St. John Baptist de la Salle
St. de la Salle was a profound thinker, a genius in the work of popular education. He embraced all classes, all conditions of society. By making the free schoolspopular, he grasped the growing needs of society in his own day and for all times. No phase of the educational problem escaped his penetrating vision.
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Excerpt from Letter #19 written on May 7, 1935 to Mrs. Antonietta Savorani, a widow from Faenza, by the Servant of God Luisa Piccarreta the Little Daughter of the Divine Will:
Fiat – In Voluntate Dei!
My good daughter in the Divine Volition,
Your letter brought me great contentment, especially in hearing that you want to strip yourself of the mourning clothes of the human will; and I briefly answer to your difficulties. To live in the Divine Will is not so difficult as you and others believe, nor does sweet Jesus want impossible things, nor can He teach difficult things; rather, in all He teaches, His love is so great that not only does He facilitate His Teachings, but in order to make all that He wants and teaches easier, He puts Himself at our disposition, doing together with us all that He wants and teaches. My daughter, everything is in a strong, firm, constant resolution to deliver our will into the hands of Jesus, so that His Will may underlie each one of our acts. Therefore, in all our being, in the most natural acts of life – in food, in sleep, in sufferings, in prayer, and also in legitimate pleasures, the Divine Will must have Its royal place, Its field of action, and our will must be the ground in which to receive these divine acts, and the footstool on which the Divine Will must place these acts; and these acts, united together, will form Its Life. Life cannot be formed with one single act, but with many acts, repeated and incessant.
Moreover, the love of Jesus, His sighs and also His tears for desire that His Will reign in us as life, are such that He never leaves us alone; He Himself descends into the depth of our will; He molds it, strengthens it, purifies it, prepares it, and does all that we do together with us. So, if we want it, everything is done; however, it is not that we must no longer feel our will: to operate on a dead will would be neither ours nor Jesus’ victory. The dead are buried. Therefore Jesus wants our will alive, so that it may feel all the good, as His operating Will lays Its acts in it. The human will becomes the residence of the Divine, and gives It all the freedom to dominate and to do whatever It wants.
Do you see, then, how easy it is? Nor does one have to be a religious to do this. The Sanctity of living in the Divine Will is for all; or rather, to tell the truth, It is for all those who want It. Therefore, get down to work; tell Jesus from the heart: “I firmly want it, I continuously want it; I want it!”, and Jesus will make wonders, and will use everything you do and suffer as raw material so that you may ask for His Will and let It operate with Its creative virtue.