DAILY MEDITATION (WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 27)
MEDITATION OF THE DAY
To Hear and Accept
Sister Angela, unworthy servant of Jesus Christ, to her beloved daughters and sisters, the leaders of the Company of Saint Ursula:
May the strength and true consolation of the Holy Spirit be in you all, so that you can sustain and carry out vigorously and faithfully the charge laid upon you, and at the same time look forward to the great reward which God has prepared for you if you strive, each one for her part, to be faithful and full of concern for [the girls] who have been entrusted to you, to guard them and watch over them as most vigilant shepherds and good servants. How much, therefore, must you pray God to enlighten you, and direct you, and teach you what you have to do for love of him in this task…. So also, you must consider in what manner you must esteem them, for the more you esteem them, the more you will love them; the more you love them, the more you will care for and watch over them.
And it will be impossible for you not to cherish them day and night, and to have them all engraved in your heart, one by one, for this is how real love acts and works. And this charge must not be a burden for you; on the contrary, you have to thank God most greatly that he has deigned to see to it that you are among those he wants to spend themselves in governing and safeguarding such a treasure, his own. Grace certainly great and destiny inestimable, if you are willing to recognize it….
Have hope and firm faith in God, for he will help you in everything. Pray to him, humble yourselves under his great power, because, without doubt, as he has given you this charge, so he will give you also the strength to be able to carry it out, provided you do not fail for your part. Act, move, believe, strive, hope, cry out to him with all your heart, for without doubt you will see marvelous things, if you direct everything to the praise and glory of his Majesty and the good of souls.
Saint Angela Merici
Saint Angela of Merici († 1540) was the foundress of the Company of Saint Ursula, the first teaching order of women religious in the Church. / From the “Counsels Addressed to Leaders.” Available online at: https://www.istitutosecolareangelamerici.org/the-writings/?lang=en.
