Salesian Literature

Chapter 4  :  Lawful occupations do not prevent us from loving God

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Curiosity, ambition, anxiety, an unawareness or forgetfulness of why we are in this world – these are what fill our lives with many more difficulties than duties, much more worry than work, a great deal more bother than business.  Foolish, empty, unnecessary pursuits which distract us from the love of God – these are the things that get in our way, not the genuine and proper duties of our state in life.

 

St. Bernard’s growth in charity was not retarded by days spent with the courts and armies of the great, playing the diplomat for the glory of God.  A change of scene for him, but not a change of heart; a loving heart still, and a loyal one.  As he might have put it[1]: there were changes in his way of living, but his way of life remained unchanged; the work he had to do was different, but he was indifferent to the kind of it was.  No chameleon he; his environment worked no change upon his bearing: always united to God, he kept burnished the silver-gilt of his purity and his charity – short, all the time, with humility.

 

A man who is a slave to courtly favours, legal triumphs, military honours – it is all over with him; he is no longer capable of the song of God’s love.  But God comes to the aid of the man who mixes in royal society, goes to war, or pleads at the bar only from a sense of duty; the pure air of heaven protects his heart from the plagues prevailing there.

 

 

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[1]  Cf. Book 2, chapter 9.

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