"All that [Our Lord] demands of [us] is to have recourse to Him with an entire confidence. And can anything be more reasonable? Is it possible that the amiable Shepherd (Luke 15) who for upwards of thirty-three years sought after the lost sheep through rough and thorny ways, with so much pain that it cost Him the last drop of His Sacred Blood? Is it possible, I say, that so good a Shepherd, seeing at last His strayed sheep returning to Him with a design of being guided for the future by Him alone, and with a sincere, but weak intention to obey Him, He should not look upon it with pity, listen to its cries, nor bear it upon His shoulders to the fold?"

~ Dom Lawrence Scupoli, The Spiritual Combat.

This book was originally published in Venice in 1589 A.D. St. Francis de Sales carried it everywhere with him for many years, reading it and rereading it.

(Saints Peter and Paul Church in Athlone, Ireland)