Salesian Literature

Salesian Views on

::   Patience  ::   Peace  ::   Perfection  ::   Perseverance  ::   Poverty  ::   Prayer  ::   Propriety 

::   Providence

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Providence

 

God’s providence in general

Treatise on the Love of God, 2:3. God, therefore, has no need of complex activity; a single act of his all-powerful will suffices to create his manifold works, for he is infinitely perfect.  We, his creatures, however, needs must describe his activity after the fashion of the limited understanding of our puny minds.

 

God’s supernatural providence in regard to rational creatures

Treatise on the Love of God, 2:4. From all eternity God knew that he could make a great number of creatures past all counting, endowed with different perfections, different characteristics, to which he could give himself.  Realizing that he could give himself in no better fashion than by uniting himself with a created nature – in such a way as to engraft the creature into the godhead, so as to form one person – his infinite goodness, naturally self-sharing, decided on that method.

 

Divine providence furnished mankind with the richest of ransoms

Treatise on the Love of God, 2:5. The means of salvation are ample beyond all doubt!  So great a Saviour is ours; for his sake we were made, by his merits we have been redeemed.  He died for us all, who had all become dead men; his mercy was the antidote to Adam’s misery – ransoming the human race, rather than ruining it.

 

Some special privileges of providence in man’s redemption

Treatise on the Love of God, 2:6. Most assuredly, God gives a wonderful demonstration of the inexhaustible fertility of his power in that tremendous variety which meets our gaze in nature.  However, he gives us an even more splendid vision of the untold treasures of his goodness in the unparalleled distinction of blessings that we discern in grace.

 

Providence is wonderful in the variety of graces bestowed on man

Treatise on the Love of God, 2:7. God’s providence, therefore, held a peerless privilege in store for the Queen of queens, the Mother who gives birth to all noble loving (Eccl. 24:24), the one uniquely perfect creature.  For others too he destined special privileges. However, God went still further in his supreme goodness: he lavished a profusion of graces and blessings on all mankind as well as on angelic nature.

 

Sermons for the Fourth Sunday of Lent, March 6, 1622

God’s Spiritual Providence: Sermon concerning God's special spiritual care of those who have withdrawn from the world to fol­low the Saviour on the "mountain" of perfection, how God's Providence is greater in proportion to the soul's lack of anxiety for its own needs, how we must diligently use the ordinary means to at­tain perfection and how, if these fail, God would sooner work a miracle than leave us without as­sistance, how God tests souls, anxiety to be rid of spiritual pains rather than trusting God to con­sole us as He wills, the twin virtues of humility and generosity, how Our Lord reproduced the five loaves and two fishes, how religious souls must be satisfied when God gives them only a suffi­ciency (or even less), and how God will continu­ally renew the spiritual goods which we have.

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