“Ask for Nothing, Refuse Nothing” is a much quoted phrase of St. Francis de Sales.
But what does it mean?
This was a question posted by a chatter during our Sunday Night Living Jesus chat room session. As we welcome your input to this site, we post here a reflection on this quote and anticipate this topic for Sunday Nov 23’s chat session.
Father Eunan McDonnell SDB, in his book, The Concept of Freedom in the Writings of St. Francis de Sales, pages 238-240, explains the underlying theme of this famous quote.
He wrote, “On the eve of his death, at Lyons in 1622, St Francis de Sales commends to his Visitation Sisters the following: ‘Do you ask me what I desire should remain most deeply engraved upon your mind, so that you may put it in practice? … Desire nothing, refuse nothing. These words say everything, for they teach us the practice of perfect indifference.'”
The Salesian practice of Salesian abandonment is allied to the gift of self to God, this detachment extends even to desires”‘ for ‘we must neither ask anything nor refuse anything, but leave ourselves in the arms of divine Providence, without busying ourselves with any desires, except to will what God wills of us.
The guiding principle of St Francis’s teaching is applied here to desires: in the state of union a person’s will is so completely transformed in God’s will that it excludes anything contrary to what God wills. Therefore any freely willed desire, or anything that is a sin or even only an imperfection, must be mortified because it is when we give free assent to such a desire that it becomes a departure from love. The maxim demands a passivity before God. encouraging us to be led by God and preventing us from manipulating God’s will to our own ends. However, there is also an active passivity at work. It contains the biblical demand to remain awake and vigilant.,.
This ‘desire nothing, ask for nothing, refuse nothing’ is not a permanent state, but a stage in seeking God’s will. It is the ‘balance that holds the scales at rest ‘ where the will abstains from taking sides as it does not know God’s preference.
Having silenced our own desires and surrendered ourselves to God’s will, we receive the gift of holy indifference: a peace of mind and soul (at the supreme point of the spirit, because there can be outward and surface turmoil) that enables us to wait for God’s will to manifest itself.
Once God’s will becomes apparent the love that waits (holy indifference) is transformed into the love that moves us into action (zeal)It i s important to maintain the Salesian balance between ‘desire nothing, ask for nothing’ and ‘refuse no thing’. This latter aspect is of pivotal importance as it situates La sainte indifference in the context of providence. It promotes an attitude of childlike trust that when we surrender willingly into God’s arms, then, God will provide what is needed. It is also an acknowledgment of God’s grace at work, enabling us to surrender our will as an expression of love. lt follows that the surrender entailed in la Sainte indifference is the fruit of love. Viewed from outside this perspective of a mutual relationship, the demands appear excessive and intolerable. ‘But if it is seen in the context of a loving union, then, it is seen as a communion of hearts, a communion of wills, a oneness. Our surrender in love is a way in which we leave God free to lead us and allow ourselves to be led into a place of greater freedom by God.”
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