Blessed Angela Truszkowska is among the important figures in nineteenth-century Poland. She was a co-founder of the Congregation of Felician Sisters. Her writings testify to her love of Jesus Christ, the Divine Bridegroom and His Church. It is in the Divine Master that Truszkowska had found a sense of religious life, therefore she showed Him as a model of love that did not hesitate to lay down His life and remain under the Eucharistic forms. She encouraged her fellow sisters to fulfil God's will modelled on Christ, and to imitate Him in their whole life. She thought that the consecrated person was called to sanctity and should make every effort to follow Jesus Christ; His words should be radically put into practice in this person's life.
Birkowski’s sermons show a deep vision of obedience which constitutes a program of spiritual life with its particular dimensions. Obedience as a man’s response to God’s plan is a way of getting all goods prepared by God and God alone, i.e. an ultimate accomplishment of a human heart. This posture means a crucial point of restoration of harmony of creatures made in relation to Jesus through Him the universe is subordinated to the Father. Christ’s submission embraces fulfilment of the Father’s will which expresses itself in service to people and in undergoing an evil in order to redeem the world. Inside this perspective every follower of Christ has to involve his whole spiritual life in obedience so that the corporal offering is supplemented by an act of free will and reason to turn from subjectivism towards real happiness. A very specific dimension of obedience concerns mystical life in which human ordinary way of cooperation with grace is to be replaced by mystical passivity. Thanks to it man is being nourished with new food of contemplation in a rhythm of progressive gratification.The Birkowski’s apprehension reflects good points of early modern Catholic theology that is an optimistic vision of man and his liaison with grace. This program enables him to shape his spiritual experience in every respect by supplying rules of life and divine power. The complete system formulated by Birkowski can be regarded as an outstanding achievement against the background of Polish early modern spirituality along with Akademia pobożności (Krakow 1628) by the other Dominican Mikołaj Mościcki. Their mystical threads are also an interesting issue at the beginning of the XVII c., which turned out a flourishing period called later A Golden Age of Polish Spirituality.
This article is an attempt to look at the faith of women from the theological perspective. It analyses the spiritual writings of the faithful women, mostly the founders of religious congregations in the Catholic Church, including unpublished and archival sources. It presents the female point of view on: the yearning to unite with the Bridegroom; following the steps of Mary in order to be closer to Jesus; the hope for the community of faith and spiritual formation and the motherly image of God. The text also discusses the developments in the conception of female Christian vocation, accompanied with the changed vision of the space where the female faith grows – from the nunnery to the consecrated life in the world.
The problem of reaching personal sanctity through Church, highlighted by the constitution Lumen Gentium issued by the Second Vatican Council, is one of key topics discussed in the theological works of the outstanding researcher Professor Father Wincenty Granat. He elaborated widely on the concept of Christian sanctity, which he identified with perfection. Drawing upon the texts of the Old and the New Testament, Father Granat emphasised that love is the foundation of sanctity. This is why, Father Granat taught about sanctity as friendship with Christ. Christ is an example of sanctity for all, this is why we all should follow Him. Servant of God Father Granat claimed strongly that the Church has its inner powers to transform sinners into saints, even though its full sanctity will come with eschatological times.
Following Jesus is understood as participation in the holiness of God. Man is bound with God through love, through life that is His life, suffering with Him and being a apostle. St. Urszula Ledóchowska realised all this in her life by imitating the earthly traits of God-Man. It is with profound commitment that she sought to worship God and before the tabernacle, where he asked God's permission to participate in the virtues of the Most Holy Heart, i.e. love, meekness, and humbleness. It is before the tabernacle that she verified her indignity in the face of the perfect God, and where she regained her strength while immersed in prayer. She worshipped God in all forms of her religious life, especially in obedience to God's will. She paid more attention to Christ's poverty and admired God who the Second Person of the Holy Trinity agreed to be poor, that is, to suffer hunger and homelessness. St. Urszula followed Christ in poverty; she formed her sisters to live in poverty and entreated them to keep poverty in the congregation. She worshipped and imitated the Most Holy Heart of Dying Jesus in His love, meekness, purity, and humbleness. In relationship with Him she gave love to God and people, claiming that each love bound with the Heart of Jesus was pure. The privileged motive in the Saint's imitation was the suffering of Christ's Heart at the moment when He offered Himself to God as an offering to the sins of people and the world. On the one hand Ledóchowska co-suffered with Jesus and wished to recompense His suffering, and on the other hand she joined them. In relation with the salvific suffering of Christ she treated each human suffering as His sacramental presence. The fact that she imitated Jesus Christ and modelled her life on Him transformed her and made her come closer to Him and identify herself with His life. She bore it always in her mind not to waste the grace of His presence and wished to imitate Him all the time. Thereby she was made able to contemplate His holiness and to live His life.
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