The central question of the Book of Job is, ‘has anyone loved god for no reason?’ This is a conversation between god and the devil. As the devil was returning back from the earth, god casually asked the devil, did you meet my servant Job, the most righteous man? The devil replied, oh yeah, he is doing well with you, because you have given him everything. And the devil asks god, ‘Has anyone loved you for no reason?’ That is where the testing begins; God strips Job of everything.
Francis of Assisi perhaps was someone who loved god for no reason; he had no strings attached to his love for God. For example, he composed the Candice of the sun, when he was in excruciating eye pain and sickness. Biographers say that for him even looking at the sun was like glass pieces being crushed in his eyes. It was not a time when he would have loved the sun that he wrote the canticle in praise of the sun.
Notes taken during my annual retreat, preached by Bobby Jose Kattikad, Capuchin.
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