List of points

May no one read sadness or sorrow in your face, when you spread in the world around you the sweet aroma of your sacrifice: the children of God should always be sowers of peace and joy.

Miles — soldier — so the Apostle calls a Christian.

So it is that in this holy and Christian war of love and peace for the happiness of all souls, there are, in God’s ranks, tired, hungry soldiers, covered in wounds… but happy. For they bear in their hearts the sure light of victory.

Every Christian has the duty to bring peace and joy to his own surroundings on earth. This cheerful crusade of manliness will move even shrivelled or rotten hearts, and raise them to God.

The world awaits us. Yes! We love the world passionately because God has taught us to: Sic Deus dilexit mundum… — God so loved the world. And we love it because it is there that we fight our battles in a most beautiful war of charity, so that everyone may find the peace that Christ has come to establish.

Fight against your harshness of character, against your selfishness, your spirit of comfort and your dislikes… We have to be co-redeemers; and, besides, consider carefully that the prize you receive will bear a very direct relation to the sowing you may have done.

The task for a Christian is to drown evil in an abundance of good. It is not a question of negative campaigns, or of being anti anything. On the contrary, we should live positively, full of optimism, with youthfulness, joy and peace. We should be understanding with everybody, with the followers of Christ and with those who abandon him, or do not know him at all.

—But understanding does not mean holding back, or remaining indifferent, but being active.

Through Christian charity and human good manners, you should make an effort not to create an unbridgeable distance between you and anybody else… You should leave a way out for others, so that they need go no further from the Truth.

Violence is not a good method for convincing anyone… Even less is it so in the apostolate.

This is how you should answer a backbiter: “I shall tell the person concerned” or “I shall speak to him about it”.

A contemporary author has written: “Going around gossiping is always inhuman; it reveals a person of mediocre quality; it is a sign of being uneducated; it shows a lack of refinement of feeling; it is unworthy of a Christian.”

You should always avoid complaining, criticising, gossiping… You must avoid absolutely anything that could bring discord among brothers.

This has to be your attitude when faced by defamation. First, forgive everyone from the very beginning and with all your heart. —Then love. Never fall into a single uncharitable act. Always respond with love!

—But if your Mother the Church is being attacked, defend her courageously. Keep calm, but be firm. Have the strength not to give in, and prevent anyone fouling up or blocking the way ahead for Christian souls when they in their turn are eager to forgive and respond with charity to personal insults.