“It is better to burn than to know” (Saint Bernard of Clairvaux).
Saint Bernard, an ardent preacher, proclaims here the primacy of love. He was able to inflame his listeners with the love of God and to present the monastic life to them in such an attractive way, with all the praises imaginable, that mothers began to hide their children from him so that they would not all follow him to the monastery.
The aim of our Lenten meditations is to become better disciples of the Lord, disciples who, with great conviction, bear witness to the love of our Father in these difficult times. His love has been revealed to us in a unique way in His Son Jesus Christ.
Thanks to the Desert Fathers, we have come to know the term “discretion”, which has a broad meaning related to “discernment of spirits”. Discretion thus helps us to distinguish prudently between the good and the bad, the true and the false, the authentic and the artificial. Later we will apply this concept to the spiritual life as well, when we look at how we can live our spiritual life wisely so that it bears much fruit.
