Sermons of St. Francis for Advent and Christmas by St. Francis de Sales

Author:St. Francis de Sales [de Sales, St. Francis]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: TAN Books
Published: 2015-06-09T04:00:00+00:00

NOTES

1.Cf. p. 51 of this sermon; Sermons on Our Lady, "The Visitation," July 2, 1621, p. 156; "The Purification," February 2, 1622, p. 174.

2.It seems that St. Francis de Sales is here distinguishing between the Son's eternal generation as God within the Blessed Trinity and His generation as man on earth. Although as God, the Son is continually and eternally proceeding from the Father, as man He "proceeded" or came forth from the womb of Mary at one particular moment in time.

3."The nature of the soul" and "that of the body" simply indicate for St. Francis a genuine and integral human nature. He speaks in this manner because he wants three aspects to correspond to the three tastes of the manna for the spiritual reflection he is making at this point in his sermon.

4.It is doubtful that St. Francis believed literally in this accounting of how bees derive honey from flowers. It is based on readings from Virgil, Aristotle and Pliny. He does find it useful for the spiritual teaching he is giving.

5.In the French this is a play on words.

6.St. Francis teaches here and elsewhere that Our Lord conformed to the exigencies of what it means to be human so as to teach us and give us the preeminent example of truly human behaviour before God and others. Our Lord fully reveals not only who God is, He also fully reveals who we are and how we ought to act.

7.St. Francis is addressing religious, for whom the vow and virtue of obedience are so central.

8.Cf. Spiritual Conferences, IX, "Religious Modesty," pp. 144-145.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.