It is impossible to keep spiritual peace if we do not take care of the mind, that is if we do not drive out thoughts that are displeasing to God and, on the contrary, keep thoughts which are pleasing to God. It is necessary to look into the heart with mind and see what is done there. Is it peaceful or not? If not, then find out in what you have sinned.
–Saint Silouan the Athonite (1866-1938)
Immediately before, and for a good while after, my religious conversion, I was of the opinion that to lead a religious life meant one had to give up all that was secular and to live totally immersed in thoughts of the Divine. But gradually I realized that something else is asked of us in this world and that, even in the contemplative life, one may not sever the connection with the world. I even believe that the deeper one is drawn into God, the more one must “go out of oneself”, that is, one must go out to the world in order to carry the divine life into it.
–Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (1891-1942)
We cannot last long travelling in the desert if we do not have a simple and humble heart and if we still expect from life something other than God alone.
–René Voillaume (1905–2003)
Even in the act of true contemplative prayer, it is well to remember these strong words of Saint Paul’s: “If I speak in the tongues of mortals and of angels, but do not have love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but do not have love, I am nothing.” (1 Cor 13:1–2). It is therefore essential that anyone who… is called to a contemplative life should take more care than anyone else that his prayer be a work of love, and that it be an authentic and living one.
–René Voillaume (1905–2003)
We should humbly and realistically accept our limitations both in prayer and in action. It rests with us to devote ourselves to prayer, to prepare ourselves for it, to begin to pray, and to advance as best as we can, but we will come up against a limit beyond which only the Holy Spirit can enable us to pass. It is the same with action. We can indeed expend ourselves on a variety of activities but we shall find our limitations in the strength we bring to them, in our courage an detachment, and, above all, in the perfecting of our charity. Only the Holy Spirit can take us beyond these limitations. Whether in prayer or in action, we are, then, wholly dependent on the Holy Spirit.
–René Voillaume (1905–2003)
I have shed many tears. I have, however, also obtained a favor; after each suffering I understood more clearly Jesus’ conduct towards me… This grace consists in accepting suffering with joy in the firm hope that suffering will come to an end one day.
–Marcel Nguyễn Tân Văn (1928–1959)
