Gladness and Thanksgiving

My advise to you my friends, is to turn aside occasionally from troubled and anxious pondering on the paths you may be treading, and to travel on smoother ways where the gifts of God are quietly savored. So that the thoughts of Him may give breathing space to you whose consciences are worried. I should like you to experience for yourselves the truth of the words: Make the Lord your joy and He will give you what your heart desires. Sorrow for sin is necessary, but it should not be endless in preoccupation. You must dwell also on the glad remembrance of God’s loving kindness, otherwise sadness will harden the heart and lead it more deeply into despair.

You must fix your attention on the ways of “God, see how He mitigates the bitterness of the heart that is crushed, how He wins back the timid soul from the abyss of despair, how He consoles the grief-stricken and strengthens the wavering with the sweet caress of His faithful love.

His loving mercy is greater than all iniquity. Think of the Lord with goodness, seek Him in simplicity of heart. You will all the more easily achieve this if you let your minds dwell frequently on the memory of God’s bountifulness.

Love without measure: extracts from the writings of St. Bernard of Clairvaux, Introduced and arranged by Paul Diemer. Cistercian Publications, 1990.