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SALESIAN LITERATURE
:: THE LETTERS OF St. FRANCIS DE SALES
::
Salesian Spirituality
Fransalian Features
Letters of St. Francis de Sales
Letters
to Persons in Religion
About 4,000 in all are addressed to persons from all
walks of life – senators, bishops, nobility, religious –
seeking counsel. Francis offered direction, and as
minister of God effaces himself and teaches the soul to
listen to God, the only true director. For him active
work did not weaken his spiritual inner peace but
strengthened it. He directed most people through
letters, which tested his remarkable patience.
The desk at which Bishop
Francis de Sales sat in 1610 served as a resting place
not only for his recent edition of the
Introduction to the Devout Life.
It was also the surface upon which he penned much of
his correspondence. Since in the seventeenth century
there were no other means by which one communicated with
business associates, relatives, and friends,
letter-writing was a skill (and an art) in which most
literate persons were well versed. The bishop often
spent the early or late hours of each day
conscientiously writing letters. Some of the time was
spent taking care of official episcopal business, but
much of it was given over to what can only be termed
spiritual correspondence.
Often early in the morning
even before his private prayer or the celebration of
Eucharist, Francis could be found bent over his writing
desk applying himself to his letter-writing task, for
the couriers that carried the mail from Annecy left
before the busyness of the work day took over. The young
bishop always worked in this way: with a sense of focus
and discipline in the midst of numerous fragmenting
concerns. When he had first become a bishop he had
drawn up a regula episcopa — a rule of daily life
— which helped him to order constructively his many
duties. It is one of the hallmarks of Salesian
spirituality that the love of God can be cultivated in
the midst of great busyness. While the heritage of
prayer emphasized silence and solitude as the optimal
conditions for a reflective Christian life, Francis de
Sales stressed that an equally reflective if different
life could be lived "In the midst of worldly concerns."
(Credit: Wendy M. Wright,
Francis de Sales,
New York: Crossroad
Publishing Company, 1997)
Translated by Vincent Kerns MSFS
New Hampshire, Manchester: Sophia
Institute Press, 1995
The Spiritual Conferences of
St. Francis de Sales
Letters
to a Wife and
Mother
In this pamphlet you are going to hear St. Francis de
Sales converse through his letters to Madame Madeleine
de la Fléchére, his cousin. They were about the same age
and he became her spiritual director during the Lenten
course of sermons he preached at Rumilly in France in
1608.
The Spiritual Conferences of
St. Francis de Sales
Thy Will Be Done: Letters to Persons in the
World
These letters to persons in all walks of life show that
the spiritual difficulties people had three hundred
years ago are largely the same that you and I have
today: impatience, anger, discouragement, difficulties
in prayer, family strife, sickness, and fear of death.
In his touching letters to people suffering these and
other common troubles, St. Francis de Sales shows how
God wants each of us to deal with such problems and how
we can gain the strength and courage to do so. Indeed,
he shows how we can even learn to see God’s will in them
and to do His will joyfully.
These letters to persons in all walks of life show that
the spiritual difficulties people had three hundred
years ago are largely the same that you and I have
today: impatience, anger, discouragement, difficulties
in prayer, family strife, sickness, and fear of death.
The Spiritual Conferences of
St. Francis de Sales
Letters of Spiritual Direction
In reading these
letters one gradually becomes aware that our contemporary
predicament allows us to find in these letters what is
crucial for our own spiritual survival: a Jesus-centred,
affectionate friendship. This Jesus-centred, affectionate
friendship pervades all the letters that Francis and Jane
wrote to their correspondents, but the source is clearly the
friendship between themselves … there is no doubt that all
the letters published in this book … are undergirded by the
“bond of perfection” that bound them together in a mutual
Jesus-centred love.
The Spiritual Conferences of
St. Francis de Sales
SALESIAN LITERATURE
A Down-to-earth
Spirituality for everyone
Doctoral Theses on Salesian Spirituality
Letters to Persons in the
World
Letters
of Spiritual Direction
Francis de
Sales as Letter Writer
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Updated on Sunday, March 30, 2008 14:14:29
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