"But love your enemies, and do good,
and lend, expecting nothing in return;
and your reward will be great,
and you will be sons of the Most High;
for He Himself is kind to ungrateful and evil men."
Luke 6:35
We must above all show charity to our enemies. By this you may know that a man is a true Christian, if he seeks to do good to those who wish him evil (St. Alphonsus Liguori).
And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified (Romans 8:30).
For man believes with his heart and so is justified, and he confesses with his lips and so is saved (Romans 10:10).
Love God
"You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment." (Matthew 22:37-38).
“To love him with all the heart, and with all the understanding, and with all the strength, and to love one's neighbor as oneself, is much more than all whole burnt offerings and sacrifices" (Mark 12:33).
"He who loves me will be loved by my Father, and I will love him and manifest myself to him" (John 14:21).
"The Father himself loves you, because you have loved me and have believed that I came from the Father" (John 16:27).
By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God and obey his commandments (1 John 5:2).
To love God as He ought to be loved, we must be detached from all temporal love. We must love nothing but Him, or if we love anything else, we must love it only for His sake (St. Peter Claver).
If I love Jesus, I ought to resemble Him; If I love Jesus, I ought to love what He loves, what He does, what He prefers to all else: humility. How may we acquire this virtue? Neither logic or reflection will help us any; thinking nice thoughts about it or taking heroic resolutions would lead us to believe we had already acquired it, and we would content ourselves with that. We must examine our actions to see if we not sought our own interest in them. Let us repeat often, " Jesus, so humble of heart, make our hearts like unto thine." - St. Peter Eymard
When the communicant is free from venial sin, Jesus acts powerfully within him, unimpeded by any obstacle. He stays long. The soul acquires an astonishing refinement of feeling; it no longer accounts itself anything but is henceforth simply one with Jesus. It says to Him: " Take all, be King of all, and let us love each other always; I am Thine forever." -- St. Peter Julian Eymard
His Majesty, The Lord, rewards great services with trials, and there can be no better reward, for out of trials springs love for God. - -- St. Teresa of Avila
Love cannot triumph unless it becomes the one passion of our life. Until we have a passionate love for Our Lord in the Most Blessed Sacrament, we shall accomplish nothing. Certainly, Our Lord loves us passionately in the Eucharist ; He loves us blindly without a thought for Himself, devoting Himself entirely for our good. We should love Him as He loves us. - -- St. Peter Eymard
Love one another
Owe nothing to anyone, except to love one another; for the one who loves another has fulfilled the law. The commandments, “You shall not commit adultery; you shall not kill; you shall not steal; you shall not covet,” and whatever other commandment there may be, are summed up in this saying, namely, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself.” Love does no evil to the neighbor; hence, love is the fulfillment of the law. - Romans 13:8-10
If any one says, "I love God," and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, cannot love God whom he has not seen. And this commandment we have from him, that he who loves God should love his brother also (1 John 4:20-21).
Under the influence of fear, we bear the Cross of Christ with patience. Under the more inspiring influence of home, we carry the Cross with a firm and valiant heart. But under the consuming power of love, we embrace the Cross with ardor. -- St Bernard
In the final analysis human holiness is decided by love. Love taught by Christ becomes the fundamental characteristic of man's existence, the basic criterion of his thought and activity, the supreme summit of his aspirations (Pope John Paul II).
St. Francis of Assisi
MARKED WITH THE LOVE OF CHRIST
The Seraphim are usually considered the highest order of angelic beings, immediately above the Cherubim. Their special duty is to love God.
St. Francis of Assisi prayed this simple prayer, "O Lord Jesus Christ, two favors I beg of you before I die. The first is that I may, as far as it is possible, feel in my soul and in my body the suffering in which you, O gentle Jesus, sustained in your bitter passion. And the second favor is that I, as far as it is possible, may receive in my heart that excessive charity by which you, the Son of God, were inflamed, and which actuated you willingly to suffer so much for us sinners."
Our Lord answered his prayer by appearing to him in the form of a seraph, a six-winged angel of love. As he knelt in the ecstasy, Christ imprinted the wounds of His person in the flesh of St. Francis. At once, in his hands and feet marks like nails began to appear; and, in his left side the image of a lance-thrust appeared, red and bleeding.
St. Francis had been marked with the love of Christ- the Stigmata.
St. Andrew
DIVINE LOVE
St. Andrew, by conversing with Christ, extinguished in his breast all earthly passions and desires, and attained to the happiness of his pure divine love.
We often say to ourselves that we also desire to purchase holy love, the most valuable of all treasures, and the summit of dignity and happiness. But these desires are fruitless and mere mockery unless we earnestly set about the means.
We must first, with the apostle, leave all things; that is to say, we must sincerely and in spirit forsake the world (though we live in it), and must also renounce and die to ourselves before we can be admitted to the familiar converse of our Redeemer and God, or before he opens to us the treasure of his choicest graces.
In the same proportion that the world and self-love are banished from our hearts shall we advance in divine love. But this great virtue is learned, exercised, and improved by conversing much with God in holy meditation, reading, and assiduous prayer and recollection; also by its external acts, in all manner of good works, especially those of fraternal charity and spiritual mercy.
The price of Divine Love is not to be appreciated; for it suffices to obtain the Kingdom of Heaven, and the love of Him who has loved us so much merits the highest degree of our love. - -- St. Francis of Assisi
