"There are people who imagine doing great things for God, things that would involve great suffering and heroic actions. Yet there is no opportunity to perform such deeds—and perhaps there never will be. They believe that just by imagining these deeds, they have shown great love, but they are often deceived. For while they desire to embrace great future crosses, they anxiously avoid the much lighter burdens that are presented to them now. Isn't it a big temptation to be heroic in imagination but cowardly in carrying it out? ... Great deeds do not always come our way, but in every moment, we may do little ones with a great love."
-St. Francis de Sales, Treatise on the Love of God
Lent is the Time for Loving
By Sister Marie Therese Ruthmann, VHM
Again we are preparing for the joyous season of Lent. Does that adjective surprise you? We have long associated Lent with penance and sharing in the sufferings and death of Jesus by fasting, almsgiving, and prayer. Of course that is correct, but it is only half the truth. It is incomplete because we know the end of the passion story which is not death but resurrection: Christ has died; Christ is risen. So why do we Catholic Christians journey through the 40 days of Lent?
Francis' insight that by doing little acts, we practice loving more often, more humbly, and more usefully can give us a clue to making our Lent a time for love. He continues with an ordinary-extraordinary agenda of "Little Virtues" we can practice in union with the suffering love of Jesus:
- Putting up with other people's moods and troublesome behavior,
- Gaining victory over our own moods and passions,
- Renouncing our petty preferences, coming against our own revulsions,
- Honestly acknowledging our faults,
- Keeping our souls in peace,
- Gently and graciously welcoming scorn or criticism.
Perhaps you would like to reflect later on these little but great ways to love during this Lent.
And so we pray:
Dear God, we renew again our desires to love you in a more intentional way during this Lenten season.
We live this love in every event life presents us.
Please give us the grace to practice the little virtues of love today and especially during this Lenten springtime.
Amen.
Sr. Marie Therese is Monastery Superior at the Convent of the Visitation in St. Louis, MO.
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Special thanks to Cecilia Kane '16 for the banner photo.