Closing of the jubilee year of Saint Francis de Sales-December 28, 2022-Feast of Sts Innocents
Today we celebrate the closing of the jubilee year of Saint Francis de Sales, on the anniversary of his death, or more precisely of his birth in heaven. December 28 is also the day when the Church celebrates the Holy Innocents. We have heard the gospel that tells us about the event. Let me dwell on it for a moment. This holiday is not so easy to grasp. How, in the light of Christmas, when we are amazed by the beauty of God who becomes a child, can such violence arise? This child in the manger is, through the wickedness of man, the cause of the slaughter of innocent children. What pain for Jesus himself, for Mary and for Joseph!
First of all, if I can put it that way, it is a conflict between King Herod and Jesus, the new king who has just been born. Herod is afraid of losing his power. He can see in this child only a competitor. Poor Herod who has understood nothing. Because Jesus is king, but it is not the same type of kingship. This brings us back to Jesus’ answer to Pilate who asks him: “So you are king?”. “My royalty is not of this world. If my royalty was of this world, I would have guards who would have fought so that I would not be delivered.”
King born in a manger, his throne: a manger. Later his throne will be a cross. The greatness of God is to have made himself very small, his power is manifested in fragility and vulnerability. To meet him, we too must make ourselves small, come down from our lofty thrones, learn to be children. What Herod refuses to do, he is afraid of losing his glory and his power. We ourselves may not be like Herod, but we can have functions, services where we exercise a certain power, where we enjoy a certain recognition, a certain prestige. We may be tempted to cling to it. Are we ready to let ourselves be stripped, to put ourselves in the school of God’s humility?
This is where the figure of Saint Francis de Sales is and must be a model for us. We have to put ourselves in the school of Jesus. But for all the Christians of the diocese, also at the school of François de Sales. I note from the experience of Saint François de Sales, some ideas which can and must inspire our personal lives and the life of the diocese.
Françis de Sales is “Doctor of Love”, to use an expression of Pope Saint John Paul II pronounced here, in this basilica, in 1986. “All is in Love. In his words, we can welcome the spiritual heritage he left us,” says Pope Francis in his letter to the Church today. Francis de Sales was tireless in showing his brothers patience and the tenderness of God, always willing to forgive, to save. He constantly returns to the love of God: “Everything belongs to the Love, in the Love, for the Love, in the Holy Church.” We all know his words: “Nothing by force, everything by love.” It seems to me that the experience he had, praying in front of the statue of Our Lady of Deliverance as a young student in Paris, is foundational. While he is going through a terrible inner crisis, because of a false theology on predestination, he knows a crisis of scruples, caught in a terrible anguish and a great despair. He falls ill. He is convinced that he cannot be saved. With the Virgin Mary he will be freed. He enters into Love, to be loved and to love. Let us ask for the intercession of François de Sales so that we may be seized by the Love of God. All of us, all the baptized in our diocese. May all our services be seized from within by the Love of God. The love of God and the love of neighbor are inseparable. It is a single commandment. But both, however, live by the considerate love of God who first loved us. We have to constantly experience the love given from within. Love is divine because it comes from God and unites us to God. A love which, by nature, must be shared with others. Love grows by love, through a process of unification. It transforms us into a we that overcomes our divisions and makes us one. Until God is all in all. It seems to me that this is what Francis de Sales lived and that this is what he wants us to live.
Francis de Sales, in the Introduction to the Devout life, and in many of his writings and interviews, has the brilliant and completely new intuition of his time, to propose union with God to all. That the divine life can, and must, be lived by all, in the particular conditions of each person’s life. In this he anticipates what the Second Vatican Council clearly affirms when speaking of the universal call to holiness. “All members of the Church are called to holiness. The call to the fullness of the Christian life and the perfection of charity is addressed to all those who believe in Christ.” This is what Francis de Sales proposes to those he meets, this is what he forms, that is what he offered throughout his time. The challenge is major for us today. We talk a lot about the necessary reform of the Church. In reality, it is not a question of inventing a new program, the program already exists, it is that of always, living the Gospel. It is centered on Christ himself, whom it is necessary to know, love and imitate, in order to live the Trinitarian life in him, to transform History. It is not enough to renew pastoral methods, nor to better organize the life of the Church. We must arouse a new impetus of holiness. This is what Francis de Sales aroused in his time. Let us pray that our diocese be traversed by a new impetus of holiness. a deep humanity. It is transmitted in simple, friendly relations, cordiality with all. Through his correspondence, his personal encounters, it is the heart that speaks to the heart. The human heart of Jesus which speaks to the heart of Francis and the heart of Francis which speaks to the heart of those he meets. carried out person to person. God does not like people in groups, but he loves each human being in particular. We must develop a pastoral care of friendship with everyone, to transmit the heart of our hearts. to Saint Vincent de Paul about Francis de Sales: “God is good because Monsieur de Sales, my friend, is so good.
May through the intercession of Francis de Sales we be led to friendship with all, even those who reject us.
In the letter that Pope Francis addresses today to the Church for the 4th centenary of the death of Saint Francis of Sales, he insists that he lived in a time of great change. That he allowed himself to be touched and questioned by the problems of the world and the new way of considering them. He became aware of a real “change of era” to which it was appropriate to respond with old and new forms of language. In particular, when Europe was devastated by the wars of religion and Chablais by fierce struggles, he was able to see and consider the surprising demand for spirituality which appeared and the new questions it posed. He offered them holiness, they offered to respond in a new way to the thirst for God. Today we are ourselves in a change of era. More radical change than we imagine, with all the worry and drama that entails. Let us ask Françis de Sales to be able to recognize, in these changes, the opportunity to announce the Gospel. He knew how to decipher his era with the grace of God. Benedict XVI said: “For decades we have been witnessing a spiritual desertification. It is the void that has spread, but in the desert, we rediscover the value of what is essential to live. In reality, we are expected. “This is why – says Pope Francis – (Francis de Sales) invites us to come out of an excessive preoccupation with ourselves, with the structures of the image that we give in society, and to ask ourselves rather what are the concrete needs and spiritual expectations of our people.”
Saint Francis de Sales, pray for us.
Mgr Yves Le Saux