This volume is part of Orbis Books Traditions of Christian Spirituality Series edited by Philip Sheldrake. Wendy Wright (Sacred Heart) points out in the preface that Salesian spirituality is not as well-known as the Benedictine, Franciscan, Dominican, or Carmelite traditions within Catholicism. Francis de Sales (1567-1622) was an aristocrat who turned down a high position in local government and became a priest instead. He was appointed bishop of Geneva, Italy, and during his ministry, preached and founded schools. De Sales wrote Introduction to the Devout Life, a manual of spiritual formation for lay people, and On the Love of God, which delineated the birth, growth, decline, activities, benefits, and perfection of God's love. He is remembered for his extraordinary 19-year spiritual friendship with Jane de Chantal, a widow who helped him found a women's community called the Visitation of Holy Mary. He died at the young age of 55.

Francis de Sales wrote: "As soon as a person gives a little attention to divinity a sweet feeling within the heart is experienced which shows that God is God of the heart . . . This pleasure, this confidence that the human heart naturally has in God certainly comes from nowhere else than the congruity between God's goodness and our soul." Wright does a commendable job explaining the importance of this process in the eyes of this seventeenth century bishop.

Francis de Sales believed that the human heart was made to beat in rhythm with God's heart, and he wrote about these two motions as the love of complacence (receptivity) and the love of benevolence (active love). His motto was "Live Jesus" and he taught by example, trying to practice the little virtues of humility, patience, simplicity, kindness, and gentleness. The latter was something distinctive to Salesian spirituality. Wright describes it as "being grace-filled or gracious both in external demeanour and in quality of heart." After discussing the spiritual friendship between de Sales and Jane de Chantal, the author charts the impact of the Salesian spirit on various people, lay and religious alike, over the next four centuries.