Practicing Love for the Neighbor

The Spirit in which Love of Neighbor is to be practiced

In the Original Rule, there is a passage which reveals the profound thought of Mother Alphonse Maria about the real basis of love for our neighbor:
“In order to accomplish a good work with zeal and to make it meritorious in the eyes of God, it must be accomplished out of love for God. Without that intention, everything is empty and cold, because every natural motive which drives you to do something good is weak and cannot reach supernatural merits.” “Though I command languages both human and angelic – if I speak without love”, says St. Paul, “I am no more than a gong booming or a cymbal clashing” (1 Cor. 13,1), and St. John says: “Anyone who does not love remains in death” (1 John 3,14).
The love mentioned by the two apostles as motive of good deeds is not only love for our neighbor, but also love for God; love for neighbor and love for God belong together, they cannot be separated from each other. The love for our neighbor always has to have the love for God as its basis, the neighbor must be loved out of love for God.
The love for our neighbor in the Servant of God was nourished by her unconditional love for God. She was constantly concerned about the salvation of the whole person – of body and soul – because of her love for God. The desire to do good to the neighbor and to lead him to God, the highest good, has emerged since her early childhood, and she tried to pursue its accomplishment all her life in various forms. For this goal she agrees to give away not only every temporal good, but also her own life and to suffer everything God would permit of her.