Visions of Sister Hadewijch

...where to set up your night-lodging. Moreover, people shall avoid you and abandon you, and no one shall feel any desire to mourn with you in your distress and in your torment. In this state, I promise you, I will remain with you for a certain span of your life; for your little houroriginal: "Stündlein" — a diminutive often used in mystical literature to refer to the appointed time of death or a moment of final union with God. has not yet struck.

But I have a small reproach against you, which grieves Me slightly and which I wish to speak now. You are young in years, and you wish for Me to acknowledge the heavy pain of your body, the endurance of your devotional exercises, and your intense desire to always flow out in pious caring loveoriginal: "frommer Liebesfürsorge" — refers to the active, nurturing charity a mystic feels toward others as an expression of their love for God., as well as the longing of your heart, the craving of your senses, and the fervororiginal: "Inbrunst" — intense, burning devotion. of your soul... All this I acknowledge.

Yet acknowledge also that I lived as a pure human being, and My body endured heavy torments, and My hands labored hard for faithfulness, and My intense desire for caring love flowed out into the whole world, to friends and strangers alike; and acknowledge that My senses craved, My heart longed, and My soul swelled with love, and that I persevered in all of this throughout My life until the hour struck when My Father took Me to Himself. You have sometimes said that I had a beautiful human life because I possessed the seven giftsRefers to the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit: wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear of the Lord.. That is true; yet I did not only possess the gifts, but was Myself the gift for the souls who possessed the gifts. And you say that My Father had [given] Me...