“When God created the world He commanded each tree to bear fruit after its kind; and even so He bids Christians,--the living trees of His Church,--to bring forth fruits of devotion, each one according to his kind and vocation. A [...]
St. Francis de Sales gives sound advice on how to meditate with Holy Scripture. He suggests: ” We can consider the Holy Bible, that is, the mysteries contained therein, and principally the Gospels, in two ways. The first is to [...]
The third quality that typifies the devout love of husband and wife is the birth and rearing of children. When I was a principal, I came to see, in the lives of the parents of our students and especially [...]
"The truly loving heart loves God's good pleasure not in consolations only but also in afflictions." (St. Francis de Sales-Treatise on the Love of God) Recently a woman contacted me, wanting to make a donation to our parish ministry to the [...]
Blessed Louis Brisson shares his thoughts at Christmas time with his spiritual children: “A little child walks along holding his mother’s hand, distrusts his own strength, and is not bold. May you be the same and venture nothing without God. [...]
Back in October, I wrote on “the union of hearts” as the first of three qualities that Francis de Sales called for in marriage. The second quality is fidelity. Obviously such fidelity excludes romantic, sexual attachments to anyone outside the [...]
and Crosses! As our national holiday of Thanksgiving approaches, how can we be grateful with a particularly Salesian heart? St. Francis de Sales’ suggests we delight in all God’s inspirations within us, and that we accept with gratitude even the [...]
“Whoever exalts himself will be humbled; whoever humbles himself will be exalted." (Mt 23:12) The above verse from Matthew’s Gospel (featured in the Lectionary for the Thirty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time) follows Jesus’ critique of the Pharisees (and scribes) for [...]
In Part 3 of the Introduction to the Devout Life, in his Instruction to Married Persons, Francis de Sales reflects on the holiness of marriage and exhorts his readers to a married love that is “completely holy, completely sacred, and [...]
