Wednesday, March 13, 2019

Responding with love (after St. Francis de Sales)


What if, this Lent, rather than giving up anything at all,
we dedicated ourselves to responding always with love?

  The very wise St. Francis de Sales once wrote to one of his spiritual directees,
How agreeable to God we should be,
if we knew how to use properly
the subjects of mortification that our vocation affords!

  How often, over the course of your day, are you challenged to show patience?  Or self-control?  Or kindness?  And how often do you manage to rise to that challenge?  Daily life is full of moments when we must choose:  anger or compassion?  selfishness or selflessness?  arrogance or humility?  fear or love?  The trick is to pause and recognize the challenge for what it is, and then to respond as Jesus would, to Live Jesus, as St. Francis de Sales exhorts his friends so often to do, responding always with love, no matter the provocation, no matter the temptation.

It is perhaps a worthy consideration for Lent!


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