There is something astonishingly hopeful in the idea that strong passions are the precious raw material of sanctity. The very energies that once pulled us away from God can, when surrendered, become the fuel that draws us home. Nothing in us is wasted, not our longing, not our intensity, not even our mistakes. All of it can be gathered into grace.
Many people carry the quiet fear that they are “too much” too broken, too inconsistent, too sinful, too complicated for God. But Fulton Sheen reminds us that it is not the wrong we have done that keeps us from God; it is only our persistence in staying there. The moment we turn, even slightly, the Heart of Christ opens wide.
I once knew someone who believed she could never change. Her temper was fierce, her self‑criticism relentless, and her past full of choices she wished she could erase. She tried to “fix herself” through sheer willpower, but every attempt left her more discouraged.
Everything shifted the day she stopped trying to love herself first and instead asked Christ to love her into loving herself. She prayed simply:
“Take my wildness, my intensity, my tangled emotions, use them for You.”
And slowly, she discovered what Sheen calls a “passionless passion,” a “wild tranquility.” Her strong emotions didn’t disappear; they were redirected. What once fueled self‑rejection began to fuel compassion. What once erupted in anger began to deepen her empathy. She learned to see herself the way Christ sees her—beloved, unfinished, and full of possibility.
This is the gardener’s wisdom: Christ does not cut away our green shoots to punish us, but to help the rose bloom more beautifully.
Like the Magdalene, like Paul, anyone who turns toward Christ discovers that holiness is not about erasing passion but transforming it. Mortification, Sheen says, is only good when done out of love, when it clears space for God’s life to flourish within us.
And this is where self‑love rooted in Christ becomes real. We do not love ourselves because we are flawless; we love ourselves because God loves us first, fiercely and without reserve.
When we allow Christ to redirect our passions, we begin to live inside this truth: Love is our origin, our calling, and our destiny.
And in that love, even our weaknesses become doorways to grace. As we love ourselves through Christ.
Smitten With Goodness 