Category: Bossuet Project

Wrapping it up for this elevation in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,9: When God made me in his image and likeness, he made me to be happy like him, as much as a creature can be; and, this is why he placed in me these three things, in me who was made to be …

Continue reading "To The Holy Trinity: The Blessedness of the Soul, Image of the Holy Trinity, in the Trinity of His Persons"

Again with Bossuet in Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,8: God has possessed me, said Wisdom (Proverbs 8): that is to say, God has generated me in conformance to that word of Eve, when she gave birth to Cain and  said: I have possessed a man by the grace of God.  He has generated me, before …

Continue reading "To The Holy Trinity: Essential, Personal, Generating and Generated Wisdom"

Once more with Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,7: I am a painter, a sculptor, an architect: I have my art, I have my design or my idea, I have the choice and the preference which I give to this idea by a particular love.  I have my art, I have my rules, my principles, …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: Fruitfulness of the Arts"

Once again in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,6: Let us now return to ourselves.  We are, we understand, we want.  At first, to understand and to want, if it is something, it is not absolutely the same thing: if it is not something, it would not be anything, and there will be neither understanding …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: Trinity Created Image of the Uncreated and How It is Incomprehensible"

Coming to the third person of the Trinity in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,5: God is thus fertile, God has a Son: but where is the Holy Spirit here, and where is the holy and perfect Trinity which we serve from our baptism onwards? Does not God love this Son and is he not …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: The Holy Spirit: The Entire Trinity"

Reasoning on in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2, 4: All of this is dead: the sun, its rays, its heat: a seal, its expression, an image either sculpted or painted. A mirror and the resemblances which object produce are dead things: God made an image most alive from his eternal and pure generation; and, …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: The Purest Image in the Rational Creature"

Moving along in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 1,3: See this delicate vapour which the sea, sweetly touched by the sun, and as impregnated with its heat, sent day and night as of its own power to the heavens, without lessening of its vast womb. It is however the purest of its substance and something …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: Images in Nature of the Birth of the Son of God"

Continuing in Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 2,2: A God, can a God come from him? A God, can he bring into existence a being other than himself? Yes, if this God is son. It is repugnant to God to come from another creator who pulls him from nothing; but it is not repugnant to …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: God of God: The Son of God Does Not Decay"

Starting a new Elevations on the Mysteries by Bossuet, 2,1:  Why should God not have had a Son? Why should this happy nature lack this perfect fecundity that she gives to her creatures? The name of Father, is it so dishonouring and so unworthy of the first being, that he cannot arrange according to his …

Continue reading "To the Holy Trinity: God is Fertile: God Has a Son"

This is the last in this series from Bossuet's Elevations on the Mysteries, 1,10: 1. God is the Holy One of Israel God particularly delights in the name of holy.  Very often he calls himself the holy one of Israel: he wants that his holiness be his motif, and the principle of ours: be holy …

Continue reading "God, His Unity and Perfection: The Holiness of God"