Could Great leaders be great in this modern world.
Reflecting on the life of St Louis IX on his feast day which has just passed, I thought I would do some research on him, although I had a good grasp of the generalities of his life, I was curious to learn more and I have always found that when researching the Saints you often find something specific in their life that reflects and helps you in yours.
Scrolling through the pages of The Glory of Christendom by Warren Carroll it hit me straight in the face! This man was most certainly great and most certainly saintly but what would he make of France today!
I thought how could anyone achieve such great social heights in todays society. St Louis was to be frank truly zealous in the good connotations of the word! His people loved him for it. What would todays Frenchman make of him, in fact what would any people think of a ruler who truly believed in the Lord our God and his awesome power to the point of ordering society to do his will.
We have lost something, we are no longer peoples, just disparate groups of people who happen to live in the same city, country, continent etc. No wonder there is so much crime, so much strife and so little community. No one has a shared goal and no one would tolerate a holy leader, a leader full of love for the one true King Christ!
This if anything for me cements the need for a society based on truly shared values not the hollow non-descript sad and flabby values of modern society but truly shared values. We can see some shining examples of this in Europe today and they are just a shadow, a glimmer if you will of what was achieved by Louis, by Alfonso the Great, by Alfred of Wessex. I am of course talking of Hungary and Poland.
It is to easy to become pessimistic during these times of desolation, watching a world which rejects the precepts of Christ is hard, however on a visit to Hungary I was amazed to see a still flourishing Catholic society, busy churches at all hours, a very modestly dressed population that are now bucking the popular trend, thanks to the family friendly policies of Prime Minster Victor Orban. I do wonder if Mr Orban looks to the likes of St Stephen and St Louis at times of hardship for inspiration.
Getting back to Louis, I do believe very strongly that young people especially young men should be introduced to the great leaders of the Christian world, there is such a gap in role models with modern celebrities being weak, sinful and quite frankly often vile human beings with very shallow lives and a total lack of faith.
Louis to me, embodied so much of what I admire in the non-clerical saints. He was a member of the laity but lived a life so close to one who has taken holy orders, without losing his focus on the role he had to fulfil, I think that’s where so many of us in the laity go wrong, including myself. It’s such a balancing act to be good husbands, fathers, sons, to fulfil our work obligations to be a success in our careers whilst still keeping to a life dedicated to piety. I don’t know about the rest of you but I find myself hitting great heights (for me) where I will be praying rosaries, vespers, compline, reading whole chapters of the bible and then work or personal matters will crash me back to reality and then I will start to make excuses for myself. It’s at this point that I think of the likes of King Louis IX he had a kingdom to rule, a court full of intrigue to deal with, a crusade to run and he still managed it. It’s with this inspiration I try harder and it’s in this, I feel that reading about these great men helps. Hopefully it will help others out there, maybe having a moment of doubt to carry on, do what needs to be done to pick the rosary back up to open that Bible to finish that saintly book!
God Love you and St Louis please intercede for us.
AC