St. John of the Cross introduced the concept of the “Dark Night of the Soul.” The assumption is that if someone endures such a “dark night” that person would be experiencing a state of mind like depression. This is what I initially believed, that God would remove Himself from my presence or at least stop talking to me. It was not until I actually encountered a dark night of the soul that I learned its true meaning.
In a simple poem, St. John of the Cross illuminates the deepest and most incredible love story anyone could ever imagine. A person is called out by God in the darkness, and through desperate yearning, that person detaches himself or herself from this world to reunite with the one and only true love, which is the Lord. I believe the initial act of detachment can be misinterpreted as depression. During this dark night, a person must be cut off from reality. The Lord is not of this world, so in order to fully encounter Him, one must be completely detached. The easy way to start is to simply close your eyes, as if in prayer, when we close our eyes to escape from distraction. Closing our eyes, we immediately enter darkness. When we enter this darkness willingly, it is up to God to make the next move. He then takes away every attachment we have to the world.
God has called me to detachment earlier in my life, but has always provided consolations while I am enduring the pain involved in this detachment. During this time, there were moments when I sunk into a depressed state and felt as though I were in a dark night, but God was not finished. He had yet to take away all the consolations that gave me comfort. He takes these away because He does not want us to depend on anything that might add more attachments–like a true love story, God wants us entirely. Over the past year, God has put me through a process of complete detachment and has removed the greatest element that kept me from giving all of myself to Him. To be honest, I continue to mourn this loss, but detachment is not about healing wounds from the past. It is stripping yourself from all the loves of the world and realizing your deepest desire is simply to be with Him.
Returning to St. John of the Cross and his poem, when we are completely detached we are free to enter into the dark night. In the poem, a lover’s search for a soul mate is described. The search is excruciating because the longing to be near the beloved is too much to bear. I know this longing all too well; I have had glimpses of it throughout my life but never to the extent of my experience this past year. Incredibly, as God took away more and more worldly loves, the more intense that longing became. I have reached the point where my longing has become unbearable, and I cannot even breathe.
The “Dark Night of the Soul” is not meant to be depressive, it is meant to be possessive. The Lord is love, and He wants only us. When we can enter into this dark night, we can truly experience a love so great as to surpass all imagination.
Kitty in the City 
I never heard the Dark Night of the Soul explained like this, so thank you! All I have heard is that many great saints experienced these dark nights, notably St. Teresa of Calcutta. This tells me that a dark night is not absence from God, like you say, but an opportunity for deeper intimacy with Him. After all, these saints were closer to the Lord than anyone, but they did not “feel” His Presence during these times of detachment. That is how faith is perfected and you are certainly a model of great faith, someone on her way to sainthood.
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I always associated the dark night of the soul with the dark despair of depression. Thank you for the eloquent clarification of the truth of this profound experience. Clearly, it is not for the faint of heart, and yet how rewarding it must be to find that closeness to our Lord and our true love.
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