{"id":18571,"date":"2020-01-31T09:36:15","date_gmt":"2020-01-31T14:36:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=18571"},"modified":"2020-01-31T09:36:15","modified_gmt":"2020-01-31T14:36:15","slug":"love-the-highest-form-of-knowing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/?p=18571","title":{"rendered":"Love: The Highest Form of Knowing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Knowing and Not Knowing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/cac.org\/love-the-highest-form-of-knowing-2020-01-31\/\"><strong>Love: The Highest Form of Knowing<\/strong><\/a><br>\n<strong>Friday, January 31, 2020<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/PWeb79W8EqQ\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"\" allow=\"accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n\n\n<p><em>My good friend, Franciscan sister and scientist Ilia&nbsp;<\/em><em>Delio<\/em><em>, has written a wonderful autobiography. In it she recounts how her parents&nbsp;<\/em><em>decided to&nbsp;<\/em><em>name her Denise<\/em><em>.<\/em><em>&nbsp;(<\/em><em>S<\/em><em>he would have been named Denis had she been a boy<\/em><em>.<\/em><em>)&nbsp;<\/em><em>Later in life, s<\/em><em>he was delighted to find a meaningful connection with the man who&nbsp;<\/em><em>fir<\/em><em>st approached&nbsp;<\/em><em>theology&nbsp;<\/em><em>in an explicitly&nbsp;<\/em><em>mystical<\/em><em>&nbsp;way<\/em><em>&nbsp;in<\/em><em>&nbsp;his text<\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em>Mystical Theology.<em>&nbsp;<\/em><em>Delio<\/em><em>&nbsp;writes:<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>When I was doing my doctoral work in theology at Fordham University, I was introduced to the master of mystical theology, Denis the Areopagite, or Pseudo-Dionysius&nbsp;[who wrote in the&nbsp;late fifth to early sixth century].&nbsp;I was immediately struck by the name \u201cDenis\u201d\u2014the mysterious person who wrote the most exquisite words stretching into the mystery of the incomprehensible God. . . .&nbsp;God is the name of absolute divine mystery beyond any speech or thought or movement. God\u2019s love is so tremendous, this mystical writer claimed, that God is like a sober drunk, falling over himself in the desire to share divine life.&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God, the&nbsp;<em>eros<\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em>of divine love<br>\nGod,&nbsp;<em>agape,&nbsp;<\/em>giving Godself away<br>\nGod,&nbsp;<em>ek<\/em><em>-static, standing outside Godself<\/em>, in the creation of the world<br>\nGod, the volcanic eruption of divine&nbsp;<em>life.&nbsp;<\/em>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Because God\u2019s&nbsp;<em>eros<\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em>is cosmic, Dionysius claimed, the whole universe is drawn to God, who is always utterly transcendent. God is both hidden and revealed, and there is no access to the hidden God except by way of God manifested in creation. We long for God because God longs for us; God eternally desires to give Godself away in love so we can give ourselves in love; love always stands outside itself in the other.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>To be united to God we must \u201cbreak through\u201d the sensible world and pass beyond the human condition to move beyond knowing to unknowing, from knowledge to love. In his&nbsp;<em>De&nbsp;<\/em><em>mystica<\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em><em>theologia<\/em><em>&nbsp;<\/em>Denis wrote: \u201cAs we plunge into that darkness which is beyond intellect, we shall find ourselves not simply running short of words but actually speechless and unknowing.\u201d [1]&nbsp;. . .&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Christian mystics understood love as the core of reality and spoke of a deep relationship between love and knowledge. \u201cLove is the highest form of knowing,\u201d Saint Augustine wrote. [2] Gregory the Great said, \u201cLove itself is a form of knowing\u201d (<em>amor<\/em><em>&nbsp;ipse notitia&nbsp;<\/em><em>est<\/em>), meaning that the love by which we reach God implies a form of knowing above ordinary reason. [3] William of St. Thierry put it beautifully in this way: \u201cIn the contemplation of God where love is chiefly operative, reason passes into love and is transformed into a certain spiritual and divine understanding which transcends and absorbs all reason.\u201d [4]&nbsp;&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Wisdom is knowledge deepened by love. The wise person knows more deeply by way of love than by way of argument because the eye of the heart can see the truth of reality. Hence the wise person is one who knows and sees God shining through everything, even what seems ugly or despised.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Knowing and Not Knowing Love: The Highest Form of Knowing Friday, January 31, 2020 My good friend, Franciscan sister and scientist Ilia&nbsp;Delio, has written a wonderful autobiography. In it she recounts how her parents&nbsp;decided to&nbsp;name her Denise.&nbsp;(She would have been named Denis had she been a boy.)&nbsp;Later in life, she was delighted to find a [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18571"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=18571"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18571\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18572,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18571\/revisions\/18572"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=18571"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=18571"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/co2mannatoday.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=18571"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}