Saint of the Heavenly Hive

Inspired by Dante’s “Divine Comedy” in Canto 31. 

“So now appearing to me in the form of a white rose was Heaven’s sacred host, those whom with his own blood Christ made his bride. All other host that soaring see and sing the glory of the one who stirs their love, the goodness which made them great as they are, like bees that in a single motion swarm and dip into flowers, then return to heaven’s hive where their toil turns to joy.” 

“These are the kind of angels and saints at the highest level of heaven, and he envisions them as this great rose…The rose, at the heart of which is an image of Christ, and then all the elements fitted together around that center. It’s a picture of the well-ordered cosmos, God’s design. Here in this heavenly place, something like this rose obtains, because this is not the place of disharmony and hatred and violence, but all things coming together around the center of the love of God… with the image of bees coming into a flower, then going out again, then returning. Saints and angels, even in that high heavenly place, going on mission to other parts of the mystical body. The closer I get to God, the more transparent I am to God. And the more myself I am.” - Bishop Barron