The Persona Dei: The Image of Truth by Dorothy Sayers

I the image of the Unimaginable
In the place where the Image and the Unimaged are one,
The Act of the Will, the Word of the Thought, the Son,
In whom the Father's selfhood is known to Himself,
I being God and with God from the beginning
Speak to Man in the place of the Images.

You that We made for Ourself in Our won image,
Free like Us to experience good by choice,
Not of necessity, laying your will in Ours
For love's sake creaturely, to enjoy your peace,
What did you do? What did you do for Us
By what you did for yourselves in the moment of choice?

O Eve My daughter, and O My dear son Adam,
Try to understand that when you chose your will
Rather than Mine, and when you chose to know evil
In your way and not in Mine, you chose for Me.
It is My will you should know Me as I am--
But how? for you chose to know your good as evil,
Therefore the face of God is evil to you,
And you know My love as terror, My mercy as judgment,
My innocence as a sword; My naked life
Would slay you. How can you even know Me then?
Yet know you must, since you were made for that;

Thus either way you perish. Nay, but the hands
That made you, hold you still; and since you would not
Submit to God, God shall submit to you,
Not of necessity, but free to choose
For your love's sake what you refused to Mine.
God shall be man; that which man chose for man
God shall endure, and what man chose to know
God shall know too--the experience of evil
In the flesh of man; and certainly He shall feel
Terror and judgment and the point of the sword;
And God shall see God's face set like a flint
Against Him; and man shall see the Image of God
In the image of men; and man shall show no mercy.

Truly I will bear your sin and carry your sorrow,
And, if you will, bring you to the tree of life,
Where you may eat. and know your evil as good,
Redeeming that first knowledge. But all this
Still at your choice, and only as you choose,
Save as you choose to let Me choose in you.

Who then will choose to be the chosen of God,
And will to bear Me that I may bear you?


Dorothy L. Sayers (1893-1957) was an English writer, best known for her detective fiction, particularly the novels and stories featuring Amateur Sleuth Lord Peter Whimsey. Before the detective fiction career took off, she worked as a copywriter at a London advertising agency, where she worked on a long-running series of ads for Guinness and created a sensationally successful viral marketing campaign for Colman's Mustard. She was also a playwright, whose works frequently examined moral and theological questions. In later life, Sayers began work on a translation of Dante's Divine Comedy. She had completed Inferno and Purgatorio, and was working on Paradiso when she died; the work was completed by her colleague and later biographer, Dr. Barbara Reynolds, and published posthumously.  From http://www.tvtropes.com/

May life lead you always closer to the truth. May your mind be keen and your heart open to receive such a gift! For we live in an illusion purchased at the great price of misunderstanding and self-indulgence. God is with us, always with us, never left us. For God so loves the world that He gives his Son, that whoever loves Him also will not perish but realize everlasting life! Love never deserts, never betrays, never gives up...but Love must give free choice.
The grace of God and wisdom of humanity live in your heart, Peggy

Artwork: Christ Consciousness, http://www.spiritpathwaysfoundation.com/