Catholic Radio Dramas

Let Me Know You

From the Proslogion by Saint Anselm, Bishop (1033-1109)

Let Me Know You and Love You, So That I May Find My Joy in You

Narrated by Frank Dugan, Huntington Beach, California

My soul, have you found what you are looking for? You were looking for God, and you have discovered that he is the supreme being, and that you could not possibly imagine anything more perfect. You have discovered that this supreme being is life itself, light, wisdom, goodness, eternal blessedness and blessed eternity. He is everywhere, and he is timeless.

Lord my God, you gave me life and restored it when I lost it. Tell my soul that so longs for you what else you are besides what it has already understood, so that it may see you clearly. It stands on tiptoe to see more, but apart from what it has seen already, it sees nothing but darkness. Of course, it does not really see darkness, because there is no darkness in you, but it sees that it can see no further because of the darkness in itself.

Surely, Lord, inaccessible light is your dwelling place, for no one apart from yourself can enter into it and fully comprehend you. If I fail to see this light it is simply because it is too bright for me. Still, it is by this light that I do see all that I can, even as weak eyes, unable to look straight at the sun, see all that they can by the sun’s light.

The light in which you dwell, Lord, is beyond my understanding. It is so brilliant that I cannot bear it, I cannot turn my mind’s eye toward it for any length of time. I am dazzled by its brightness, amazed by its grandeur, overwhelmed by its immensity, bewildered by its abundance.

O supreme and inaccessible light, O complete and blessed truth, how far you are from me, even though I am so near to you! How remote you are from my sight, even though I am present to yours! You are everywhere in your entirety, and yet I do not see you; in you I move and have my being, and yet I cannot approach you; you are within me and around me, and yet I do not perceive you.

O God, let me know you and love you so that I may find my joy in you; and if I cannot do so fully in this life, let me at least make some progress every day, until at last that knowledge, love and joy come to me in all their plenitude. While I am here on earth let me learn to know you better, so that in heaven I may know you fully; let my love for you grow deeper here, so that there I may love you fully. On earth then I shall have great joy in hope, and in heaven complete joy in the fulfillment of my hope.

O Lord, through your Son you command us, no, you counsel us to ask, and you promise that you will hear us so that our joy may be complete. Lord, I am making the request that you urge us to make through your Wonder-Counselor. Give me than what you promise to give through your Truth. You, O God, are faithful; grant that I may receive my request, so that my joy may be complete.

Meanwhile, let this hope of mine be in my thoughts and on my tongue; let my heart be filled with it, my voice speak of it; let my soul hunger for it, my body thirst for it, my whole being yearn for it, until I enter into the joy of the Lord, who is Three in One, blessed for ever. Amen.

Source: The Liturgy of the Hours – Office of Readings

About Saint Anselm:

Saint Anselm (1033-1109) was born at Acosta, Italy in 1033 and had an early longing to follow the monastic life. At 16, he left home to study in Burgundy, France and became a disciple and friend of Lanfranc at the monastery of Bec in Normandy. He became a monk in 1060 at the age of 27 and for the next eighteen years studied Sacred Scripture, theology and philosophy and developed a profound spiritual and ascetic life. In 1078, at 45, he was named abbot of the monastery, a position which required him to visit England to inspect abbey property there.

In 1092, the English clergy elected Anselm archbishop of Canterbury but Anselm refused to compromise the spiritual independence of the archdiocese. Thus King William II of England refused his approval. On his arrival to England in 1093 he immediately came into bitter dispute with King William. The king refused to permit the calling of needed synods and demanded an exorbitant payment from Anselm as the price of his nomination to the see. Anselm refused to pay it. In 1097, he went to Rome, where Pope Urban I refused William II’s demand that he depose Anselm, and so William threatened to exile Anselm and confiscate diocesan properties. The pope supported Anselm and ordered the king to permit him to return to England and that he return all confiscated property to him.

In 1098 Anselm attended the Council of Vari and defended the Filioque of the Creed in the controversy over the procession of the Holy Spirit.

Anselm returned to England in 1100, on the death of William II, (who was killed in a hunting accident receiving an arrow through his eye) but also encountered difficulties with William’s successor, Henry II, who laid on new demands over lay investiture. (It was Henry II who would later order the death of the Catholic bishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket in 1170). Again Anselm returned to Rome and Pope Paschal II supported his refusal of lay investiture of bishops to Henry. Anselm prevailed but agreed bishops and abbots could pay homage to the King for their temporal possessions. This brought about a certain reconciliation.

While Anselm vigorously defended the Church rights against English kings, he was also a pre-eminent theologian and was called “the Father of Scholasticism.” He denounced the slave trade and believed that revelation and reason could beharmonized. He was the first to incorporate the rationalism of Aristotle into theology. He authored the “Monologium,” on the existence of God, and Proslogium, which deduces God’s existence from man’s notion of a perfect being. This influenced the great thinkers of later ages, among them Duns Scotus, Descarte and Hegel. His “Cur Deus homo?” was the outstanding theological treatise on the Incarnation in the Middle Ages. He died at Canterbury in 1109 and was named a Doctor of the Church in 1720.