Spreading Our Wings and Taking Flight: Lives of Surrender and Love

As you have probably noticed lately, we have been making a big to-do about the release of an Apostolic Letter, Totum Amoris Est, issued by Pope Francis on the 400th anniversary of the death of Saint Francis de Sales.  At this point, you might be asking yourself: “Why are the Oblates so excited?  Why are they making such a big deal about this?”  I will provide you with an honest answer.  While Francis de Sales is a highly quoted, beloved and a brilliant, yet relatable Doctor of the Church, he doesn’t get the same kind of attention some of the other giants do, saints like Augustine, Thomas Aquinas and Francis of Assisi.  Honestly, we are okay with that.  Those are all great saints, ones that Francis de Sales himself happened to love but when our saint gets his moment, we seize it.  

We seize it because of our mission to share this spirituality and this moment provides us with a special opportunity to do just that.  We share that spirituality because it has changed the world, the Church and each of us Oblates.  It has made us much more keenly aware of the Love of God.  It has given us a simple, yet clear path to say “yes” to Him.  It’s something that we want to share because we want you to experience the presence of God in your life.  Francis de Sales is not the reason that God’s love is accessible.  He has shown us in “his method” how accessible God’s love has always been.  As Pope Francis wrote: “It was a method that renounced all harshness and respected completely the dignity and gifts of the devout soul.”

The devout soul has its own personal relationship with God, one that calls for our “yes.”  As the Holy Father reflects on the teaching of Francis de Sales, he writes: “It is up to us to take flight or to remain on the ground.  Even as he bestows his grace, God would not have us rise without our consent.”  So as Francis tells us in the Treatise on the Love of God, we have a choice to follow the lead of God’s inspirations or to reject them.  In the words of Pope Francis: “Each person is responsible for cooperating with his or her own fulfillment, with spreading his or her wings with confident trust before the gust of God’s wind.”   

To spread our wings with confident trust means that we know that God’s wind will lift us, that we will soar.  Sometimes we have a hard time trusting that this will happen.  We grow in that trust, we live in that trust with what Francis de Sales calls devotion.  The Pope tells us that devotion from a Salesian perspective is something very real and practical, “…a style of life, a way of living immersed in our concrete daily existence” that “embraces and discovers meaning in the little things.”  

Why do the little things matter?  Sometimes we might be tempted to say that even if they did in the past, the world is too askew now for any change to come from them.  We are tempted to give up, to think that our little actions in no way matter.

Pope Francis reminds us why they do.  He does it by highlighting how much the world changed in the time of Saint Francis de Sales.  As a young man, de Sales went to Paris and found a place and a people devastated by the Wars of Religion.  When he returned many years later, he found as the Pope calls it “[a] whole world athirst for God.”  “…[H]e sensed an authentic ‘epochal shift’ that demanded a response.”  What is fascinating is that the dear saint had an epochal shift himself, from interior spiritual torment in his youth to interior peace.  He encountered Jesus Christ which led him to proclaim in the Treatise that “Nothing sways the heart as much as love.”

Thus, why Francis de Sales can speak to us…He does so with authenticity.  He found his peace through what Pope Francis calls a “steady cultivation of lived experience.”  He did this in the same way the saint encourages us to do even now, to cultivate an interior life, an interior peace that “does not separate us from the world but teaches us how to live in it and appreciate it.”  

As Francis de Sales came to know and love God in a powerful way, he surrendered to the Lord.  He spread his wings, and the wind of God sent him soaring.  That love, that peace that he sought so desperately as a young man, he found in his daily encounters with the Lord, in quiet prayer, in little actions, in friendship and in charity.  Pope Francis emphasizes a fundamental Salesian teaching: devotion and charity cannot be separated.  Francis de Sales showed how making loving God his way of life led to his love of others.  “Today he bids us set aside undue concern for ourselves, for our structures and what society thinks about us, and consider instead the real spiritual needs and expectations of our people.”

If we embrace and discover meaning in the little things, we will realize how they make a major difference.  Our dear saint learned that in his own life.  He spread his wings with a confident trust and God lifted him to soar.  We can do the same and the amazing thing, the almost unbelievable thing, is that the accumulation of little acts of devotion and charity transform the world.  We have spent our lives seeking to pass that simple message on to you.  Now, we are hoping that through the authenticity of your own life, you might continue to pass this on as well.  Just remember, though, it will come in the way you authentically witness, how in the simple, daily ways you show the epochal shift, how the soaring comes in spreading your wings every day and allowing God’s wind to take you where you need to be and to the people you are called to encounter.

Everything Pertains to Love

Those who follow and seek to immerse themselves in the spirituality of Saint Francis de Sales received a gift from Pope Francis on December 28, 2022.  On that date, Pope Francis published the Apostolic Letter, Totum Amoris Est, (Everything Pertains to Love) on the fourth centenary of the death of Saint Francis de Sales. 

In sending this Letter to the Oblates around the world, our Superior General, Father Barry Strong, OSFS, wrote:

“At his Wednesday General Audience, Pope Francis reflected on the mystery of Christ’s birth and continually drew inspiration from Saint Francis de Sales. During this period of catechesis, he noted that the manger teaches us ‘the perfect renunciation of all goods’ since such a rustic crib combines ‘tenderness and austerity, love and sorrow, sweetness and harshness.’”

Within this context, he (Pope Francis) announced the Apostolic Letter. He remarked, “It is entitled, ‘Everything Pertains to Love,’ taking up a characteristic expression of the holy bishop of Geneva.  In fact, this is how he wrote in the Treatise on the Love of God, ‘In the holy Church everything belongs to love, lives in love, is made by love and comes from love.’ And may we all go down this road of love, so beautiful.”

Having read the document, I know I will have to review it many times to reap the fullness of what Saint Francis de Sales and Pope Francis wrote.  I found the Letter both inspirational and practical in that the insights of Saint Francis de Sales can lead every soul into a healthy, nourishing relationship with God, allowing them to become living expressions of the Love of God in the world. 

A learned Oblate finished reading the Letter and commented, “I have a favorite section from the Letter.  It is, ‘For him, (Saint Francis), Christianity was not to be confused with a facile escapism or self-absorption, much less a dull and dreary obedience…Indeed, ‘there are Christians whose lives seem like Lent without Easter’, and while we can understand the grief of people who have to endure great suffering, ‘slowly but surely we all have to let the joy of faith begin to revive as a quiet yet firm trust, even amid the greatest distress.’”

A friend from Denver, a liturgist, musician and author, wrote me stating, “My favorite line of the document is this, attributed to Saint Francis de Sales, ‘Nothing sways the human heart as much as love.’ That’s a meditation all in itself.”

There is so much to reflect upon in the Pope’s Letter that I’m sure others will share their reflections in the coming months.  If you’re interested in reading it, you can find it here.

I read the entire document in one sitting.  Now I’m going to return to it one section at a time.  I’m sure it will inspire future reflections from me in this newsletter.  I’d love to read yours. 

Father Jack Loughran, OSFS

Provincial

Toledo-Detroit Province

Pope Publishes Apostolic Letter on Saint Francis de Sales

On December 28, the 400th Anniversary of the death of Saint Francis de Sales, Pope Francis issued his Apostolic Letter, Totum Amoris Est ("Everything Pertains To Love"), in which the Holy Father reminds us that the spirit of Charity cultivated by Saint Francis de Sales is now entrusted to us.

Pope Francis also invites us to spend Christmas with Saint Francis de Sales.
Read his remarks in his General Audience on December 28th, the 400th Anniversary of the death of Saint Francis de Sales.

Read Articles Celebrating the Pope’s Apostolic Letter, Totum Amoris Est (“Everything Pertains to Love” ). Click on the buttons below:

Pope Francis to issue Apostolic Letter to mark the 400th anniversary of the death of Saint Francis de Sales

The Vatican recently announced that Pope Francis is preparing to release an apostolic letter on December 28th on Saint Francis de Sales to celebrate the 400th anniversary of his death.

The Pope has referenced Saint Francis de Sales and his teachings several times over the years. In his 2019 World Day of Peace address, he reminded all of the importance of showing, in Saint Francis’ words, “a bit of sweetness towards oneself in order to offer a bit of sweetness to others."  In 2018 during his January 24th general audience – which coincided with the Feast of Saint Francis de Sales – the Pope used Francis as "a model of meekness" for all and invited young married couples to listen to Francis and recognize in their “family life the primacy of God and His love.”

The apostolic letter also comes one hundred years after Pope Pius XI proclaimed Saint Francis de Sales as the "Patron Saint of Journalists, Editors and Writers." 

Read More:  Pope to publish apostolic letter on St. Francis de Sales By Loup Besmond de Senneville, La Croix 

Learn more about Saint Francis and the Double Jubilee Year!