Episode Transcript  

One

The Spirit’s Way: Detachment Through Mary

The Catechism teaches that the Holy Spirit reveals Jesus to us, prepares us to receive Him, and forms Him in our soul (CCC 687). But how? Always through Mary. Just as the Spirit formed Christ in her at the Annunciation and descended again at Pentecost, He continues to form Christ in us through her. This is how God works.

St. Louis de Montfort wrote that it was “with her, in her, and of her” that God produced His masterpiece, Jesus Christ, and that He will follow this pattern until the end of time (True Devotion, 20). The more the Spirit finds Mary in a soul, the more completely Christ will be formed there.

St. Maximilian Kolbe confirmed this when he said the union between Mary and the Holy Spirit is so perfect that “the Holy Spirit works only through the Immaculata” (Collected Works, 634). To be filled with Christ, we must belong entirely to Mary.

But what prevents us from belonging entirely to Mary and through her to God? Every one of us has two or three created, earthly things we actually want or love more than God. Disordered attachments. Created things we love as much, or more, than God. 

Two

Disordered Attachments

I’ll speak only for myself. If I’m honest, there are still things I love more than God. How do I know? Because I always have God, nothing can separate us from the love of Christ unless I choose to sin. But when one of the few things I’m deeply attached to is threatened or taken away, I panic. I get overly angry. I grieve as if I’ve lost everything, even though I still have God.

That reaction reveals the truth: something else has taken up space in my soul that belongs to Him. It fills my desires as much as, or more than, God does.

St. John of the Cross would say that my root problem is disordered attachment, loving created things in a way that blocks my union with God. He gives us a vivid image, “It makes little difference whether a bird is tied by a thin thread or by a cord. Even if it is tied by thread, the bird will be held bound just as surely… This is the lot of those who are attached to something.” (Ascent of Mount Carmel, I.11.4)

Even a small attachment can hold the soul back from flight. When the soul is purified of these attachments, when it wants God above all else, then it is free. Then we will possess God fully and be perfectly happy and at peace.

True detachment is not loving God and hating everything else. It is ordered love: loving lesser things less, and loving the Greatest Thing more.

Three

No Room at the Inn

Consider the first Christmas: Why was Jesus not born in the inn? Because it was full. Why was He born in the cave? Because it was empty. This is the essence of detachment. To be filled with God, we must first be emptied, emptied of our disordered attachments to created things. 

As St. John of the Cross writes in Letter 15, “The immense blessings of God can only enter and fit into an empty and solitary heart.” 

Disordered desire for created things crowds out God. Only when we long for Him above all else is the soul made spacious enough to be filled with Him.

Four

Active Purification 

John of the Cross teaches us that to be emptied of disordered attachments to make room for God we need two things: active purification, which we initiate through discipline and spiritual practices, and passive purification, which God allows through trials and sufferings that we must accept and cooperate with in faith.

The active purification or emptying takes place by: Receiving Jesus often in the Eucharist, where He comes to live in us. Monthly confession, aided by a daily examination of conscience. Daily meditation and a resolution where we put into practice one thing God shows us in prayer, if He says forgive, we forgive; if He says carry the cross, we carry it. Avoiding the near occasion of sin, the situations that often result in our sin. And fidelity to our daily duties, especially the hidden, humbling ones.

Five

Passive Purification 

The second way to make room for God is by passive purification.  When something happens in our lives that we did not choose, do not like, and cannot change, we are invited by God to accept it with trust in Providence. This is the way God is trying to break in and carve out more space in your soul so that He can flood you with His life. So, accept it. Surrender to God, let Him do what He wants, and don’t resist Him.

This is where God, by heavy trials, particularly interior ones, perfects and completes what the soul has begun on its own, but cannot complete on its own. That is why it is passive but not inactive, because we cooperate by faith, trust, acceptance, and love, with a total gift of self to God, rather than resisting Him. 

St. Maximilian Kolbe taught that the surest remedy for disordered attachments is not by fixating on ourselves but total consecration to Mary. 

To this end, Kolbe writes, “Do you want her to come often to visit you? Do you want her to dwell permanently in your soul? Do you desire that she, she alone, may direct your thoughts, take possession of all your heart? Do you wish to live entirely for her? If you really desire all this, open your heart completely before her and give yourself to her without reserve and forever, even if only with the yearning of your soul…Have you ever thought what becomes of you when it is no longer you who acts, but she herself who loves God and men in you and through you? Are you aware of the fact that, in such a case, your actions are measured in proportion to her dignity? That in her hands they become pure, without blemish, just as she is entirely pure and immaculate?… Could you desire anything more?” (1216)

Suggested Resolutions:

Choose one resolution for today to help you grow closer to God, or create your own. Here are some ideas to inspire you. 

• In your daily examination of conscience, ask yourself what you’re attached to. Look at the things that make you anxious, the things that distract you during prayer, the things you’re most afraid to lose. Give them to God in prayer.

• Entrust yourself to Mary every day, abandoning yourself to her care, even if it means letting go of the things that you’re attached to.

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