原文|Bishop Barron

翻译|Carrie

朋友们，今天我们纪念传教士和殉道者圣约翰·德布雷博夫和圣伊扎克·犹果。我们只有在爱中不顾一切，圣神才会在我们心中增长。毕竟天主就是爱，从不积聚自我，而是奉献自我。

 

若我们苦苦执着于保存自己的生命和安全，我们实际上得不偿失。在精神上，这个事实既残酷又无情，但本质简单。耶稣的一生正是如此，以十字架上的死亡达到最高潮。同样，圣人的人生也毫不例外。

 

圣托马斯·莫尔不顾声誉、故土、家庭、朋友的敬重、自己最后的生命；圣伊扎克·犹果在传教时被听众咬掉手指，他返回法国，但随后又回去传教地殉道；德兰修女舍弃修道院的安逸，走进世上最破败的贫民窟。

 

这样的例子数不胜数，紧握生命，你就失去生命；投资生命，在爱中把生命奉献出去，你就得到三十倍、六十倍、一百倍的回报。

 

Friends, today we celebrate the missionaries and martyrs Sts. John de Brébeuf and St. Isaac Jogues. The spirit of God grows in us only in the measure that it is risked in love. God, after all, is love. Not the hoarding of being, but the giving away of being.

 

In the measure that we strive to preserve our life and security by hanging on, we in fact lose the little that we have. It is brutal, unforgiving, but simply in the nature of things spiritually. You see it in the life of Jesus, which culminates in death on the cross. You see it, invariably, in the lives of the saints.

 

St. Thomas More risked reputation, home, family, the esteem of his friends, and ultimately his life; St. Isaac Jogues had his fingers chewed off by the people he was trying to convert, returned to France, and then went back to his death; Mother Teresa left the comfort of her convent for the worst slums in the world.

 

And on and on it goes. Cling to your life and you will lose it; invest it, throw it away in love, and you will get it back thirty, sixty, and a hundredfold.