Thursday, June 22 : Saint Vincent de Paul

Where is the heart that loves? On the thing it loves. Therefore, where our love is, there our heart is held captive. It cannot leave it; it cannot be lifted higher, it cannot go either to the right or the left; see, it is fixed. Where the miser’s treasure is, there is his heart; and where our heart is, there is our treasure. And what is so deplorable is that the things that hold us in servitude are, for the most part, such unworthy things. And what is this? Some nothing, some imagination, a bitter word spoken to us, a lack of gracious welcome, a little refusal, the mere thought that someone doesn’t think much of us: all these things wound and put us out to such an extent that we are unable to let them go! Self-love attaches us to these imaginary wounds; we don’t know how to escape them, we are always inside ourselves. And why? Because we are prisoners of this emotion… Are we in “the freedom of the children of God”? (Rm 8,21). Or are we chained to goods, comforts, honors?… O Savior, you have opened up the door of liberty to us; teach us to find it! Make us understand the importance of our enfranchisement; make us turn to you to come to it. Enlighten us, O my Savior, that we may see what we are attached to, and please set us in the freedom of the children of God.

Roman Extraordinary (Tridentine) Daily Readings – rosary,team