Salesian Spirituality for Lent: Purified by God’s Grace & Personal Effort, by Derek Rotty

By Derek Rotty, Catholic Exchange, Feb. 16. 2026

Derek Rotty is a husband, father, teacher, and free-lance writer who lives in Jackson, Tennessee. He has written extensively on Catholic history, culture, faith formation, and family. He recently published his book Prophet of Hope: Fulton Sheen Responds to the Modern World, available on Amazon. Find out more about him & his work at www.derekrotty.com.

Editor’s Note: This Lenten series aims to unpack De Sales’ rich spiritual wisdom, applying it to the penitential season and to our lives as disciples generally. Catch up on the rest of the series here!

Author’s Note: All quotes from Introduction to the Devout Life, by St. Francis de Sales, are taken from John K. Ryan’s translation, published in 1966 by Image/Doubleday (ISBN: 0-385-03009-6). References include the part and the section. For example, Part IV, Section 3 is cited as (IV.3).

Having examined St. Francis de Sales’s exhortation to perseverance (in Part Four of the Introduction), which is helpful at the beginning of Lent, it is right to turn and examine the pilgrimage along which he guided “Philothea”—the soul interested in growing in devotion. The bishop and spiritual director aimed to move souls from initial desire toward a resolution to total espousal of the devout life. Thus, from its first pages, this entire text intended to guide readers toward the transformation their wills—that is, the seat of the deepest desires of their souls.

Practical as ever, De Sales begins by defining devotion, “a virtue most pleasing to God’s majesty.” To make his point simple and abundantly clear, as he was wont to do in writing and preaching, the teacher capitalizes on an analogy. Using the connection and contrast between walking and running, he teaches that charity is analogous to walking, while devotion is analogous to the “spiritual agility and vivacity” of running. Devotion, thus, “consists in a certain degree of eminent charity”; it “makes us prompt, active, and faithful in observance of God’s commands”; and, finally, “it arouses us to do quickly and lovingly as many good works as possible, both those commanded and those merely counselled or inspired” (I.1). Beyond that, he recommends devotion as “the delight of delights and queen of the virtues…the perfection of charity” (I.2). …

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