Mary, Living Flame of Love of the Holy Spirit
O living flame of love,
that tenderly wounds
my soul in its deepest center!
(Living Flame of Love, 1).
Most Holy Virgin of Mount Carmel, wholly ablaze with the fire of the Holy Spirit from the first instant of your existence; ever-burning bush that is never consumed; golden lamp that holds the light of Christ to illumine the pilgrims of the holy Mountain; Mother of beautiful Love, in whose Heart the Father found His delight, the Word His dwelling, and the Holy Spirit His most pure temple: draw near today to my poverty and allow a spark of that divine fire to reach also the center of my soul.
Do not permit me to live content with a lukewarm love, with a routine faith, with a hope without ardor. You know that the Beloved does not want a divided heart, but a whole one; He does not seek a measured surrender, but an offering without reserve; He does not call the soul to remain in the outer courts, but to bring it into the inner wine cellar, where He intoxicates it with the new wine of His charity and slowly transforms it into Himself. Obtain for me that holy wound of love that made your son John of the Cross sing; that secret sore that hurts because it loves and loves because it wounds; that silent flame that consumes all that is not God and leaves the soul clean, transparent, and docile to every prompting of the Spirit.
Mother of Carmel, teach me that the Holy Spirit does not descend only to console, but also to purify; that His fire illumines, but also burns; that He caresses while transforming; that He does not destroy nature, but raises it to make it share in the very divine life. Let me not fear, then, when that fire consumes my securities, my disordered affections, my hidden ambitions, or my deepest resistances. If all of this turns to ashes, it will be so that the face of Christ may appear with greater clarity, engraved by the Father upon the soul as a living image.
You remained beside the Cross when Love seemed defeated. There you beheld how the open Heart of your Son poured out blood and water to give birth to the Church. There you received a new motherhood over all the disciples. There the Holy Spirit was preparing, in the silence of sacrifice, the great Pentecost that would set the world ablaze. Make me also understand that there is no flame of love without the wood of sacrifice; nor resurrection without the cross; nor transforming union without that slow purification by which the Father prunes the vine so that it may bear abundant fruit.
May my prayer be fire and adoration, not routine; surrender, not mere compliance. May my heart burn when it hears the Word of the Word, be inflamed when it receives His Body in the Eucharist, and remain long in silence to let the Holy Spirit work, who prays in us with ineffable groanings and leads us to the bosom of the Father. May my whole life become a hidden flame that, without making noise, illumines those who live in darkness, warms those who are cold toward God, and reminds the world that only Love deserves to be loved.
And when the purifying fire has consumed me and I no longer seek anything but the glory of the Father, the face of Jesus Christ, and the breath of the Holy Spirit, take me by the hand, Most Holy Virgin of Mount Carmel, and lead me into that eternal flame where the Three divine Persons are one single Love, one single Life, and one single Beatitude. Then I shall understand that my whole existence was but a schooling to let myself be loved by God and to respond to that Love with my whole being, until my soul, as the little saint of Carmel desired, is transformed in the Beloved.
Our Lady of Mount Carmel, kindle in me the living flame of the Holy Spirit so that, purified in Christ, I may live only for the glory of the Father. Amen.