Advent Meditation~By St. Alphonsus de Liguori (December 4)

[Dawn Marie]

THE MYSTERIES OF THE FAITH

THE INCARNATION

Discourse by Saint Alphonsus de Liguori

December 4, 2014

 

Discourse 5

 

Whoever loves God has nothing to fear, and God cannot help loving in return one who loves Him:

"I love those who love Me."  And what shall he be afraid of who is the beloved of God?

"The Lord is my light and my salvation, whom shall I fear?" So said David, and so said the sisters of Lazarus to our Blessed Lord: "He whom thou lovest is sick." It was enough for them to know that Jesus Christ loved their brother, to convince them that He would do everything for his recovery.

 

But how, on the contrary, can God love those who despise His love? Come, then, let us once and for all make the resolution to give the tribute of our love to a God who has so sincerely loved us. And let us continually beseech Him to grant us the precious gift of His holy love. St. Francis de Sales says that this grace of loving God was the grace for which we ought to ask God more than for any other; because with Divine love all good comes to a soul. "All good things come together with her."

This made St. Augustine say, "Love, and do whatever you like." Whoever loves a person avoids everything that may offend him, and always seeks what may give him most pleasure. Thus it is with one who really loves God; he can never deliberately do anything to offend HIm, but he studies in every possible manner to please Him.

 

And in order the more quickly and more surely to obtain this gift of Divine love, let us have recourse to the foremost of God's lovers ----- I mean, to Mary His Mother, who was so inflamed with His holy love that the devils, as St. Bonaventure assures us, had not the boldness given to tempt Her. "They

were scared away by Her burning charity, so that they dared not approach Her." And Richard adds that even the Seraphim themselves might descend from their lofty throne in Heaven to take a lesson in love from the heart of Mary. And because, continues St. Bonaventure, the heart of Mary was a

complete furnace of Divine love, therefore all who love this Blessed Mother, and address themselves to Her, will be inflamed by Her with the same love; She will make them resemble Herself.