This blessed friend is Jesus; it is his will and plan that we hang on to him, and hold tight always, in whatever circumstances; for whether we are filthy or clean is all the same to his love.
— Saint Julian of Norwich (1342-1416)
Three things make a person worthy of God’s path, and three things cause them to recognize it and enter onto it. First, submit to God and relinquish all your ideas about control. Hold on to God’s grace and determine to keep it by forgiving everyone in all things, as far as is humanly possible. Second, stay on God’s path by welcoming all things, except for sin. This will keep your heart open and flexible. Third, remain on this path by doing all things well for God’s honor. That’s why I think doing simple things is just as important in God’s sight as the highest states of contemplation. Why? Whatever I do for love gives honor to God. It’s all one and the same. There’s no high or low. But whenever I sin, I step off this path.
–Mechthild of Magdeburg (Thirteenth Century)
Spirituality is not to be learned by flight from the world, or by running away from things, or by turning solitary and going apart from the world. Rather, we must learn an inner solitude wherever or with whomsoever we may be. We must learn to penetrate things and find God there.
–Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)
To get at the core of God at his greatest, one must first get to the core of himself at his least, for no one can know God who has not first known himself. This core is a simple stillness, which is unmoved itself but by whose immobility all things are moved and all receive life.
–Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)
With the love of God, people will be able to accept and endure whatever happens to them. They will gently forget the harm that is done to them. There is nothing else in human experience that will bring you as close to God or form a more certain bond.
–Meister Eckhart (1260-1328)
Let us find ourselves… in love; root ourselves in it like trees, build ourselves on it as a firm foundation founded on love for God which makes us his mansion and his temple in which he dwells; let us, rooted in love for our neighbor which makes us fruitful, give forth leaves of help and fruit of sustenance. Those who are thus founded and rooted can, to a certain extent, understand what is the length and breadth and depth and height of love. Its breadth extends to our enemies; its length perseveres to the end; its height makes it all powerful, and its depth makes us attribute nothing to ourselves but all to the love God bears for us.
–Francisco de Osuna (1497-1541)
