You're listening to Catholic Sprouts, the daily podcast third day in the 12th month and year of our Lord

2022. My name is Sir Roland Paterlot, and you're listening to Saturdays with Sir Roland

on Catholic Sprouts where every Saturday we discuss the art of dragon slain. Today is the memorial of St. Francis Xavier.

He was good friends with St. Ignatius of Laola and one of the founding members of the Jesuit

Order. St. Francis was full of passion and zeal to spread the good news of Jesus to the ends of

the earth, and that is exactly what he did. He was a missionary in India and Japan and many other places as well.

St. Francis Xavier is a good tie-in to our topic today, which is the virtue of admiration.

The last couple weeks we've been discussing the orange dragon of invidia, which tempt us to the

dangerous and deadly sin of envy. To combat envy, we are called to see the beauty and creativity in all of

creation, and remember that God loves each of us with our unique talents and abilities. St. Francis

Xavier encountered many different types of people with different customs and different languages.

And while at first that might seem like an obstacle to converting people to Christianity,

Francis knew, maybe more than anybody, that wherever you can find goodness and beauty and truth, you can find God.

He was truly a people person, and his love for other people was ultimately what helped him

draw them into a relationship with the author of love, God.

He knew there was only one God, and all people were searching for that God,

and God was seeking a relationship with all people. This allowed Francis to introduce other people

to the one true God, perhaps by using things they already knew and loved, and helping them realize

that everything we have is a gift from God, including our unique talents and abilities. If you remember the battle cries we're creating for each deadly dragon, there's four parts.

There's the color and sin of the dragon, the legendary dragon slayer, the weapon to defeat it,

and the armor to protect ourselves.

So far with the orange dragon, we've discussed what envy is, and last week we listened to a letter that was written by St. Joseph, the legendary dragon slayer.

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