I was positively amazed when I read the phrases of love (obviously a pure, chaste, supernatural love) that St. Francis de Sales wrote to St. Jane Frances de Chantal. What strikes me in a particular way is the love that St. Francis de Sales nurtured for the soul of Chantal. Another thing that astonishes me, as I read these expressions of love, is that the holy Bishop of Geneva and the co‑foundress of the Visitation Order loved each other so intensely that their beautiful souls seemed almost fused together. Who knows how many degrees of glory they have merited in Heaven for having loved each other on this earth in such a pure and supernatural way! In fact, for every act of charity (the supernatural love that comes from God) performed in the state of grace, the soul receives from God an eternal reward. It is one thing to save one’s soul by a hair’s breadth; it is quite another to be saved with the merits of a great saint.Here are some phrases of love taken from the letters that St. Francis de Sales (the saint of gentleness) wrote to St. Jane Frances:
“I love more tenderly than ever what I love, and first of all your soul.”
“I know that my soul is in you and yours is in me… I never celebrate Mass without you, and I never receive Communion without you; in substance, I am as much yours as you could desire.”
“My desire to love you and to be loved by you has no measure smaller than eternity.”
“God has given me to you in a unique, entire, irrevocable way.”
“It will never be possible for anything to separate me from your soul.”
“I have never felt so much affection as I now feel for our soul and our most united heart.”
“I wish I could express to you the feeling I had today, while receiving Communion, of our dear unity, for it was a great, perfect, sweet, powerful feeling, such that it could almost be called a vow or a consecration.”
“I will change nothing of the resolution I have made to be a man truly yours and wholly yours, without reserve and without exception. I use the language of my heart and not that of our time. And, according to my way of seeing things, when I said that I am entirely yours, I said everything; and if I did not say this, I said far too little.”
“[It is God] who, with His love, has bound me and even consecrated me to be, to live, to die, and to live again forever yours and wholly yours.”
“I am yours. Jesus wills it, and so I am.”
“I am the one whom Jesus has made yours without end, without reserve, without comparison.”
“I am for you what God knows.”
“In Him and through Him, our heart is one and indivisible.”
“I have a very particular light that makes me see how the unity of our heart is the work of that great Unifier, and therefore, from now on, I intend not only to respect but to love and honor this unity as something sacred.”
“For me nothing has importance except God, for whom and by whose grace, nevertheless, I love more tenderly than ever what I love, and first of all your soul. I am more yours than I can say in this world, for the words that could express this love do not exist.”
“Dearest Mother, always love your poor dear soul which I possess, for I love without measure, without comparison, and more than can be expressed, my dearest soul which you possess. I mean: let us greatly love this one single soul and this one single life that God has been pleased to give us for His service.”
[The translation was made starting from the Italian version of the above mentioned thoughts taken from “Tutte le lettere - San Francesco di Sales”, Edizioni Paoline, 1967, edizione italiana a cura di Luigi Rolfo].