We do not even begin to pray unless we are first touched by 'the inner wound of love', which impels us to seek ever more direct and personal experience of Christ, comparable to the relation of married love; once touched by our lover, we can no longer be content with what is mediated of his love in the Church, through 'angels and prophets', but desire to transcend even the freedom and rationality proper to mankind and receive the direct supernatural enlightenment of the Word. Origen gives voice to the longing which has never been quenched in any religious tradition, the passion, not for 'intellectual' ecstasy or even for a mystical absorption, but for direct, palpable assurance and experience of the sweetness of a God who enters into intimacy with his creatures.
rowan williams, the wound of knowledge
