Maestra Thecla was fully aware that “it is Jesus who lives in me, along with the Father and the Holy Spirit. To remain united to the Divine Master….”
As early as October 1951, she wrote: “The Trinity is my family.”
Guided by her spiritual director, Blessed James Alberione, Maestra Thecla opened her life to the mystery of the Trinity dwelling within her. This is confirmed in her spiritual notes, where she reminds herself:
To live in intimacy with the Divine Master: mind, will, heart, works, senses, hands, feet, eyes, hearing–everything for him and with him. To reach the point of “it is no longer I who live but Jesus who lives in me.”
Starting in 1950, her sole resolution was to surrender herself completely to the Lord. Her spiritual life simplified and acquired a Trinitarian dimension. She herself reveals this to us when she says:
Holiness! That is what I want. To live a Trinitarian life like Mary Most Holy. To trust the heavenly Father. To love his Son, who came to save me. To confide in the grace of the Holy Spirit. The heavenly Father is always close to me. He is within me, thinking of me and providing for everything. Jesus is with me; the Holy Spirit sanctifies me. To live in union with the three divine Persons.
For M. Thecla, holiness consisted of intimate union with the Trinity dwelling within her. She seemed to live in the divine presence as if in her own home: “To often reflect on the fact that the Blessed Trinity is within me. Adoration, union, recollection and…keeping such an important Guest company.”
Prima Maestra strove to intensify her union with the Triune God to the point of merging into the Trinity like a drop of water merges into the ocean. “My God,” she wrote, “I want to hide myself in you, lose myself in you, like a drop of water in the ocean.” This desire reached the point of self-immolation in the form of offering her life to God on the Feast of the Holy Trinity 1961.
Her yearning to dwell in the Trinity, her great longing for the Eternal, was expressed by the word heaven, which occurred over and over again in her conversations. This was the “place” where all one’s efforts would be rewarded, but, even more than that, she considered it the place of complete communion: “We will be with the Lord forever.”
In the last years of her life, Prima Maestra intensified her desire to conform herself to the will of God and live for his glory: “I want to become a saint only for the greater glory of God.” “I want to do everything only to please him.” The fact that she lived in the Holy Spirit can be glimpsed through her words:
Divine Holy Spirit, give me your love, your gifts. I want to allow you to work in me. I don’t want to block your sanctifying actions. Glory to the Father, to the Son and to the Holy Spirit.
Her notebooks from the year 1963, which contain her spiritual reflections during her illness, reveal her firm resolve to embrace the will of God–an attitude that led her to unity with him:
I take everything from you, the good and the bad, physical and moral sufferings. I am united to you now and always (31.10.63).
To live in unity of life with Jesus Master (January 1963).
To imitate St. Paul’s union with the Divine Master:
Who will separate me from the love of Christ? (24.01.63)
Today, greater intensity of life with Jesus Master.
Everything with him: unity (27.01.63).
Lord, I am ready to do your holy will in everything. I don’t remember things or the names of people; I have trouble breathing; but I accept everything for your sake, out of love and in a spirit of penance, for all the needs of the Congregation, for the Pope, the Council, Primo Maestro and the whole Pauline Family.
