Conference Matter for Religious

"To attain the perfection of the Religious State many efficient and powerful means are presented to us by the masters of the spiritual life. Among these means spiritual conferences hold a place of preeminence. From the very foundation of the Religious State, beginning, we may say, with our Blessed Lord's invitation to lead a life according to the Evangelical Counsels, conferences upon the nature, principles, virtues and obligations of the Religious State, have been at all times an unfailing source of spiritual nourishment to the members of every Order. The Ancient Fathers of the Desert kept alive their fervor, zeal and faithful observance of the precious Counsels of Jesus Christ, by imbibing their Master's own Spirit from the ever living, fruitful word of God, spoken to them by those appointed to be their guides to life eternal. It is in the conferences addressed to Religious that the Divine Sower casts the seeds of holiness, fecundates them with the dew of His heavenly graces, and enables them to bear the rich fruit of perfection. In the spiritual conference the soul is lifted above the things of earth into that celestial atmosphere where she contemplates the infinite perfections of the heavenly Bridegroom and consequently draws from this living fountain of eternal life the precious gift of divine love. In the spiritual conference we are edified by the examples taken from the lives of the saints and from the multitude of generous souls whose lives have been consecrated to God by the most noble sacrifices that man can offer to his Creator. In the spiritual conferences we are instructed in our duties, and our obligations are brought home to us with that earnest solicitude that imparts resoluteness to our purpose and the firm conviction that fidelity to God and to sacred duty will alone purchase for us the as imperishable crown promised by our Heavenly Father as His own reward to those who persevere unto the end." - Fr. Brown C.SS. R.