AUGUSTINIAN RECOLLECT SPIRITUAL

EXERCISES

A Holy Retreat on the

“I AM” of Jesus in the Gospel of John
 INTRODUCTION
• In his Gospel, St. John, puts in the lips of Jesus the expression “I
AM”, with the purpose of describing who Jesus is; and what are
His attributes as God and Man, and as Redeemer of the world.
• St. John proposes a wide and rich mosaic so that the believer
may approach the mystery of Christ in a gradual, progressive
and ascending manner, may gradually discover not only who
Jesus is, but at the same time, how is it that his very own life is
miraculously and at the same time mysteriously inserted in
Christ’s mystery itself.
 7 “I AM” SAYINGS OF JESUS
I. I am the Bread of Life (Jn. 6:35)
II. I am the Light of the World (Jn. 8:12)
III. I am the Good Shepherd (Jn. 10:11)
IV. I am the Gate for the Sheep (Jn. 10:7)
V. I am the Resurrection (Jn. 11:25)
VI. I am the Way, the Truth, and the Life (Jn. 14:6)
VII. I am the True Vine (Jn. 15:1)
 I AM: CHRIST AS GOD
• The words that St. John the Evangelist uses echo the words
of the Old Testament in which God presents Himself as: “I
am who am” (Ex. 3:14).
• St. Augustine reflects on the fact that Christ being God, and
becomes aware of the immense distance between God and
men and women, and of infinite love and kindness that Christ
has had in order to come near to men and women. His
mystery and His own reality as God, totally surpasses man
and woman.
• God has always been and will always be, and we started to
exist when God willed it. Our earthly life someday will come
to an end. Nevertheless, the goodness and mercy of God will
not allow us to die totally, that our soul may continue living,
and that we may live forever in God:
“And I entered, and with the eye of my soul—such as it was—
saw above the same eye of my soul and above my mind the
Immutable Light. It was not simply a greater one of the same
sort, as if the light of day were to grow brighter and brighter,
and flood all space. It was not like that light, but different from
all earthly light whatever—and I trembled with love and fear. I
realized that I was far away from You in the land of unlikeness. ”
• What called the attention of St. Augustine most was the fact that
this God loved men and women so much, that He had given up
His own Son to save them.
How you loved us, 0 good Father, who spared not even your only
Son, but gave him up for us evildoers! How you loved us, for whose
sake he who deemed it no robbery to be your equal was made
subservient, even to the point of dying on the cross! Alone of all he
was free among the dead, for he had power to lay down his life and
power to retrieve it. For our sake he stood to you as both vic­tor and
victim, and victor because victim; for us he stood to you as priest
and sacrifice, and priest because sacrifice, making us sons and
daughters to you instead of servants by being born of you to serve
us.
 THE “I AM” MADE FLESH
• St. Augustine is amazed at the mystery of the Incarnation of Christ,
because this event destroys the logic of thinking of the ancient
philosophy.
• The Story of St. Simplicianus and the Neo-Platonist.
• For St. Augustine, the Incarnation of Christ has become the greatest
sign of the love and mercy of God for all men and women.
• It is a ‘philanthropic’ mercy that should lead all men and women to
imitate this same act of love and mercy, and learn to embody it in
different realities that surround them. It is the coming down of Christ
that must lead us to come down to meet our brothers and sisters.
• St. Augustine knew how to bring down his knowledge and
wisdom to the level of the simple people of his diocese and
town . If Christ had gone down to the people, as Good
Samaritan par excellence (Lk. 10:25-37), he must also go
down.
• We should also come down, leave behind our judgments
and criticism that we make to the people who surround us
to accept the weakness, limitations, and the reality of
others.
• The text that moves St. Augustine to embody the reality
that surrounds him is that of 2 Cor. 5:15. St. Augustine
shows it in a kind of ‘inconfessable confession’ within the
Confessions:
• Filled with terror by my sins and my load of misery
I had been turning over in my mind a plan to flee
into solitude, but you forbade me, and
strengthened me by your words. To this end Christ
died for all, you reminded me, that they who are
alive may live not for themselves, but for him who
died for them. See, then, Lord: I cast my care upon
you that I may live, and I will contemplate the
wonders you have revealed. You know how stupid
and weak I am: teach me and heal me.
 CHRIST, THE HUMBLE GOD
• By His Incarnation, Christ becomes a humble God, a
Teacher of humility who invites us to imitate Him, to be
humble , by forgetting our self-sufficiencies and the pride
that separate us from Christ.
• Christ has built for Himself a humble house in our own
neighborhood. Jn. 1:14, the Word of God became flesh
and ‘put up His tent” among us. He is Emmanuel, Christ
who, out of humility has put Himself at our feet , so that
we may learn to be humble.
• Not yet was I humble enough to grasp the humble Jesus as my
God, nor did I know what his weakness had to teach. Your
Word, the eternal Truth who towers above the higher spheres of
your creation, raises up to himself those creatures who bow
before him; but in these lower regions he has built himself a
humble dwelling from our clay, and used it to cast down from
their pretentious selves those who do not bow before him, and
make a bridge to bring them to himself. He heals their swollen
pride and nourishes their love, that they may not wander even
farther away through self-confidence, but rather weaken as they
see before their feet the Godhead grown weak by sharing our
garments of skin, and wearily fling themselves down upon him,
so that he may arise and lift them up.
• Our life must be an imitatio Christi, an imitation of Christ (Gal
2:20), striving to think, love and pray like Christ Himself.
• The initials WWJD (What Would Jesus Do?), a phrase which is
a constant invitation to have the mind of Christ , as St. Paul says
(1 Cor 2:16), to allow ourselves to be guided by Him.
• For St. Augustine the humanity of Christ is the way through
which we must walk: and His divinity, the goal toward which we
go. Through Him we walk and toward him we go: “Christ-God is
the County whither we go; Christ-Man is the Way whereby we
go. To Him we go.” (Ad illum imus, per illum imus)
• Rise up and walk: Christ, as Man, is your Way; as God,
your Fatherland. Our Fatherland: the Truth and the Life;
our Way: The Word became Man and dwelt among us.
We become tired of walking, and the Way came to us;
because the Way came to us , let us walk. Christ, as
Man, is our Way, let us not abandon the Way, in order
to reach the only Son of God, equal to the Father, and
transcends every creature.
• The Incarnation of Christ is useful for healing the eye of the heart
which was blinded by carnal affections. Christ, as Physician, had
made a remedy for healing the eyes of the hearts of human
beings, and had made it of clay, to save particularly men and
women who are made of dust:
You were blinded by earth and by earth you are healed; the flesh had
blinded you, the flesh heals you. Indeed, the soul had become flesh
by giving in to the carnal desires; that is why the eye of the heart had
become blind. The Word became flesh; this Physician made
eyedrops for you. And, because He came in a way that with the flesh
He would extinguish the vices of the flesh and with His death would
put an end to death, that is why it happened in you, because the
Word became flesh.
 THE GOD CRUCIFIED
• Christ takes on a body in order to be able to offer it to the
Father in the sacrifice of the cross. Hence, when He came
into this world, He says: Sacrifice and holocaust You did not
desire, but You have formed Me a body.
• The Incarnation of Christ leads us to the mystery of the
cross. The Cross is the exaltation of Christ, the glorification
—according to the Gospel of John—the moment to know
what He really “Is”: “When you lift up the Son of Man, then
you will realize that I am” (Jn 8:28).
• Christ shows His infinite love for all men and women on
the Cross. The Cross must be present in the life of every
believer. St. Augustine literally says that the way by which
Christ is followed is by His passion and death.
• The way of Christ leads us to Golgotha, and, in a
mysterious manner, makes us discover that we have
received life in order to devote it to love. He/she who lives
only for himself/herself, is ignorant of the love of God. St.
Augustine demonstrates that the way to reach the eternal
Fatherland is the passion and death of Christ:
“Indeed, glorious is the Fatherland, but the
way is humble. The Fatherland is the life of
Christ: the way, the death of Christ; the
Fatherland is the Mansion of Christ; the way
is the Passion of Christ. Why does the one
who rejects the way seek the Fatherland?”
-Io. Ev. Tr. 28, 5
• “Don’t stay away from the wood of the Christ” (A ligno Christi noli
resilire). The Cross of Christ is the wood, the lumber and the boat that
has to lead the human being through the sea of this world, in order to
reach the eternal Kingdom:
Do you wish to cross this depth (of this world)? Remove not from the
wood of Christ's Cross: you shall not sink: hold yourself fast to Christ.
What do I mean by this, hold fast to Christ? It was for this reason that He
chose to suffer on earth Himself... wherefore chose He to suffer all these
things, but that He might console the suffering?… He deferred not His
resurrection, that you might not still be in doubt. Suffer then tribulation in
the world with the same end as that which you have observed in Christ:
and let not those who do evil, and flourish in this life, move you. "Your
thoughts are very deep." Where is the thought of God?
-En. in Ps. 92, 8
• St. Augustine invites us to contemplate Christ raised on the Cross.
That Christ be engraved in our heart, as it happened to St. Claire of
Montefalco:
…With inward eyes gaze on the wounds of Him hanging, the scars of
Him rising again, the blood of Him dying, the price of him that believes,
the gain of Him that redeems. Consider of how great value these are,
weigh them in the scales of Charity; and whatever of love ye had to
expend upon your marriages, pay back to Him…Let Him be fixed in
your whole heart, Who for you was fixed on the Cross: let Him possess
in your soul all that, whatever it be, that you would not have occupied
by marriage. It is not lawful for you to love little Him, for Whose sake
you have not loved even what were lawful. So loving Him Who is meek
and lowly of heart, I have no fear for you of pride.
-De Virg. 55 & 56
• The God made flesh is therefore God crucified, Who is glorified at the moment
of His passion and death, and invites us to take up our cross to follow Him. The
Cross is the synthesis of our life: the good works, the perseverance until the
end, the highest goal towards which we journey and the importance of the
grace of God:
For its breadth lies in the transverse beam, on which the hands of the Crucified are
extended; and signifies good works in all the breadth of love: its length extends
from the transverse beam to the ground, and is that whereto the back and feet are
affixed; and signifies perseverance through the whole length of time to the end: its
height is in the summit, which rises upwards above the transverse beam; and
signifies the supernal goal, to which all works have reference, since all things that
are done well and perseveringly, in respect of their breadth and length, are to be
done also with due regard to the exalted character of the divine rewards: its depth
is found in the part that is fixed into the ground; for there it is both concealed and
invisible, and yet from thence spring up all those parts that are outstanding and
evident to the senses; just as all that is good in us proceeds from the depths of the
grace of God, which is beyond the reach of human comprehension and judgment.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 118, 5
AD UNIUS DEI LAUDEM ATQUE
DILECTIONEM
IF YOU LOVE HIM, FOLLOW HIM!
• Christ is the also the Way, the Truth and the Life. He is the Way
that leads human beings to an encounter with the Father. St.
Augustine says that as human beings we search for Truth and
Life, and if Christ had not presented Himself as the Way, we
would not know where to go to find all these very desirable
elements:
If the Lord your God had said to you, “I am the truth and the life,” in
desiring truth and longing for life, you might truly ask the way by
which you might come to these, and might say to yourself: A great
thing is the truth, a great thing is the life, were there only the means
whereby my soul might come thereto!
-Io. Ev. Tr. 34, 9
• Christ has made Himself the Way by becoming flesh.
But human being finds itself asleep because of its sins.
For this reason it is necessary that the Way Itself
awake the human being, so that it may arise and walk
through Christ , so that it may follow His example, so
that it may reach the Truth and the Life:
Labor in finding a way to come to the truth and life; this is
not said to you. Sluggard, arise: the Way Itself has come
to you, and roused you from thy sleep; if, however, it has
roused you, up and walk.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 34, 9
• The obstacle in walking through Christ the Way, is
having gone through other ways of sin and of
separation from God. Even if the feet of the heart may
be wounded and deformed, by following the paths of
sin, Christ can heal us interiorly:
Perhaps you are trying to walk, and are not able, because
your feet ache. How come your feet to ache? Have they
been running over rough places at the bidding of avarice?
But the word of God has healed even the lame.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 34, 9
• If in reality we love Christ, we must follow Him, because
He is the Way. St. Augustine himself reminds us that to
follow Christ is to imitate Him (Quid est enim sequi nisi
imitari), to imitate is a manner of loving , of acting and
of thinking in relating oneself with others (De Virg. 27):
…if you love, follow. I do love, do you say, but by what
way am I to follow… I am the Way, He affirms. The Way to
where? And the Truth and the Life.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 34, 9
• For this reason St. Augustine would invite us to
consider if we really love Christ and if we are indeed
following His Way, or rather we pass through the
tortuous paths of our selfishness, of the search for
ourselves, that make us deaf to the voice of God,
forgetful of His will, trying to find life in elements that
cause death and sin.
IN SEARCH FOR LIFE
• Christ is the only Way that leads to the Father. St.
Augustine states that through Christ Himself, by
following His Way, His example, by receiving His grace,
we can go to the Father:
No one comes to the Father except through Me. And, for
this reason He by Himself, to Himself and to the Father ;
and we through Him, to Him and to the Father.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 70, 1
• St. Augustine insists that Christ is the eternal Life.
There is a need to walk through Christ the Way, in
order to arrive at Christ the Life, and in order to live
with Him forever:
… He in person is the eternal Life in which we will be
when He takes us to Himself, and this eternal Life, which
He is, is in Him in such a way that we also may be where
He is, that is, in Him.
-Io. Ev. Tr. 70, 1
THE TRUTH, BREAD OF THE BELIEVER
• Christ is the Truth that must be transformed into the Bread of
the believer, because ‘it refreshes the mind and does not fail.”
• “Only the truth can make us free”. There is a need to
acknowledge the different kinds of slavery that we can have,
and pray that Christ Himself , the Truth and Liberator of man
and woman, may be the one to break the chains that bind us
to sin, in order to be truly free in Christ.
• In order to see what are our chains, we must live in the truth,
that is, we must proclaim and to proclaim to ourselves the
Truth.
• St. Augustine realizes that for a long time he had not proclaimed
to himself the Truth, but had lived in self-deception and lie. And
for this reason he indicates in the Confessions that he wishes to
approach the Light in order to follow the Truth in his own life:
You love the truth because anyone who "does truth" comes to the
light. Truth it is that I want to do, in my heart by confession in your
presence, and with my pen before many witnesses.
-Confessions 10,1
• He/she who is able to live in the truth has encountered Christ
Who is the Truth, and in Him can attain happiness. Every human
being searches for truth and, even if there are many who love to
deceive and tell lies, nobody likes to be deceived , but we all like
to possess the light of the Truth:
• When I ask everybody which they prefer: joy over the
truth or joy over what is false, they are as unhesitating
in their reply that they prefer to rejoice over the truth as
in their declaration that they want to be happy. Now the
happy life is joy in the truth; and that means joy in you,
who are the Truth, 0 God who shed the light of
salvation on my face, my God.
-Confessions 10, 33
• We too, within these spiritual exercises, must follow the
Light of Christ, the Truth, to illumine us, and confront us
with our own lies, because only the Truth will make us free.
• St. Augustine is aware that in order to unmask our self-
deceptions we need the help of the Holy Spirit, because it
is the Spirit who will guide us to all truth. The door that
leads to the truth will always ne charity or love. The Holy
Spirit teaches us to tell the truth in our interpersonal
relationships and in our communities. He is the very Spirit
of love, who exhorts us to seek love in everything that we
do.
• Sometimes truth can become a dart for doing harm, and it is than that
this love no longer edifies charity, but rather, destroys. It is possible to
live in truth, only in love and in constant search for love. For this
reason St. Augustine points out concisely but profoundly:
The only way to truth is love
-Contra Faustus 32, 18
• If the Truth has made us free through Christ Himself, by the love for
God, the very love of God must lead us to discover that whoever is
truly free becomes a slave of God through love:
Let love make you slave, because truth has made you free
(Servum te caritas faciat quia liberum te veritas fecit).
-En in Ps 100, 7
AD UNIUS DEI LAUDEM ATQUE
DILECTIONEM