“Prayer is the light of the spirit. Prayer and converse with God is a supreme good.…I do not mean the prayer of outward observance but prayer from the heart, not confined to fixed times or periods, but continuous throughout the day and night. Our spirit should be quick to reach...
The Wisdom of the Saints….about the dignity of the human person (part 2) “’Let Us make man to Our own image and likeness.’ He did not say this of the Heavens or of the stars, but of man – not, indeed as regards man’s body, but as regards his soul,...
“I know that many say, ‘What good can prayers do for a soul that has departed this world, either with sins or without sins?’ If a king were to banish certain people who had offended him, but then their families should weave a crown and offer it to him on...
“The alarming increase of divorces in our land and the consequent break-up of family life is due principally to the loss of love for the ideal in womanhood. Marriage has become identified with pleasure, not with love. Once the pleasure ceases, love ceases. The woman is loved not for what...
“The truly blessed are not the ones who can work miracles or see angels; the truly blessed are the ones who can see their own sins.” St. Anthony the Egypt (3rd-4th centuries) “Therefore, rise, run to the Church; here is the Father, here is the Son, here is the...
“Let the young men also be blameless in all things, being especially careful to preserve purity, and keeping themselves, as with a bridle, from every kind of evil. For it is well that they should be cut off from the lusts that are in the world.” St. Polycarp of Smyrna...
“[The Church] is called Catholic, then, because it extends over the whole world, from end to end of the earth, and because it teaches universally and infallibly each and every doctrine which must come to the knowledge of men concerning things visible and invisible…because it universally treats and heals every...
“Zeal for the salvation of souls is of so great a merit before God, that to give up all our goods to the poor, or to spend our whole life in the exercises of all sorts of austerities cannot equal the merit of it. There is no service more agreeable...
“The most high and infinitely good God has not granted to angels the power with which He has invested priests.” St. John Chrysostom (4th-5th centuries, Doctor of the Church) “[about the life of a bishop]The turbulent have to be corrected, the faint-hearted cheered up, the weak supported; the Gospel’s opponents...
“Being obedient, Mary became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.” St. Irenaeus (2nd-3rd centuries) “Obedience is, in a way, the mother of all virtues.” St. Augustine of Hippo (4th-5th centuries, Doctor of the Church) “Obedience unites us so closely to God that in a...