dialogue with Jesus Christ, in which imagination helps contemplation - for example, in contemplating the Gospel or the mysteries of the Holy Rosary - and memory brings back memories of the marvels God has done for us and of his goodness, which will inflame the heart with gratitude and make love more ardent.
The Advent liturgy often repeats this urgent proclamation: The Lord is coming, and we must prepare for him a broad way, a clean heart. Create in me, O God, a pure heart,14 we ask him. And in our prayer today we make concrete resolutions to empty our heart of everything that does not please the Lord, to purify it through mortification, and to fill it with love for God through constant signs of affection for the Lord, as did the Blessed Virgin and St. Joseph, with ejaculations, acts of love and atonement, with spiritual communions....
Many souls will also benefit from this effort of ours to prepare a worthy dwelling place for the Savior. We will be able to say to many who accompany us on our own paths what is expressed with simplicity in that old popular song: I know of a flat road / where one reaches God / with the Virgin by the hand.
We ask her that our life may always be, as St. Paul asked the first Christians of Ephesus, a walk in love
Hablar con Dios