Delving, rediscovering, I experienced a quiet moment at work, focusing on a Kindle edition of St Francis de Sales sermons. The Saint is dear to me, an intellectual inspiration, a marvelous writer and unique challenging thinker, a penetrating spiritual director. Digest these words on male/female interactions, the freeing of energy, responsibility and accountability forced forefront. A spiritual teacher I am familiar with stresses the importance of advancing beyond the pursuit of entertainment. The religious life is more than seeking the pleasure of entertaining moments, the pursuit of passing time through distraction, avoiding the banality and boredom of stillness, the humiity of detaching from cleverness, the seriousness of loving and interacting with others through vulnerability, imperfection, tenderness, gentleness, and admiration. The ability to truly love on the natural and intimate level.
Our Dear Lord, Who demands nought save our love in return for our creation, preservation and redemption, will require a strict account of the senseless way in which we have frittered and wasted it. If He will call us to account for idle words, how will it be with respect to idle, foolish, pernicious friendships? Husbandmen know that the walnut tree is very harmful in a vineyard or field, because it absorbs the fatness of the land and draws it away from the other crops; its thick foliage overshadows and deprives them of sunshine; and, moreover, it attracts passers-by, who tread down and spoil all that is around while striving to gather its fruit. So with these foolish love affairs and the soul; they engross it, so that it is unable to bring forth good works; their superfluous foliage—flirtations, dallyings and idle talk—consume profitable time; and, moreover, they lead to so many temptations, distractions, suspicions, and the like, that the heart becomes altogether crushed and spoiled. Such follies not only banish Heavenly Love, they likewise drive out the fear of God, enervate the mind, and damage reputation. They may be the plaything of courts, but assuredly they are as a plague spot of the heart. –Sermons of St Francis de Sales
