Letters - Direction - Brulart 1

LETTERS OF St. FRANCIS DE SALES

Principal means of uniting oneself to God and to others

Annecy, May 3, 1604[1]

Madame,

I cannot write you in one letter what I promised you, for I don’t have enough free time to summarize all that I have to tell you on the subject you want me to explain. I will tell it to you a little at a time; besides being convenient for me, this will be advantageous for you too, as it will give you time to mull over my suggestions.

You have a great desire for Christian perfection; this is the most generous desire you could have. Nurture it and help it to grow every day. The means of attaining perfection vary according to the diversity of callings: religious, widows, and married persons – all must seek this perfection, but not all by the same means. For you, Madam, who are married, the means is to unite yourself closely to God and to your neighbour, as well as to all that concerns them.

The principal means of uniting yourself to God are the sacraments and prayer. As to the sacraments, you should not let a month go by without receiving communion; and after a while, depending on the progress you will have made in the service of God and following the counsel of your spiritual guides, you should communicate more often.[2] But as to confession, I advise you to go even more frequently, especially if you have fallen into some imperfection which troubles your conscience, as often happens at the beginning of the spiritual life. Still, if you cannot conveniently get to confession, then contrition and repentance will do.

As for prayer, you should apply yourself to it frequently, especially to meditation, for which, it seems to me, you are well suited. So every day spend a short hour in prayer in the morning before going out, or else before supper; be careful not to make your prayer either after dinner or after supper, for that would be harmful to your health. To help yourself pray well, you might prepare beforehand the point on which you are to meditate so that, as you begin your prayer, you have your subject matter ready. And for this purpose you may read authors who have written on the life and death of Our Lord […]; from these choose the meditation you want to make, read it attentively so as to remember it at the time of prayer when you will have nothing more to do than to recall the points, still following the method which I wrote out for you in the meditation I gave you on Holy Thursday.

Besides that, often pray spontaneously to Our Lord, whenever you can, and in whatever setting, always seeing God in your heart and your heart in God. Enjoy Grenada’s books on prayer and meditation, for there are none that can teach you better or move you more powerfully than these.[3] I should like you not to let a day go by without giving half an hour or an hour to spiritual reading, for that could be like a sermon for you. These are the principal means of uniting yourself to God.

The ways by which we can unite ourselves to our neighbour are very numerous; but I will mention only a few of them. Since God wants us to love and cherish others, we must see our neighbour in Him. This is the counsel of St. Paul who orders servants to serve God in their masters and their masters in God (Eph. 6:5-7). We must practise this love of our neighbour and express it outwardly; and even if at first we seem to do so reluctantly, we must not give up on that account, for this feeling of aversion will, in the end, be conquered by the habit and good dispositions that result from repeated acts. We must bring this intention to our prayer and meditation; having begged God for His love, we must ask Him also to grant us love of others, especially of those persons we have no inclination to love.

I advise you to take the trouble now and then to visit hospitals, to comfort the sick, and to have compassion for their infirmities, letting these touch your heart; and pray for the sick even as you give them whatever help you can. But in all this, be very careful that your husband, your servants, and your relatives be not inconvenienced by overly losing visits to Church, by too lengthy withdrawals to pray and noticeable neglect of your household responsibilities or, as sometimes happens, by your trying to control the actions of others, or showing too much disdain for gatherings where the rules of devotion are not precisely observed. In all these instances charity must prevail and enlighten us so that we yield to the wishes of our neighbour in whatever is not contrary to the commandments of God.

You must not only be devout and love devotion, but you must render it lovable to everyone. Now you will make it lovable if you render it useful and pleasing. The sick will love your devotion if they receive care and comfort from it; your family will love it if they see you more attentive to their well-being, more gentle in handling affairs, more kind in correcting, and so on; your husband will love it if he sees that as your devotion increases, you become more warm and affectionate toward him; your relatives and friends will love it if they see you more free, supportive of others, and yielding to them in matters that are not contrary to God’s will. In short, we must, as far as possible, make our devotion attractive.

I am sending you a little paper I have written about Christian perfection, which I would like you to pass on to Madame du Puits d’Orbe. Receive it in good part, as also this letter, which comes from a heart that is totally devoted to your spiritual good and which has no greater desire than to see the work of God accomplished in you perfectly.

I beg you to remember me in your prayers and communions, and I assure you that I shall always remember you in mine and shall ever be, Madam, your very affectionate servant in Jesus Christ.

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[1] Oeuvres, XII, 267-271: Letter CCXVII.

[2] The frequency with which Christians in the west have received communion has varied through the centuries. See, for example, Joseph Jungmann, The Mass of the Roman Rite (New York: Benziger, 1951-55), Vol. 2, pp. 359-367. The Council of Trent had encouraged more frequent communion, but at the time of Francis de Sales, reception of communion by a lay person more than once a month was still somewhat exceptional.

[3] Louis of Grenada (1504-1588), a Spanish Dominican often recommended by Francis de Sales, had written a book of meditation which was available in French translation since 1572.

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