St. Francis De Sales

St. Francis explains to us Christ’s teachings regarding discipleship to relationships with the opposite sex by using an analogy. St. Francis uses honey, safe and poisoned, to describe relationships. He explains to us how the choicest flowers are going to be the flowers in which the delicious honey will come from. Similarly, a relationship between a man and a woman will grow in purity if it based off of good qualities. He goes on to tell us how poisonous flowers will poison the honey that comes from them. Correspondingly, if a relationship is based off of things that are vain, it takes away and poisons the relationship. As St. Francis clearly states, in his book Philothea, “All such friendships are bad, foolish, and vain, tending to sin” (169).
St. Francis continues to talk about the dangers of eating dangerous, poisoned honey. No matter which type of honey one is looking at, they look the same. Therefore, it is easy for a person to be unable to tell which is poisonous. When in a relationship with a person, no matter what sex, it is crucial to be founded on God’s love. If one starts the relationship on vanity, then one will fall through right into the trap that the Devil has set for God’s children to step.
When a friendship does not consist of God’s love then it will not be able to grow and thrive in the way that He intended it to grow. As one grows towards the other person, in an unworthy way, the relationship continues in vain because they are only showing affection to the other person for their own gratification. However, as one grows towards the other person, in a worth way, the relationship will thrive with God’s love and grace.
In order for true friendship to become perfect, St. Francis says that “the more your friendship stands on the foundation of virtue” (172). The spiritual relationship between two people, and two souls, bring them together. This spiritual relationship continues to grow and prosper, and therefore, building upon the virtue of the foundation that St. Francis speaks of in his book. Anything that is not based upon virtue is “but empty shadows as compared” (173).