Advent with St. Jane-Sunday
” The Son of God, to show us an example, came to humble Himself with an abjection the most admirable which not only can be, but can even be thought of; for you see the God of all Majesty, as it were forgetting and annihilating this supreme and adorable greatness, came to make Himself a little child in the womb of one of His creatures.
I would greatly desire that we should imprint in our hearts this love of humbling ourselves unto nothing in all things in which Our Lord humbled Himself..principally in honor, esteem, in the desire of being preferred, to be accounted virtuous, which must all be destroyed in us in imitation of the self-abasement of the Son of God.”
St. Jane de Chantal, Exhortation 111
Advent with St. Jane- Mon and Tues
“Our Lord was taken for a child like others; from all powerful He appears all powerless; from all great, all little. All gentle and kind, He allowed Himself to be guided like a little lamb; from all rich with the eternal riches of the Father of lights, of Whom He is by nature the Eternal Son, He is become all poor like mortals, in an obscure stable, and has only very scantily what He needs, according as His most holy Mother and St. Joseph give and supply Him.
By this example let us take strength and courage. Oh that it might please Our Lord that we humble ourselves for Him, that we should live no more in ourselves, but in Him and His good pleasure.”
St. Jane de Chantal, Exhortation 111
Advent with St. Jane-Wednesday
“We adore the Son of God in the bosom of His Eternal Father, triumphant and glorious; and we adore the same Son, humbled, annihilated, and hidden under our nature which he has united to His own, to live in a stable, to be born in poverty, in contempt, in suffering. He leaves, in a manner, His eternal joys to become a weeping and shivering infant.
Let us during these days which remain before the great day of Christmas, employ ourselves in considering faithfully the abjection of this great God, to imitate it according to our feeble capacity. Keep near Him, and make ready pure and clean hearts for Him to dwell in at His coming into the world; for if you open to Him, He will come in and abide with you. And this I pray Him to do.”
St. Jane de Chantal, Exhortation 111
Advent with St. Jane-Thursday
” As much as we shall humble ourselves by true humility of heart, so much will the Almighty humble Himself in us to fill our hearts with the abundance of His Holy Spirit, Who will prepare us to receive the Lord in His holy birth.
Let us cast our eyes on our Lord, and ask for His help, that we may be taught what we have to do so as to receive Him on His coming into the world. He will teach us nothing but this only: that we must keep our hearts on high, raised in the greatness and mercy of God. He will teach us His Divine will.”
St. Jane de Chantal, Exhortation IV, 1631
Advent with St. Jane-Friday and Saturday
If we keep ourselves near to God, He will enlighten us. And therefore I beg you as far as I can, that we all purify ourselves in consideration of the adorable purity of the coming of our Lord and Master, and again in consideration of the feast of the Immaculate Conception of our Lady and glorious Mistress and Protectress, and that we pray her, since the least imperfection was never found in her, to obtain for us faithfulness in purifying our hearts and that we may render them a dwelling well-pleasing to her Beloved Son by their candor and true purity.”
St. Jane de Chantal, Exhortation II