Page: Quotes, Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
Some people by the word freedom understand the ability to do whatever one wants … People who have the more allowed themselves to come into slavery to sins, passions, and defilements more often than others appear as zealots of external freedom, wanting to broaden the laws as much as possible. But such a man uses external freedom only to more severely burden himself with inner slavery. True freedom is the active ability of a man who is not enslaved to sin, who is not pricked by a condemning conscience, to choose the better in the light of God’s truth, and to bring it into actuality with the help of the gracious power of God. This is the freedom of which neither heaven nor earth are restrict.
–Saint Philaret of Moscow (1782-1867)
Page: Quotes, Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
And so in friendship are joined honor and charm, truth and joy, sweetness and good-will, affection and action. And all these take their beginning from Christ, advance through Christ, and are perfected in Christ. Therefore, not too steep or unnatural does the ascent appear from Christ, as the inspiration of the love by which we love our friend, to Christ giving himself to us as our Friend for us to love, so that charm may follow upon charm sweetness upon sweetness and affection upon affection. And thus, friend cleaving to friend in the spirit of Christ, is made with Christ but one heart and one soul, and so mounting aloft through degrees of love to friendship with Christ, he is made one spirit with him.
— Saint Aelred of Rievaulx 1110-1167)
Page: Quotes, Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
The more you devote yourself to study of the sacred utterances, the richer will be your understanding of them, just as the more the soil is tilled, the richer the harvest.
–Saint Isidore of Seville (c. 560-636)
Page: Quotes, Prayer (why), Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
Prayer purifies us, reading instructs us. Both are good when both are possible. Otherwise, prayer is better than reading.
— Saint Isidore of Seville (c. 560-636)
Page: Quotes, Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
The principles of holy living extend to everything. For instance,
in the matter of reading, he who has given himself wholly to God,
can read only what God permits him to read. He cannot read books, however characterized by wit or power, merely to indulge an idle curiosity, or to please himself alone.
–François Fénèlon (1651-1715)
Page: Quotes, Philip Neri (1515-1595), Quote Author, Quote Topic, Spiritual (life)
Spiritual persons ought to be equally ready to experience sweetness and consolation in the things of God, or to suffer and keep their ground in drynesses of spirit and devotion, and for as long as God pleases, without their making any complaint about it.
— Saint Philip Neri (1515-1595)
