Prayer is a…

John Chrysostom (347-407), Page: Quotes, Prayer (what), Prayer (why), Quote Author

It is simply impossible to lead, without the aid of prayer, a virtuous life. What prayer could be more true before God the Father than that which the Son, who is Truth, uttered with His own lips? Prayer is the place of refuge for every worry, a foundation for cheerfulness, a source of constant happiness, a protection against sadness.
–Saint John Chrysostom (347-407)

Three sorts of prayer…

Catherine of Siena (1347-1380), Page: Quotes, Prayer (what), Quote Author, Quote Topic

Prayer is of three sorts. The one is perpetual: it is holy perpetual desire, which prays in the sight of God…  for this desire directs all thy works, spiritual and corporal, to His honor, and therefore it is called perpetual…The other kind is vocal prayer, when the offices or other prayers are said aloud. This is ordained to reach the third – that is, mental prayer: your soul reaches this when it uses vocal prayer in prudence and humility, so that while the tongue speaks the heart is not far from God… And whenever one felt one’s mind to be visited by God, so that it was drawn to think of its Creator in any wise, it ought to abandon vocal prayer, and to fix its mind with the force of love upon that wherein it sees God visit it.
–Saint Catherine of Siena  (1347-1380)

Giving up prayer…

Fulton Sheen (1895-1979), Page: Quotes, Prayer (what), Prayer (why), Quote Author, Struggle (with Sin)

No soul ever fell away from God without giving up prayer. Prayer is that which establishes contact with Divine Power and opens the invisible resources of heaven. However dark the way, when we pray, temptation can never master us. The first step downward in the average soul is the giving up of the practice of prayer, the breaking of the circuit with divinity, and the proclamation of one’s owns self sufficiency.
–Blessed Fulton Sheen  (1895-1979)