Wisdom of the Saints about Purity (part 4)

“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 (1st-2nd centuries)

“A great crown is laid up for you, brothers; don’t barter away a great dignity for a petty pleasure.” St. Cyril of Jerusalem (4th century, Doctor of the Church)

“In my youth, miserable wretch that I was, yes, most wretched from the first dawning of adolescence, I had begged You for chastity, and said: ‘Give me chastity and continence, but not for a while,’ for I was afraid that You might hear me too soon and heal me of the disease of concupiscence, which I wished rather to satiate than to extinguish.” St. Augustine of Hippo (4th-5th centuries, Doctor of the Church)

“Face the world as you face a tumultuous and tempestuous sea. Sail across this world in the boat of your interior peacefulness, without losing sight of the harbor. When the strong winds of its desires try to take hold of you, call for help and awake Christ sleeping in the cabin of your heart.” St. Augustine of Hippo

“He who aspires to the grace of God must be pure, with a heart as innocent as a child’s. Purity of heart is to God like a perfume, sweet and agreeable.” St. Nicholas of Flue (15th century)

“The impure then cannot love God; and those who are without love of God cannot really be pure. Purity prepares the soul for love, and love confirms the soul in purity.” St. John Henry Newman (19th century)

“When our spirit is excited, or relaxed, or depressed, when it loses its balance, when it is restless and wayward, when it is sick of what it has, and hankers after what it has not, when our eye is solicited with evil and our mortal frame trembles under the shadow of the tempter, what will bring us to ourself, to peace and to health, but the cool breath of the Immaculate and the fragrance of the Rose of Sharon? It is the boast of the Catholic religion that it has the gift of making the heart chaste; and why is this, but that it gives us Jesus Christ for our food and Mary for our nursing mother? Go to her for the royal heart of innocence. She is the beautiful gift of God which outshines the fascinations of a bad world, and which no one ever sought in sincerity and was disappointed.” St. John Henry Newman (19th century)

“Purity of heart, carefully and constantly guarded, becomes the rule and the radiance of our whole life, and of every word and deed. This virtue is the fine flower of Christian families, where it blooms as if on its natural soil; and it has an irresistible appeal for all…Purity of heart is the serene atmosphere which surrounds every earnest vocation, the soil from which must bud and flower all other good intentions…It is purity of heart which enables us to enjoy the incomparable happiness of long conversations with God in His holy tabernacle; it fosters enthusiasm for the apostolate and for charity; it inspires a continual serenity which is neither downcast in adversity nor extravagant in joy. Live in the light of this virtue, and guard it in prayer, mortification, and study.” Pope St. John XXIII (19th-20th centuries)

“The pure of heart are those who control all lusts, not as a denial of love, but as a guarding of it until the body can be used as God wills it to be used…As clouds hide the sun, so habits of an unclean mind hide God. Impurity is a cataract on the eye of the soul.” Ven. Fulton Sheen (19th-20th centuries)

“When you decide firmly to lead a clean life, chastity will not be a burden on you. It will be a crown of triumph.” St. Josemaria Escriva (20th century)

“In these times of ours, in which the true beauty of conjugal love is threatened in so many ways – threatened together with the dignity of fatherhood and motherhood – have courage! Have inflexible courage to look for it, to bear witness to it to each other, and to the world. Be apostles of the dignity of parenthood. Be apostles of beautiful love.” Pope St. John Paul II (20th-21st centuries)

“People cannot understand chastity: some think it is mad; some think it is difficult; some think it has no value. Nevertheless, in God’s eyes, it has great value. A true life of chastity can be realized only with the help of God, Who alone can give meaning to chastity.” Ven. Francis Xavier Nguyen Van Thuan (20th-21st centuries)