Fr Ronald Rolheiser
Inside each of us, beyond what we can picture clearly, express in words, or even feel distinctly, we have a dark memory of having once been touched and caressed by hands far gentler than our own. That caress has left a permanent mark, an imprint of a love so tender and deep that its memory becomes a prism through which we see everything else. This imprint lies beyond conscious memory but forms the centre of our soul.
This is not an easy concept to explain. Bernard Lonergan, one of the great intellectuals of the past century, tried to explain it philosophically by saying we bear inside us “the brand of the first principles”, namely, the oneness, truth, goodness, and beauty which are the attributes of God. That’s accurate, but abstract. Maybe the old myths and legends capture it better when they say that, before birth, each soul is kissed by God and it then goes through life always in some dark way remembering that kiss and measuring everything it experiences in relation to that original sweetness. To be in touch with your heart is to be in touch with this primordial kiss, with both its preciousness and its meaning.
What exactly is being said here?
Precious
Within each of us, at that place where all that is most precious within us lives, there is an inchoate sense of having once been touched, caressed, loved, and valued in a way that is beyond anything we have ever consciously experienced. In fact, all the goodness, love, value, and tenderness we experience in life fall short precisely because we are already in touch with something deeper. When we feel frustrated, angry, betrayed, violated, or enraged, it is because our outside experience is antithetical to what we already hold dear inside.
There we are temples of God, sacred churches of truth and love. There we bear God’s image”
We all have this place, a place in the heart, where we hold all that is most precious and sacred to us. From that place our own kisses issue forth, as do our tears. It is the place that we most guard from others, but the place where we would most want others to come into; the place where we are the most deeply alone and the place of intimacy; the place of innocence and the place where we are violated; the place of our compassion and the place of our rage. In that place we are holy. There we are temples of God, sacred churches of truth and love. There we bear God’s image.
Understanding
But this needs understanding: the image of God inside of us is not a beautiful icon stamped inside of our soul. No. The image and likeness of God inside us is energy, fire, and memory; especially the memory of a touch so tender and loving that its goodness and truth become the prism through which we ultimately see everything. Thus, we recognise goodness and truth outside of us precisely because they resonate with something that is already inside us. Things touch our hearts when they touch us here. Isn’t it because we have already been deeply touched and caressed that we passionately seek a soulmate, that we seek someone to join us in this intimate place?
Are not the touch and tenderness that bring ecstasy nothing other than the stirring of deep memory? Are not the ideals that inspire hope only the reminder of words somebody has already spoken to us?”
And, consciously and unconsciously, we measure everything in life by how it touches this place: why do certain experiences touch us so deeply? Why do our hearts burn within us in the presence of any truth, love, goodness, or tenderness that is genuine and deep? Is not all deep knowledge simply a waking up to something we already know? Is not all love simply a question of being respected for something we already are? Are not the touch and tenderness that bring ecstasy nothing other than the stirring of deep memory? Are not the ideals that inspire hope only the reminder of words somebody has already spoken to us? Does not our desire for innocence (and innocent means “not wounded”) mirror some primal unwounded place deep within us? And when we feel violated, is it not because someone has irreverently entered the sacred inside us?
Sensitivities
When we are in touch with this memory and respect its sensitivities, we are in touch with our souls. At those times, faith, hope, and love will spring up in us, joy and tears will both flow through us freely, and we will be deeply affected by the innocence and beauty of children, as pain and gratitude alternately bring us to our knees.
That is what it means to be recollected, centred. To be truly ourselves is to remember, to touch and to feel the memory of God’s original touch in us. That memory fires our energy and provides us with a prism through which to see and understand.
Sadly, today, too often a wounded, calloused, cynical, over sophisticated, and overly adult world invite us to forget God’s kiss in the soul, to view this as childish. But, unless we lie to ourselves and harden ourselves against our own ourselves (the most dangerous of all activities), we will always remember, dimly, darkly, unrelentingly, the caress of God.