Salesian Literature

Vol. 1, Preface by the Editors

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The Spiritual Conferences is an unusual book.  St. Francis de Sales is the author, but he never put pen to paper to write the manuscript.  In fact, the book is a collection of verbal talks that Bishop Francis gave to his dear Sisters of the Visitation.

 

Origin of the SPIRITUAL CONFERENCES

St. Francis founded the Order of the Visitation, along with St. Jane de Chantal, in 1610, at Annecy.  St. Jane writes: “Our Holy Founder used to visit us often and give us short spiritual talks to teach us about true perfection.”  Another of the first Sisters, Mother Marie-Adrienne Fichet, historian of the early years of the Order, adds that even when the weather was bad, with rain or snow, he would visit them two or three times a week and even more often.

 

Mother Fichet mentions that at first Bishop Francis, who was then writing his book, Treatise on the Love of God, would at the request of the Sisters share with them whatever he had completed.  When the Sisters wanted to take notes of his talks, he objected saying, “You will find everything in my book on the love of God.”  However, later on, the sisters did not follow this directive strictly and began to make notes of the talks, not while the Bishop was speaking but afterwards.  Mother Fichet had an extraordinary memory and was the first to do this work.

 

Mother Claude-Agnes Joly de la Roche followed Mother Fichet. Writing of Mother de la Roche, St. Jane says, “God gave her such a wonderful memory that she could remember word for word what our good Bishop had preached, sever days after she had heard him.”  From July 1620, the work was taken up by a third Sister, Mother Marie-Marguerite Michel.  It is recorded that Mother Michel prayed specially to the Holy Spirit and so was able to recall the talks with remarkable accuracy.  Each talk written by her was afterwards read aloud to the Sisters, so that they might notice if anything had been forgotten.  It hardly ever happened that anything could be added to what she had written.

 

The Sisters, who began as community of four, were eight at the end of the first year and ten at the end of the second year.  Bishop Francis encouraged the Sisters to ask him questions, verbally or in writing.  Often his talks were in reply to these questions, as he himself mentions.  A few of the topics were suggested by Mother de Chantal.

 

How the Spiritual Conferences came to be published

When St. Francis de Sales died in 1622, there were thirteen monasteries of the Visitation in Savoy and in France.  They had gone up to thirty-five by 1629.  All these communities had hand-written copies of the Conferences and used to read them diligently.  At first, Mother de Chantal had no intention of having the Conferences printed.  They were to be kept as a carefully guarded family treasure.  In one of her letters, she writes: “The Sermons may be shown to outsiders but not the Conferences, except to well-known and trustworthy persons.”

 

However, from September 1624, Mother de Chantal began to think of printing the Conferences.  But she was busy attending to important work, such as the foundation of many new monasteries as well as her efforts to obtain the Beatification of her holy Director.  Meanwhile, some unknown person managed to get hold of the manuscript and, without the permission of the Sisters, it was published in May 1628 with numerous mistakes.  Mother de Chantal acted promptly.  She had the pirated edition withdrawn from the market.  She then carefully prepared an edition, which she entitled “The True Spiritual Conferences”, and had it published in May 1629.

 

A definitive edition of the Complete works of St. Francis de Sales in French has been published by the Visitation Sisters of Annecy, in 26 volumes, between 1892 and 1932.  It is known as the Annecy Edition of the writings of St. Francis de Sales.  The first twelve volumes were edited by Dom Benedict Mackey, the English Benedictine scholar and an outstanding authority on St. Francis de Sales.  Volume VI, containing the “Spiritual Conferences”, was published in 1895.  For it Dom Mackey retained the text of St. Jane de Chantal’s edition of 1629, not doubt out of respect for the great Foundress.  However, her edition was not a critical and complete one.  Hence the Visitation Sisters of Annecy published a revised edition of the “Spiritual Conferences” in 1933.

 

Grateful Acknowledgements

We express our grateful thanks to Sister Marie-Helene Reinle, Superior of the First Monastery of the Visitation of Annecy for her kind permission of 5th April 1992 to use the text of Volume VI of the Annecy Edition for this translation.  Much of the information presented in this preface is drawn from Dom Mackey’s remarkable 58-page Preface to Volume VI.

 

We have also made use of the more recent revised French edition of the “Spiritual Conferences” published by the Visitation Sisters of Annecy in 1933.  And we have consulted the latest French edition of 1969, edited by Fr. Andre Ravier, SJ, and Roger Devos, who are both present-day authorities on Saint Francis de Sales.

 

A completely New Translation

The earliest English Translation of the “Spiritual Conferences”, to the best of our knowledge, was made by Fr. William Henry Coombes, DD, and published in 1814 as “The Spiritual Entertainments of St. Francis de Sales.”  Another translation was published in 1862 with a Preface by Cardinal Wiseman.  The Visitation Sisters in England prepared a fresh version which was published by Burns & Oates of London in 1909 and has been out of print for long.  Even the 1909 translation leaves much to be desired and so we decided to publish a completely new translation of the French text of the Annecy Edition, as revised in the 1933 edition.

 

First of Two Volumes

In order that the book should not be too bulky, we decided to publish the “Spiritual Conferences” in two volumes, with about half the conferences in each volume.  In the Annecy Edition, Dom Mackey placed the different conferences in a chronological order, whereas Mother de Chantal had followed a logical order.

 

Writing to a Novice of the Visitation Sisters at Lyons, in March 1616, St. Francis de Sales says: “Remember that charity has three parts – the love of God, affection for oneself, and the love of neighbour.”  Inspired by these words, we have arranged the Conferences in this Volume One as follows: first of all two Conferences concerning God, then about self, and after that two on love for others.  Then come the Conferences on the more important virtues, such as Humility, Generosity, Detachment, Simplicity and Obedience, ending with a Conference on the Constitutions.

 

The Conferences here in relation to the Annecy Edition

The order of Conferences in this Volume One, with reference to the order in Volume VI of the Annecy Edition (=AE) is the following:

 

1    =       AE II;

2    =       AE XV;

3    =       AE XIV;

4    =       AE VIII: second part; In 1993 Edition = IX;

5    =       AE IV; 

6             not in AE.  In 1993 Edition = XXII

7    =       AE V;

8    =       AE VIII: first part.  In the 1933 Edition = VIII;

9    =       AE XII;

10   =       AE X;

11   =       AE XI;

12   =       AE I

 

Dom Mackey’s Tribute to the “Spiritual Conferences”

Here are a few enlightening words from the renowned Dom Mackey: “As a first impression, it might appear that this book is very far from being a systematic presentation of the duties of the Religious Life.  Rather, it seems to be a collection of ascetical instructions without sequence or unity.  But this is not true.  The questions which St. Jane Frances de Chantal and her daughters asked their dear Father were numerous.  In answering these many questions, he was led to explain to the Sisters the Religious Life under all its different aspects and to deal with its principal obligations”  (translated from the Preface to Volume VI, pp. XXIX-XXX).  Dom Mackey even goes to the extent of affirming that “No other book better merits to be entitled THE SPIRIT OF ST. FRANCIS DE SALES” (Preface, p.V).

 

A word of Thanks

We are grateful to Fr. Claude Morel for giving financial assistance to print this book.

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Conclusion

May the reflective reading of the Conferences fill us with the true spirit of St. Francis de Sales, the “Doctor of Love”, and lead us to live the Gospel of Jesus as this great Saint did, with humility, gentleness and whole-hearted love of God and neighbour.

 

Live Jesus!

Frs. Armind Nazareth msfs & Antony Mookenthottam msfs

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