Ways The Saints Inspire Us

[MarysLittleFlower]

I like talking about the Saints and I'm sure there must be others who do as well :) I find it helpful to read about them because they encourage me to be less lukewarm and to love Jesus more. In Our Lord, we have the model of every virtue. If we look at His life, I think we can find the answer to holiness by imitating Him and our Blessed Mother. I find the Saints encouraging as people who have done this way better than I have.

 

Maybe we could share about specific Saints that have inspired us in ways :) for example, I love St Therese's great trust in God and surrender to His will, and St Gemma's purity and humility. It's also really beautiful how trusting and obedient she was to her spiritual director.

[vee]

What i find inspiring is how God works through these people who are nothing in and of themselves to make them holy.  I like how Therese was a neurotic nut until her Christmas miracle.  John of the Cross couldve become angry and bitter but instead God led john deeper into Himself.  I like how francis de sales had a temper but by the grace of God he was able to control it.  I could go on but Ill stop for the night.

[Julie de Sales]

I admire how St Benoit Labre trusted God despite the fact that no religious community was willing to accept him when all he desired was to consecrate his life to the Lord; how he was always making pilgrimages and loved praying before the Blessed Sacrement day and night; how, even coming from a good and prosperous family, he had no problem in being a mendicant for the love of God; how he accepted insults and how he humiliated himself before others; how in church, thinking that his lack of higene may disturb the faitful, he was praying in a isolated place and how, when going to confession, he was there in the morning but he was letting everybody pass before him.

I also admire St Jeane of Chantal, the foundress of the Visitation order, who at the foot of Sf Francis of Sales, asking advice on her vocation and he telling her: ,,You will go to the Carmel. No, you will go to the benedictines" she kept saying that she will go wherever God wanted her to enter.

I gain courage when I think about St Jean Vianney who said that in temptations of dispair he would throw himself at the foot of the Tabernacle like a little dog at the foot of his master.

Or when I think of a Carmelite sister who prayed for religious vocations in her family and when she was recieving the news that someone married, she wasn't losing courage and continued to pray for the others.

And there are a lot more...we cannot always imitate this acts of virtue, but their examples are very encouraging.

[Spem in alium]

Saint Rose of Lima, because she continued to strive for holiness despite familial and social expectations and frustration. She's also my Baptismal and Confirmation saint, which is pretty awesome :)

 

[Byzantine]

There was a time (and it still may be) when reading an account of St. Francis' Christmas at Greccio (especially the part about the vision) brought tears to my eyes.

Edited June 12, 2013 by Byzantine