The world calls for and expects from us simplicity of life, the spirit of prayer, charity towards all, especially towards the lowly and the poor, obedience and humility. Without this mark of holiness, our word will have difficulty in touching the heart of modern man. It risks being vain and sterile.
–Blessed Pope Paul VI (1897-1978)
When there is a crisis in the church, it is always here: a crisis of contemplation. The church wants to feel able to explain about her spouse even when she has lost sight of him; even when, although she has not been divorced, she no longer knows his embrace, because curiosity has gotten the better of her and she has gone searching for other people and other things.
–Carlo Carretto (1910-1988)
The Church therefore has one inescapable task: To lift up Christ. When she seeks to lift herself up she becomes weak, but when she acknowledges her own weakness and proclaims her Lord, she is strong.
–Avery Dulles (1918-2008)
Those in the Catholic Church, whom some rebuke for praying to Saints and going on pilgrimages, do not seek any Saint as their savior. Instead, they Seek saints as those whom their Savior loves, and whose intercession and prayer for the seeker He will be content to hear. For His Own sake, He would have those He loves honored. And when they are thus honored for His sake, then the honor that is given them for His sake overflows especially to Himself.
–Saint Thomas More (1478-1535)
The 15 Marks of the Catholic Church
(1) The Church’s Name, Catholic, universal, and world wide, and not confined to any particular nation or people.
(2) Antiquity, in tracing her ancestry directly to Jesus Christ.
(3) Constant Duration, in lasting substantially unchanged for so many centuries.
(4) Extensiveness, in the number of her loyal members.
(5) Episcopal Succession, of her Bishops from the first Apostles at the Last Supper to the present hierarchy.
(6) Doctrinal Agreement, of her doctrine with the teaching of the ancient Church.
(7) Union, of her members among themselves, and with their visible head, the Roman Pontiff.
(8) Holiness, of doctrine in reflecting the sanctity of GOD.
(9) Efficacy, of doctrine in its power to sanctify believers, and inspire them to great moral achievement.
(10) Holiness of Life, of the Church’s representative writers and defenders.
(11) The glory of Miracles, worked in the Church and under the Church’s auspices.
(12) The gift of Prophecy found among the Church’s saints and spokesmen.
(13) The Opposition that the Church arouses among those who attack her on the very grounds that Christ was opposed by His enemies.
(14) The Unhappy End, of those who fight against her.
(15) The Temporal Peace and Earthly Happiness of those who live by the Church’s teaching and defend her interests.
— Saint Robert Bellermine (1542-1621)
You cannot pray at home as at church, where there is a great multitude, where exclamations are cried out to God as from one great heart, and where there is something more: the union of minds, the accord of souls, the bond of charity, the prayers of the priests.
–Saint John Chrysostom (347-407)
