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“Draw me: we will run after thee to the odour of thy ointments. The king hath brought me into his storerooms: we will be glad and rejoice in thee, remembering thy breasts more than wine: the righteous love thee.”
Canticle of Canticles 1:3, Douay-Rheims
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St. Joan of Arc
The greatest gift we can receive from God is a moment of unreflective certainty in the world, the silent Being of which we must spend the rest of our lives interpreting.1 This encounter with Being is the pearl of great price for which one sells all one owns to acquire.
"Again the kingdom of heaven is like to a merchant seeking good pearls. Who when he had found one pearl of great price, went his way, and sold all that he had, and bought it.”
Matthew 13: 45-46 Douay-Rheims
St. Joan of Arc appeared as a single encounter. It is as if the trajectory of my entire life beforehand prepared me to receive it, and the purpose every day after was to open its Being in my world through interpretation and discovery. It is my “pearl of great price.” Her appearance was a confrontation in the world, a resplendent moment of intuitive comprehension, whereby she permanently entered my life story through the Jehannian hermeneutics of St. Thérèse’s plays and poetry. I refer to it, using Thérèsian terminology, as a “divine glance”2 and the silent Being of the combined hearts of St. Joan (The Dove) and St. Thérèse (The Rose). This sudden interruption in my world led to a tireless journey to obtain what it was that so magnificently interrupted me. I could sense the silent Being of the combined hearts as it simultaneously hid itself from me. It demanded my pursuit. Abandonment to pursuit was its price.
“My beloved is like a roe, or a young hart. Behold he standeth behind our wall, looking through the windows, looking through the lattices. Behold my beloved speaketh to me: Arise, make haste, my love, my dove, my beautiful one, and come.”
Canticle of Canticles 2: 9-10 Douay-Rheims
The journey transformed my life as I sold everything I had to obtain the pearl, the Kingdom of the Combined Hearts. I call their kingdom Mystical France.
Wherefore I wished, and understanding was given me: and I called upon God, and the spirit of wisdom came upon me: And I preferred her before kingdoms and thrones, and esteemed riches nothing in comparison of her. Neither did I compare unto her any precious stone: for all gold in comparison of her, is as a little sand, and silver in respect to her shall be counted as clay. I loved her above health and beauty, and chose to have her instead of light: for her light cannot be put out.
Now all good things came to me together with her, and innumerable riches through her hands, And I rejoiced in all these: for this wisdom went before me, and I knew not that she was the mother of them all.
Wisdom 7: 7-12 Douay-Rheims
Mystical France
Stepping into the Being of Mystical France is a journey to the silent primordial ground of the encounter with St. Joan which is her sanctity. Opening our Being to receive God’s grace through St. Joan’s sanctity becomes a relationship with the eternal Kingdom of God through temporal Being. The Holy Spirit guides us on our journey as we interpret what is silent, receive it, and allow it to bear fruit in our Being as the word of God.
For the word of God is living and effectual, and more piercing than any two edged sword; and reaching unto the division of the soul and the spirit, of the joints also and the marrow, and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the heart. Neither is there any creature invisible in his sight: but all things are naked and open to his eyes, to whom our speech is.
Hebrews 4: 12-13 Douay-Rheims
In its metaphysical Catholicity, it is a holy consecration to St. Joan of Arc through whom, by God’s overflowing grace, the Holy Spirit forms France in our hearts out of the silence. Mystical France is an expression of True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin Mary who holds the Fleur de Lys close to her heart. In its happening, it is Being in the world on the pathway to the Kingdom of Jesus Christ with St. Joan and St. Thérèse.
The alethic structure of the encounter is Being in holy friendship3 with St. Joan of Arc. The plays and poetry of St. Thérèse unconceal this friendship as Being in the world. The effect of this union is a sharing in St. Thérèse’s mode of Being with Joan,4 which I call their refulgent “combined hearts.” The purpose of interpreting the Being of their combined hearts is our sanctification, conditioned on fidelity to grace. They lead the heirs to the Kingdom through a line of insight, and we will not arrive without them.
Mystical France is not a history of the lives St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux nor a reflection on their spirituality. The reader can find more on each saint at Heroic-Hearts.com, a podcast I co-host with Amy Chase. Mystical France is a pathway to the Immaculate Heart of Mary and the Kingdom of God through a relationship with St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse.
Despite the frequent philosophical language, the work remains primarily devotional. I make no attempt to interpret this “divine glance” as a purely philosophical affair. The astonishing5 moment imbuing my soul in a lifelong relationship with St. Joan of Arc was a supernatural grace from Our Lord Jesus Christ through the Immaculate Heart of Mary. I have done my best to share this silent encounter through my life story and reflections, which I hope will open a similarly powerful silence before St. Joan and St. Thérèse’s Being in others.
The journey with St. Joan and St. Thérèse to Magdalene’s Mystical France.
The opening of Mystical France in our hearts is an immersion in the refulgence of the combined hearts of St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux. The radiance of their Being is a royal French Catholic spirituality unconcealed in the world as an alethic appearance of St. Mary Magdalene on the shores of Provence, following the Western tradition of Mary Magdalene in France.6 Magdalene’s contemplative mode of Being in Provence is itself a refulgence of the light of the Holy Spirit emanating from the center of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. Mystical France is the Being of Mary Magdalene imbued in the light of the Holy Spirit and beloved by Our Lady. Devotion to Mystical France as Magdalene’s refulgence is devotion to the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary, through the combined hearts of St. Joan and St. Thérèse.
The contemplative endeavor to uncover Magdalene's holy refulgence, bringing the Father’s Kingdom on earth as it is in Heaven, is a lifetime of interpreting the silence of Joan’s French Royal Being before us. It is an expression of True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin. Opening the manifested "gestalt” of Magdalene's refulgence through Joan’s silence is a French devotional lifepower,7 when obedient to the dogmas, doctrines, magisterial teachings, and metaphysics of the Church. This constitutes the purpose of the encounter with St. Joan who, with St. Thérèse, guides us to this Kingdom. Magdalene’s presence in the grotto on the shores of Provence is the Being of this devotional lifepower of the Holy Spirit.
The silent encounter with St. Joan as Being in holy friendship appears like a lightning bolt revealing a mystical landscape hidden in the stillness of her heart. Joan is the “point of inquiry” on a journey through her glorified heart to Mystical France in the center of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. The “Jehannian hermeneutic” - our primary method of interpreting Joan’s Being - is the heart of St. Thérèse as revealed through her poetry and plays. It is through St. Thérèse that we perceive Joan within proper values, judge the experience of our encounter, and, at our deepest level of our Being, yield to St. Joan’s friendship convinced that we must follow her to the Kingdom at all costs.
A Catholic contemplative reflection centered on the life of St. Joan of Arc as Being in the world brought Mystical France to the open in the world. It interpreted her mystical heart as an overflowing of God’s grace. A story emerged in this contemplation whereby Joan guided me to mystical, and literal, Provence by the radiance of the light of Magdalene's glorified Being. St. Thérèse, through her plays and poetry, authentically interpreted St. Joan’s heart for me and is the one through whom I learned the values I prioritized to judge my encounter with Joan. The project is both a personal testimony and an invitation to walk in alethic wonder with St. Joan and St. Thérèse into the mystical Kingdom of Catholic and Royal France. St. Mary Magdalene, in the glory of her repentance on the shores of Provence, embodies this kingdom. This spiritual pilgrimage with St. Joan and St. Thérèse is a surrender to Christ’s redemption and a pledge of obedience to the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church and total consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary.
Experientially, the reader will find an anthological collection of reflections revealing the “appearance of the Kingdom appearing” as related through an eclectic array of devotional expressions. The expressions that emerge in the heart and mind of the reader remain to be written.
The project’s mission and vision are posited below based on the conclusion that Being in holy friendship with St. Joan of Arc, through the values learned from St. Thérèse, reflects a royal French Magdalenian spirituality. It must be constituted in the intellectual and devotional life of the soul, faithfully within the framework of the Church's teachings and the spirit of True Devotion to the Blessed Virgin.
The Vision and Mission of Mystical France
Blessed by the grace of slavery to the Blessed Virgin Mary, the heir to Mystical France receives the Being of the combined hearts of St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux through the Holy Spirit. We unite in Being with our saintly sisters in alethic wonder to participate in their mission.
Our relationship to the Kingdom of God is as royal heirs to Magdalene’s mystical kingdom, the radiance of which shimmers throughout the French royal hearts of St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux. The unconcealment of the gift happens through the influence of the life of St. Joan of Arc, Thérèsian Carmelite spirituality, the holy tradition of Mary Magdalene in France, and the philosophical lens of St. Edith Stein. The horizon of efficacious grace is the Kingdom of God "on earth as it is in Heaven" through the majesty of Joan and Thérèse’s French Catholic spirituality and holy devotion to St. Mary Magdalene on the shores of Provence.
Vision
The Vision of Mystical France is the Being of the combined hearts of St. Joan of Arc and St. Thérèse of Lisieux, refulgent as an alethic prism through which the Holy Spirit unconceals the glorified Being of Magdalene's repentant, contrite heart in Provence, the gestalt of Our Lady’s Catholic and Royal France, throughout the world.
Mission
The Mission of Mystical France is to project the heavenly refulgence of Christ in St. Joan and St. Thérèse’s glimmering combined hearts into all hearts worldwide by giving testimony to that light as Being in the world.
Alethic Transformation
The resulting alethic transformation in our hearts in the world becomes a transcending stairway to Magdalene's mystical mode of repentant Being, the gestalt of France in Heaven. The result is the fulfillment of our consecration to the Blessed Virgin Mary, in whose Immaculate Heart this kingdom resides. It is the abandonment of our lives to the prayer Our Lord taught us, “Thy Kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matthew 6: 9-13). It is to “seek first the kingdom” (Matthew 6:33).
Method
The method of Mystical France is alethic discovery framed by metaphysical Catholicity. It is to “contemplate how we think” about our faith to better “see what we have already seen”8 through a single-minded surrender to the opening of the combined hearts in our Being within the context of the magisterial teachings of the Catholic Church. Opening in this sense means to receive, record, interpret, assert, and articulate what these saints give us faithfully and prayerfully. This method of contemplative discourse is our "journey" with the saints.
Goal
Our goal is “descriptive fidelity” to what St. Joan and St. Thérèse give us "precisely as it is given, and within the limits of how it is given.”9
Outcome
The outcome we seek through the refulgent combined hearts is a mystical Being in holy friendship with St. Joan, St. Thérèse, St. Mary Magdalene, and a sharing in their abiding union with Jesus Christ and the Blessed Virgin Mary.
“The certainty of being is an unreflective certainty, and it precedes all our rational knowledge.” ~ Edith Stein. Potency and Act (The Collected Works of Edith Stein). An encounter with Being is an unreflective certainty of that which is outside us but remains silent in the entities constituting our world. Being with a capital B in this manuscript refers to the silence out of which entities announce themselves, not the entities themselves. It is the hidden structure of entities. We do not imagine silent Being in our own heads as a creation of our imagination; the Being of entities confronts us as silence to be interpreted by consciousness. Bringing Mystical France on earth as it is in heaven is a matter of interpreting the unreflective certainty of its Being before us. Mystical France announces itself as a confrontation from outside ourselves. It is not a subjective creation of the mind.
Also note Edith Stein’s term, “unreflective certainty” which I often use for a more philosophical presentation in place of the “divine glance.” “The certainty of being is an unreflective certainty, and it precedes all our rational knowledge.” ~ Edith Stein. Potency and Act (The Collected Works of Edith Stein) Kindle Location 484.
“Friendship is born from one soul into another soul; and the soul has value only in itself. Once we meet there, everything else disappears. And yet, by an admiral privilege, time confirms friendship… like two rocks overhanging similar waves and showing them unwavering resistance, so do they notice the flow of years vainly attacking the unchanging harmony of their hearts.” Lacordaire, OP, Henri-Dominique. The Life of St. Mary Magdalene. Dominican Friars, Province of St. Joseph, 2015. pp. 11-12.
“In either case, one spirit, by joining with another, comes to share in the other’s mode of being.” Stein, Edith. Potency and Act - Studies Toward a Philosophy of Being. Washington DC: ICS Publications, Institute of Carmelite Studies, 2009. loc. 2064.
“Phenomenological Reduction - A Peer Reviewed Academic Source.” Accessed December 3, 2022. https://iep.utm.edu/phen-red/#H1. “There is an experience in which it is possible for us to come to the world with no knowledge or preconceptions in hand; it is the experience of astonishment. The ‘knowing’ we have in this experience stands in stark contrast to the ‘knowing’ we have in our everyday lives, where we come to the world with theory and ‘knowledge’ in hand, our minds already made up before we ever engage the world. However, in the experience of astonishment, our everyday ‘knowing,’ when compared to the ‘knowing’ that we experience in astonishment, is shown up as a pale epistemological imposter and is reduced to mere opinion by comparison.”
“Jesus Christ had left his mother to Jerusalem, St. Peter to Rome, St. John to Asia; to whom would he bequeath Mary Magdalene? We already know; it was France that received from the hand of God that part of the testament of His Son.” Lacordaire, OP, Henri-Dominique. The Life of St. Mary Magdalene. Dominican Friars, Province of St. Joseph, 2015.
“Lifepower” in this model is intended to be in the framework of Edith Stein’s development of the term in Stein, Philosophy of Psychology and the Humanities. It is a life source within the psyche that can be influenced by outside forces.
Detmer, Phenomenology Explained - From Experience to Insight. p. 18. “Its (phenomenology) aim is to help us to see more clearly what we have already seen…”
Ibid. p. 18. “One of the principal goals of phenomenology, then, is simply descriptive fidelity. The aim is to describe accurately what is given in experience precisely as it is given, and within the limits of how it is given.”