March 24, 1946prev home
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The Third Sunday in Lent
Awaited so long, with a yearning to hear the angelic words, so gentle, clear,, and consoling.
I must tell you, though, that from the moment you went away an angel, who does not seem to be mine, has been constantly and visibly present for me. I say he does not seem to be mine because, whereas Azariah shows himself to me by materializing in beauty, as I described for you at one point,211 this one is completely spiritualized, in a very intense light that only a miracle of God allows me to fix my gaze upon, and he has the incorporeal beauty of spiritual beings and does not use his feet to move, but the two lights of his wings, and everything in him is light: his face, his hands crossed over his chest, and his extremely white, immaterial robe.... And I say “hands,” “face,” and “robe,” because we poor mortals can express ourselves only materially to say what we see. But this very beautiful spirit, who never leaves me and with whom my soul embarks upon continuous loving conversations, has only the incorporeal condensation of his spirit in the form of a face, hands, and clothing, to present himself to my spiritual sight and is thus reduced to the minimum necessary to fulfill this purpose, which really involves using improper, very material words to speak of his face, hands, and robe. In short, he looks to me like the Angel at Gethsemane, who was “light in the form of an angel.”212 I looks to me like one of the many I have seen in the choirs in Paradise.... Oh, light, light singing in the boundless azures of Heaven...! He looks to me like one of the Christmas angels... for the shepherds... one of the angels at Compito.213 During one of the last nights of exile they lifted me into ecstasy as they skimmed overhead, singing unrepeatable harmonies....
I don’t know who it is. I know his presence is my comfort. To me, he is more than gentle moonlight for the solitary, lost traveler and gives me certainty that I am not alone, but in the best of company, with the best of guides, and on the best of ways: in the company of the angel of God and on the way the angels follow: God’s. I don’t know who it is. I delight in his presence, but he does not disclose himself.
Yesterday Marta was away for six hours, in Camaiore.... Well, alone in my room for three out of six hours, I was so happy with this angelic presence that I even got physical relief from it.. I got recollected in that meditation and contemplation which may look like somnolence to strangers, but is instead a spiritual ardor, and I was enraptured.... What peace...!
But now Azariah shows himself and speaks. The luminous angel is not Azariah, then.… And I write.214
And Azariah kneels to listen to Gabriel, who, increasing his light, greets me with the words “Ave Maria!” Nothing but “Ave Maria.” He then utters a tremendous word - oh, it really is tremendous! - and gives me an order. So condemnatory in its motives! But I will take it with me to the grave. “It is much more tremendous,” the Archangel says, “than the secret of Fatima and should not be revealed because men, even these for whom it is issued, do not deserve to know it.” And then the Archangel - together with Azariah, who gets up again from his genuflection - sings, “Let us bless the Lord.” I reply “Thanks be to God,” as Azariah taught me, and with them say, “Glory be to the Father and to the Son and to the Holy Spirit....” And now I also have the anguishing weight of this tremendous knowledge....
Since the Archangel greeted me with the words “Ave Maria,” I think it was he who spoke on December 5. Do you remember that card with a rule for Dora?215 But I do not ask about anything... and remain in my uncertainty.216
211 January 15, 1946.
212 This description appears in her work on the Gospel, corresponding to Luke 22:43.
213 S. Andrea di Compito, where she was evacuated. See The Notebooks. 1944, note 312.
214 We omit over ten handwritten pages containing Azariah’s commentary on the Mass for the Third Sunday in Lent.
215 See note 121.
216 We omit eleven handwritten pages (dated March 31, 1946) containing Azariah’s commentary on the Mass for the Fourth Sunday in Lent.