Dear brothers and sisters,
Last Thursday, for the first time since October, we have returned outdoors for our cookout. The missionaries brought the Blackstone to the front yard and delighted us with delicious burgers and sausages.
Fr. Martin started us out with a talk on three of the fruits of the Holy Spirit: love, joy, and peace. He told us that the fruit of love is the joy of loving; love is love’s own reward. The simple fact of carrying in the heart a love for someone is a joy. It is already a consolation that fortifies, that purifies, that ennobles.
Next to the fruit of charity, St. Paul places joy. And, logically, joy should follow upon love. Every lover rejoices to find the beloved. In the spiritual order, as in the natural, when love attains union, it produces joy.
Third among the fruits of the Holy Spirit is peace, which is logically connected with joy. Peace is the perfection of joy. This complete joy cannot be disturbed or snatched away; it is possessed in absolute and complete serenity.
Peace is the singular pleasure we experience when we taste the joys of our soul in their fullness. When those things that hinder the sweetness of our joy are removed, we have tranquility, peace, that celestial gift that refreshes all our faculties, that complete purification of the heart that makes us see the vanity of exterior things.
We completed the afternoon with games and fellowship.
May our Lady of Guadalupe keep you always under the mantle and protection.
Yours in Christ,
Fr. Richard, MC