PASSIVE PURIFICATIONS. — To remove from the soul the obstacles that stand in the way of full perfection (sins, vices, unruly passions, purely natural tendencies), these must first be eliminated through mortification (v.): this is active purification. No one, however, can discern in the most hidden recesses of his inner self the countless imperfections and vicious tendencies that infect even his practice of virtue (cf. the list drawn up by St. John of the Cross, *Dark Night*, Bk. I, chs. 2–7), nor much less can he rid himself of them thoroughly. For this purpose, a special intervention of God, of a mystical order, is required: the grace of infused contemplation, which enlightens the soul, revealing to it the entire complex of its impurities, and radically strips it through a long and most painful purgation: this is passive purification, called by St. John of the Cross the “dark night,” which “is understood to mean the purgative contemplation that passively brings about in the soul the renunciation of self and of all things” (*ibid.*, Prologue to the 1st stanza).
Passive purification is twofold, as the Mystical Doctor explains: “The first night or purification is the sensory one, by which the soul is purified according to the senses, adapting them to the spirit; and the other is the spiritual night or purification, by which the soul is purified and stripped according to the spirit, adapting and disposing it for union with God” (*ibid.*, Bk. I, ch. 8).
I. PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SENSES
This belongs to beginners, leading them to the state of the proficient. Two elements must be distinguished here, one negative and the other positive: a) the negative element of the passive purification of the senses is prolonged spiritual dryness, which renders discursive meditation impossible: “They no longer know where to turn the imagination’s sense and reasoning, for they can no longer take a single step in meditation as they used to do before” (*ibid.*, Bk. I, ch. 8). b) The positive element of this passive purification is a principle of obscure mystical contemplation, revealed through a vivid desire for God (by which the aforementioned dryness is distinguished from a natural disposition to melancholy); yet “this contemplation is hidden and secret even for the one who possesses it” (*loc. cit.*). At this point in the interior life, the work of the spiritual director is of the greatest importance, calming the soul and preventing it from turning back to restore discursive meditation, now useless and harmful (St. John of the Cross, *Living Flame of Love*, 3rd stanza, V. 3, §§ 4–13).II. PASSIVE PURIFICATION OF THE SPIRIT
Belonging to the soul whom God destines for a higher perfection (*Dark Night*, Bk. I, Bk. II, ch. 1), the purification of the spirit is separated from the preceding by a more or less lengthy period during which the soul enjoys the fruits of now habitual contemplation (*ibid.*), yet in which notable imperfections still remain: presumptuous display of one’s gifts, vanity and arrogance, loss of the due respect for God (*ibid.*, Bk. II, ch. 2). Then follows, terrible in the torments it brings, the passive purification of the spirit: “God strips their faculties, affections, and senses, both spiritual and sensory, both exterior and interior, leaving the intellect in darkness, the will arid, the memory empty, and the soul’s affections in profound affliction, bitterness, and anguish, depriving it of the feeling and taste it once had for spiritual goods” (*ibid.*, ch. 3). The operative principle of this purification is a more penetrating contemplation, which, by revealing to the soul the stark contrast between divine light and perfection and its own impurity, causes it indescribable pain: “As this pure light invades the soul to expel impurity, the soul feels so impure and wretched that it seems to it that God has become its adversary and it the enemy of God” (*ibid.*, ch. 3). A true purgatory, whose pain not even the spiritual father can alleviate (*ibid.*, ch. 7), often lasting for years.Connected to this fundamental purification are often horrible temptations, a spirit of blasphemy, scruples, perplexities, and sometimes, in stronger and more favored souls, even visible assaults, with blows and suggestions of every kind from the devil. All this serves to make the soul more keenly aware of its own nothingness, so that it may hope for the liberating grace from God alone. Overcoming every obstacle, the soul finally “attains the spiritual union of perfect love of God” (*ibid.*, ch. 14). Then, as the Venerable Marie of the Incarnation says, “the soul, in its unity and center, remains in an actual love within the embraces of the Spouse, the surpassingly lovable Incarnate Word” (*Eccl. Spirit.*, Bk. II, *Relation of 1654*, § LXXVI, V [13th state of prayer, part 1]). V. MYSTICAL.