Flower Mysticism for Divine Union
and God's Kingdom
John S. Stokes Jr.
Conventional ascetic, mystical theology is based on an affective,
purgative, illumined, unitive rising of the soul to God, following
paths set forth by Ss. Teresa of Avila, John of the Cross, Francis
de Sales, etc.
From the complexity of these paths, mystics have been regarded as
special kinds of persons.
On the other hand, St. Louis de Montfort has observed,
"(Consecration to Jesus through Mary) is an easy, sure,
perfect and secure way of attaining union with our Lord
in which union the perfection of a Christian consists.
". . . It is true that we can attain divine union by
other roads, but it is by many more crosses and strange
deaths, and with many more difficulties, which we shall
find it hard to overcome . . . But by the path of Mary,
we pass more gently and more tranquilly."
True Devotion Par. l52
From this viewpoint mystics are not seen as special kinds of
persons; rather, each person is seen to be a special kind of mystic.
To establish, in grace, God's Peaceable Kingdom on earth, and, to
enable this by uniting with Christ's sacrifice of reparation to
remove the Kingdom-blocking temporal effects of sin in the world,
requires, following the example of Pope John Paul II, a widespread
personal mystical rising to heaven and unity with God, for filling
and coming forth with the grace, light wisdom and power to
accomplish this - with Mary, "who comes forth as the morning rising,
fair as the moon, bright as the sun, and terrible as an army set in
battle array."
To this end, the challenge is to further general knowledge of world
mystical need, and of the mystical potential of all, that all, and
especially young people, will be motivated to seek mystical access
and inspiration for action as more challenging and more fulfilling
than promiscuous sex, alcohol, drugs, rock music, hip-hop,
privilege, wealth accumulation, power struggles, elitism, etc.
What is in question is the mellowing and freeing of our souls from
limiting and restraining interior body-mind attachments, through
loving inspiration, self-examination and sacramental confession and
penance, for rising to heavenly union with God through Mary - from
which to come forth spiritually graced and strengthened for the
building of God's earthly Kingdom, and to this end for reparational
deliverance of earth from the effects of sin.
In classic mysticism this is accomplished through an extensive
series of descents and soul risings of grace, wisdom, light and
power. But, in my own experience, even with the guidance of a
spiritual director - Professor of Ascetic and Mystical Theology at
our archdiocesan seminary - this took three years and filled a
spiritual journal of two hundred pages (single space).
However, after thus entering into a degree of union with God in
this laborious way, it became clear to me that this same series of
steps to union can be accomplished ever more simply and directly
- as asserted by St. Louis de Montfort - through Our Lady; and
specifically as we meditate on the sequence of Mysteries of the
Rosary of Our Lady ascetically and mystically, "that by meditating
on these mysteries...we may imitate what they contain, and obtain
what they promise" - mystically.
As a consequence of this realization, I set aside the draft of what I
thought was going to be a book, as too tedious, and even boring for
anyone else - recalling the words of the priest from whom years
earlier I received catachetical instruction and baptism as a
convert, "You'll probably want to write a book; most converts do, but
born and raised Catholics rarely read them."
More generally, I realized that each person who climbs Mt. Carmel
starts at a different place at the base of the mountain, and thus
has an unique path to the top, which may not be of all that much
interest to others. Further, I recalled the counsel of St. John of
the Cross, who advised not dwelling even on one's own illuminations,
lest this divert one's focus and discernment from further ascents.
The essential impetus for mystical rising is our soul's inherent
desire for the uniting beatific vision of God. In the body our soul
first envisages God as shown forth in the beauty, design and power
of nature, which artists, musicians, poets and philosophers seek to
discern and express seeing things in their essences, and then
symbolically. Then, in the love of God, our soul quickens our
active imaginations to move from individual essences and symbols to
more general "archetypes" of things; and finally through a series of
ever refined illuminations - quickened by even more generalized
mandalas (such as single golden flower) and the operation of
spiritual light - our soul successively sheds itself of these until
we enter into the uniting beatific vision of God.
What is in question, then, is the awakening in all of a sense of
our soul's inherent love of God; the introduction of the concept of
moving through a series of freeing and illuminating steps from the
perception of God's self revelation in nature to the very union with
God of the beatific vision; and guiding them to a particular path to
be followed to such union - of which it is proposed that
self-purification while meditatively following the sequence of Rosary
Mysteries is the simplest, clearest and most direct.
The key to praying the Rosary mystically is, through the purity and
love of the Joyful Mysteries and flowering of the heart, perceiving
and implementing - in meditative correlation with the Sorrowful
Mysteries - the ascetic, penitential, mortificational freeing of our
soul's attachments to the sensory, possessive and willful centers of
our lower vital subtle bodily centers; and then the "staying up" of
our souls with spiritual flowers of the heart center as they rise
up, in correlation with the Glorious Mysteries, through the wisdom
and illuminative center purifications of our upper subtle mental
body - in preparation for heavenly rising from the crown center.
In essence it is the spiritual flowering generated through love of
God in our hearts, which in seeking to lift our soul upwards towards
union with God motivates and enables us to discern at each step the
bodily attachments to be penitentially loosened and dissolved to
make possible each next upwards step of the soul in grace, wisdom
and illumination.
In this we have the Communion verse of the original liturgy for the
feast of the Rosary in the Roman Rite:
"Send forth flowers as the Lily,
and yield a fragrance,
And bring forth leaves in grace,
and praise with canticles,
And bless the Lord in his works."
Sirach 39:13-14 (Ecclesiasticus 39:18-19)
and St. Francis' affirmation that the burgeoning of the spiritual
leaves, flowers and fruits of our interior rising of soul are
inspired by our meditative perception of the leafing and flowering
of nature.
"Into love's furnace I am cast"
"The tree of love its roots hath spread
Deep in my heart, and rears its head;
Rich are its fruits: they joy dispense;
Transport the heart, and ravish sense.
In love's sweet swoon to thee I cleave,
Bless'd source of love . . . .
"All creatures love aloud proclaim;
Heav'ns, earth and sea increase my flame;
Whate're I see, as mirror bright
Reflects my lover to my sight;
My heart all objects to him raise;
Are steps to the Creator's praise . . . ."
In this we have further, the spiritual passages applied by the
Church Fathers to the Blessed Virgin,
I am a rose of Sharon, a lily of the valleys.
As the lily among thorns, so is my love among the daughters.
Stay me up with flowers, compass me about with apples
Canticles 2: 1,2,5
"I have struck root among the glorious people, . . .
in the portion of the Lord, his heritage,
Like a cedar on Lebanon . . . a cypress on Mount Hermon,
Like a palm tree in Engedi, like a rosebush in Jericho,
Like a fair olive tree in the field,
Like a plane tree growing beside the water . . .
I give forth perfume . . .
I spread my branches . . .
I bud forth delights like the vine,
My blossoms bear fruit fair and rich."
(Sirach 24: 13-17)
St. Louis de Montfort says of the Blessed Virgin's mediation of
our spiritual flowering:
"God the Holy Spirit wishes to fashion his chosen ones
in and through Mary. He tells her, "My well-beloved,
my spouse, let all your virtues take root in my chosen
ones that they may grow from strength to strength and
from grace to grace. When you were living on earth,
practising the most sublime virtues, I was so pleased
with you that I still desire to find you on earth
without your ceasing to be in heaven. Reproduce
yourself then in my chosen ones, so that I may have
the joy of seeing in them the roots of your invincible
faith, profound humility, total mortification, sublime
prayer, ardent charity, your firm hope and all your
virtues. You are always my spouse, as faithful, pure,
and fruitful as ever. May your faith give me
believers; your purity, virgins; your fruitfulness,
elect and living temples."
- True Devotion 34
Then, there is the Gospel affirmation of our interior spiritual
trees as perceived by the initial subtle spiritual vision of a blind
man whose sight was restored by Jesus:
"And looking up, he said: I see men, as it were trees, walking"
Mark 8: 24
Those with such spiritual vision also see - as represented in
religious art - the auras of persons whose souls have been
sanctified through union with God.
It is to be recalled that in Christian mystical tradition,
interior subtle spiritual flowering is envisaged not only as
taking place interiorly as we meditate and contemplate, but is
seen by those with subtle spiritual vision as also producing
flowers which rise heavenward transporting our prayers. Thus,
the Catholic Encyclopedia states, that the name "Rosary", meaning
a spiritual garland or bouquet of roses, was given to the Psalter
of Our Lady as a consequence of "an early legend which. after
traveling all over Europe, penetrating even to Abyssinia,
connected this name with a story of Our Lady, who was seen taking
rosebuds from the lips of a young monk when he was reciting Hail
Marys and to weave them into a garland which she placed upon her
head." Encyclopedia (1912) Vol 13, p.187).
In this we understand why we are taught always to move our lips when
we pray - even in "silent" prayer. "Grace is poured abroad in your
lips" (Psalm 44:3). The up-facing blooms of petunias, "Our Lady's
praises", remind us of infloresced subtle pneums of our prayers
issuing for rising to heaven as we pray. And the issuing and rising
of these pneums may be supported musically - as with plain chant.
More fundamentally, the Church in the Litany of Loreto invokes Mary,
the "Flower of flowers" (Chaucer) as the Mystical Rose and Queen of
the Most Holy Rosary - exemplar of interior mystical flowering.
This quickening of our interior spiritual flowering has thus been a
primary focus of the restoration of the Flowers of Our Lady and Mary
Gardens to contemporary religious and gardening culture. In the
inspirational leaflet of our Mary's Gardens 1951 introductory "Our
Lady's Garden" seed kit, Edward A. G. McTague wrote:
The Mary Garden is an act of faith...an appeal to the
heart. May it be that as you envisage the Flowers of
Our Lady they bloom spiritually within your interior life.
Then, with your garden stewardship, foliage, buds and
blooms will come of God's creatures the seeds, in due
season and according to his established order - in
veneration of the Blessed Virgin, and quickening
recourse to her in meditation and prayer.
Today, Andrea Oliva Florendo, has counseled:
Meditating on a Flower
Look on the flower for a few seconds. Then,
close your eyes. Make your mind calm and quiet.
Imagine this flower in your heart. Imagine that petal
by petal the flower is blossoming. Feel that you are
the flower and that you are growing inside your heart.
Bloom! Bloom! Bloom!
And in her book, "The Liturgy of Flowers In A Mary Garden", she has
written:
"Each of us is like a flower in a garden. We participate
in some way in the spirit of the Creator. Like the plant
of self in a bud, there is an identity in us that is
continually unfolding. I found mine (in seeds) in the
garden of my soul. One day blossoming; the next leaving,
but always unfolding its tender secrets. . .
"Tender shoots and buds bear silent witnesses to my
restoration. I can remember when I was young and
nature like people was alive. Fragrant thoughts lifted
from the heart of wind; language found it speakers in
trees and flowers...Always there is a language which
will draw us to the sacred in ourselves. Once we
recognize the voice, we began to unfold like plants
moving toward the light. For now we are invited to
follow a ray of light and step into a paradise garden,
the Mary Garden, and linger there. . . .
"As we resurrect our ties with the natural world, we
become more open to receive the Divine which is
constantly at work in the rhythm of nature and in us.
We will know when the connection comes to fruition.
We find the little green shoot of our beginning, we
operate in joy and like a flower, we unfold beautifully."
With such blossoming in our spiritual heart, we then, by spiritual
examination and introspection discern each restraining soul
attachment to sense gratification, mind and will of our subtle vital
spiritual body; and, through the Sacrament of Confession, and its
penance and absolution, and the accompanying practice of the
"opposite virtue", we free our soul to be lifted up by the
accompanying burgeoning of our further spiritual leaves and flowers
for rising to our spiritual mind, where our soul is further to be
freed by spiritual wisdom and illumination for its transporting to
heaven.
As this takes place, as in praying the Rosary, we nurture the
blooming of our spiritual heart through meditation on the Joyful
Mysteries; the liberation of our soul from our vital body through
the graces and wisdom of the Sorrowful Mysteries; and the
purification of our soul itself through the illumination and
drawing of the Glorious Mysteries. which then raise it to heaven -
"and after this, our exile, show unto us the Blessed Fruit of Your
Womb, Jesus."
Thus, the same Flowers of Our Lady which symbolically quicken our
meditation on the Rosary Mysteries, and our penitential
self-examination for spiritual imperfections and attachments to be
eliminated ascetically for our soul rising to the next Mystery in
the Rosary path to Heaven and Kingdom, also serve to instill the
interior spiritual flowering which supports our soul on its journey
up that path.
Then, our soul, filled with the Holy Spirit, descends back to our
bodies, for our sacrificial dissolving reparation with Christ and
Our Lady - "in the world but not of it" - of the temporal effects of
sin; to make way for our guided and strengthened building of the
Peaceable Kingdom, with the heavenly grace, light, wisdom and power
of the Luminous Mysteries - especially, in conformity with the
Second Great Commandment of love of neighbor, of reaching out in
reconciliation, compromise and just cooperation across all barriers
of race, ethnicity, religion, nationality, class, gender, etc.
An important aspect after our entry into heavenly union with God is
our gained understanding that:
1) God created the universe not just to show forth the divine
goodness and action to us as dependents, but to share with us - and
for us, created in the divine image and likeness, to share with him
that goodness and action: each of us to our fullest potential, as
adopted children of the Father, members of Christ ("I am the vine
and you are the branches"), and temples of the Holy Spirit,
2) Through Mary's immaculate purity, utter humility and total assent
and fidelity to God's word, God was enabled to bring her, in her
created divine image and likeness, into the fullness of the divine
union and sharing desired for Creation ("the Lord is with you") - of
the Divine Maternity, and subsequently, of universal sharing with
her divine Son as Co-Redemptrix, Mediatrix and Advocate - which we
are all participatinly to emulate and make recourse to in prayer, to
the extent of our own purity, humility, and fidelity and assent to
God's word.
3) The building and coming, as culmination of the Divine/human
sharing, of God's Peaceable Kingdom - to be transfigured, at the End
of Time, with the General Resurrection, into the eternal New Heaven
and New Earth - is to be accomplished by us, with the sanctifying
grace of the Father: through the inspiration and guidance of our
actions by the actual graces of the Holy Spirit; but, equally,
through our penitential, sacrificial offering for and with Christ,
of all our adversities, sorrows and sufferings in dissolving
reparation the kingdom-blocking temporal effects of sin in the
fallen world.
The consequence of this is that as we look out on the world we see
much dependent petitioning of God's mercy, protection and assistance
through Mary; but at the same time a lack of turning to her advocacy
and mediation for access to and bestowal of the grace, light, wisdom
and power for guidance and strength for our shared building of the
earthly Peaceable Kingdom, and for our sharing in Christ's
reparation, through sacrificially taking up of all our adversities,
sorrows and sufferings, big and little, for and with him, in
emulation of her Co-Redemption - as beseeched by her and Fatima.
Pope John Paul's legacy to the world is his personal example of, and
call of all - with his addition of the luminous mysteries
to the Rosary - to mystical rising to the fullness of divine grace,
light, wisdom and strength for the building of God's Kingdom - of
which, through union with God, we attain the fourth luminous mystery
vision as transfigured
A potential primary motivation to this is to make known, from
experience, the potential, and therefore the call, of all to rising
to mystical union with God's heavenly grace, light, wisdom and power
through the nurturing of their potential soul freeing and upwards
lifting interior spiritual flowering.
We are inclined in our era of literacy to think we have to receive
mystical experiences and insights through meditation and
contemplation based imaginatively on the writings of the saints; but
we are to remember that for the first fifteen centuries of
Christianity most of the faithful were illiterate, and ascended
spiritually simply and directly through imagery, such as that of
flowers: seen symbolically in nature, and then in cathedral
ornamental articulation, and in religious art.
The simple, direct, clear symbols of the same flowers that were
seen symbolically in the medieval period are still at hand today,
and even more so through their mass growing and commercial
distribution; but the broad cultural teaching and sustenance of
their symbolism which was formerly provided by poets, players,
minstrels, craftsmen, etc., is to be replaced and sustained today
through:
(1) repeated public media presentations of flower symbolism and its
researched place in history and religion - through articles, books,
lectures, courses, displays, TV. websites, e-mail, etc.;
(2) home, church, school and college religious teaching of the
simple efficacy of flower symbol meditation for illuminative
enhancement of the catechism, sacraments and Rosary in personal
religious formation and mystical fulfillment - free of the general
secular deluge of present day printed and visual media;
(3) provision of simple, everyday, first-hand familiarity with and
recourse to symbolical flowers through their cultivation in home
parish and shrine Mary Gardens - with permanent (stone) markers
supporting quickened perception of their symbolism;
(4) use of indoor flower bouquets and dish gardens, and of flower
ornamented personal, home and public artifacts - such as holy cards,
housewares, needlework, paintings, and commercial decorations -
quickening flower reflection and meditation through the day, away
from the garden.
(5) motivational demonstration to all the faithful, and especially
to youth, of the indispensable need for personal meditative mystical
access to the grace, light, wisdom and power supportive of the
virtues, morality, ethics and sacrificial reparation required for
the culminating building and coming of God's earthly Peaceable
Kingdom, for which the world was created; and a pointing out of the
supports for this provided by flowers so widely at hand.
For all thus attuned to flower symbolism, the floral bouquets all
around us quicken frequent reflection through the day on our
universal human interior spiritual burgeoning - both of the infused
rooting of the virtues and fruits; and of the interior flowers
sustaining our penitentially loosened souls as they rise within us
in preparation for the heavenly ascent potentially available for
all.