Becoming a saint…
Jesus does not want from me a mediocre virtue, but a high one: He is not happy with me until I become, or at least I am committed to becoming a saint.
–Saint John XXIII (1881-1963)
Have hope and firm faith…
Have hope and firm faith in God, for He will help you in everything. Act, move, believe, strive, hope, cry out to Him with all your heart, for without doubt you will see marvelous things, if you direct everything to the praise and glory of His Majesty and the good of souls.
–Saint Angela Merici (1474-1540)
When someone loves God…
When you are in love, surely your constant concern is to be near the beloved at any and every opportunity, and you avoid anything that would hinder you from being in the company and society of your loved one. So it is when someone loves God. One constantly desires to be with him and speak with him. This can only be achieved through pure prayer, so let us apply ourselves to prayer with all our strength, for it makes us become like the Lord.
–Saint Theodorus the Ascetic (Seventh Century)
Make a fresh start…
When you arise it on each day, make a fresh start in every virtue and commandment of God with greatest patience, with fear and long-suffering, and the love of God, with all spiritual and physical fervor, and with much humiliation.
–The Desert Fathers (and Mothers)
Live quietly and…
Just as grass does not grow at all on a well-traveled road, even if you sow seed on the road, because the ground is trampled down, so it is with us: Live quietly, apart from things, and you will see plants growing that you had no knowledge of because they were within you and you were trampling them down.
–The Desert Fathers (and Mothers)
Love and self-control…
Love and self-control liberate the soul from its obsessions. Reading and reflection deliver the intellect from ignorance. Regular prayer brings the soul into the very presence of God.
–Saint Maximos the Confessor (580-662)
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