List of points

Nobody is happy on earth until he decides not to be. This is the way the path goes: suffering — in Christian terms! — the Cross; God’s Will, Love; happiness here and, afterwards, eternally.

Servite Domino in laetitia! — I will serve God cheerfully. With a cheerfulness that is a consequence of my Faith, of my Hope and of my Love — and that will last for ever. For, as the Apostle assures us, Dominus prope est!… — the Lord follows me closely. I shall walk with Him, therefore, quite confidently, for the Lord is my Father, and with his help I shall fulfil his most lovable Will, even if I find it hard.

A piece of advice I have insisted on repeatedly: be cheerful, always cheerful. —Sadness is for those who do not consider themselves to be children of God.

I am trying to spare myself nothing, to help my younger brothers ‘tread softly’ as you asked us. There are so many joys to be found in ‘having it tough’.

Another man of faith wrote to me: “When you have to be on your own, you can notice clearly the help of your brothers. Now, when it comes to my mind that I have to put up with everything ‘all alone’, I often think that, if it weren’t for that ‘company we keep from afar’ — the holy Communion of Saints! — I would not be able to preserve this optimism which fills my heart.”

Don’t forget that sometimes one needs to have smiling faces around.

“You are all so cheerful, and one doesn’t expect that,” I heard someone say.

It has been happening for a long time; insistently and with diabolical determination, Christ’s enemies never tire of complaining that the people who give themselves to God are all sullen. And, unfortunately, some of those who wish to be ‘good’ have lent support to those words, with their ‘sad virtues’.

—We give you thanks, Lord, because you have chosen to count on our cheerful, very happy lives to erase that false caricature.

—I also ask You that we may not forget it.

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.

The cheerfulness of a man of God, of a woman of God, has to overflow: it has to be calm, contagious, attractive…; in a few words, it has to be so supernatural, and natural, so infectious that it may bring others to follow Christian ways.

“Happy?” —The question made me think.

—Words have not yet been invented to express all that we feel — in the heart and in the will — when we know ourselves to be children of God.

Christmas time. You write: “Together with the holy expectation of Mary and Joseph, I also impatiently await the Child. How happy I shall feel at Bethlehem! I have a feeling that I won’t be able to contain this joy without bounds. Yes! but, with Him, I also want to be born anew.”

—I hope you really mean what you say!

A sincere resolution: to make the way lovable for others and easy, since life brings enough bitterness with it already.

There are many who feel unhappy, just because they have too much of everything. —Christians, if they really behave as God’s children, will suffer discomfort, heat, tiredness, cold… But they will never lack joy, because that — all that! — is ordained or permitted by Him who is the source of true happiness.

Faced by all those men without faith, without hope; by minds desperately near the borders of anguish, seeking for a meaning in their life, you found your purpose: Him!

This discovery will permanently inject a new happiness into your existence, it will transform you, and present you with an immense daily hoard of beautiful things of which you were unaware, and which show you the joyful expanse of that broad path that leads you to God.

Your happiness on earth is identified with your fidelity to faith, to purity and to the way God has marked out for you.

Give thanks to God that you are happy, with a deep joy which has no need to be noisy.

With God, I thought, every day seems more attractive. I can see “little bits” at a time. One day I notice some wonderful detail; on another, I discover a sight I had not seen before… At this rate, it is impossible to say what will happen next.

Then, I noticed that He was reassuring me: “Your happiness will grow greater every day, for you will be drawn deeper and deeper into that divine adventure, into that great ‘complication’ with which you have become involved. And you will realise that I will never abandon you.”

Happiness is a consequence of self-surrender. It is re-affirmed every time you turn the water-wheel.

What changeless joy you feel after having given yourself to God! But you must feel a great concern and desire for everyone to share in your joy!

All the things that are now worrying you can be solved by making an effort to smile for love of God.

Optimism? Yes, always! Even when things seem to turn out badly: perhaps that is the time to break into a song, with a Gloria, because you have sought refuge in Him, and nothing but good can come to you from Him.

Hope does not mean beginning to see the light, but trusting with one’s eyes closed that the Lord possesses the light fully, and lives in its clarity. He is the Light.

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.

If you cut any hint of envy out at the roots, and if you sincerely rejoice in other people’s success, you will not lose your joy.