
You might not think that some of history's most approachable spiritual direction would come from a man like Francis de Sales. After all, he grew up with great privilege as a wealthy noble, enjoying the finest schools across Europe, while his family connections afforded him access to prestige and power.
Yet God can weave threads of every experience into one robe of sanctity when we say yes to Him.
In 1567, Françoise Bonaventure de Sales was born on a French chateau into one the noblest families of his day. His parents, good people, destined their first son for a prestigious career as a lawyer and senator, so they sent him to elite schools in Annecy, Padua, Geneva, Paris. He received training in riding, dancing, and fencing. He had servants. He probably had the envy of most French people, too, as they scrapped for their own livings.
Yet the further he advanced into the nobleman's life, tall, handsome, contemplative Frances felt a restless stirring. What else was there? Could wealth and status ever really satisfy him? He started seeking deeper answers. He began attending theological lectures in Paris. The idea of predestination was spiritually trendy, and instead of the hope and purpose he was looking for, Francis found only despair: Who could be saved? He grew so convinced of his own eternal condemnation that he became physically sick.
Like so many other saints before and after him (Bernard of Clairvaux, Thérèse, Bernadette, Kolbe), Francis found healing and freedom in consecration to Our Lady. She always leads not to trends, but to the truth: God is love. Francis' heart and vocation bloomed with this confidence in God's unconditional love. He decided to become a priest, even though everyone thought he was throwing away his elite education and opportunities.
But that background became the backbone of his ministry as a priest and later as a bishop. Because he had been so finely educated, Francis was an excellent writer. He wrote pamphlets and books and volumes of letters of spiritual advice. One of his primary ministries addressed lay aristocratic women, including his friend, the future St Jane de Chantal, teaching them that all are called to be saints: “It is an error, or rather a heresy, to say devotion is incompatible with the life of a soldier, a tradesman, a prince, or a married woman…. It has happened that many have lost perfection in the desert who had preserved it in the world.”
Francis saw relationship with Jesus through joyful, accessible practicality. Like so many other Doctors of the Church, Francis echoed the same truth—little, daily, ordinary things performed with love and self-gift are the heart of and secret to sanctity. He taught that holiness is at once earthy and transcendent: ”Genuine devotion is consistent with every state of life. Like liquid poured into a container, it adapts itself to any shape.”
I have to admit, that spiritual guidance is both comforting because yay!, all of us can do little, daily, ordinary things, but also it's more grueling than we think. Sometimes I wonder if it's "easier" to throw ourselves ardently into obviously dramatic spiritual endeavors than it is to eke it out day by monotonous day. I know I get way more energized about a mission trip or a service project than I do about getting out of bed to do laundry and pay bills and run errands over and over again.
But I guess what Francis and the others discovered is the only thing that we really can ever do with full control: love. Everything else is truly subject to the whims of nature. But love... only we can control whether we love or not, and only that choice to love cannot be removed regardless of the circumstances. It is always available because it is always singularly, solely ours to choose. Love is the only ultimately self-possessed act of free will. Love is the only thing that makes a difference.
Francis de Sales' feast day is January 24.
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