Quote for the Day

[Shin]

'The things of this life are only really happy, as far as they prepare us for the eternal life which follows.'

St. Ignatius of Loyola

[Shin]

'Be assured that in the study of perfection, as in that of the sciences, any act animated by holy fervor makes more progress than a thousand others produced by sloth; so that what the careless man acquires with trouble, after many years, the fervent man readily obtains in a short time.'

St. Ignatius of Loyola

[Shin]

'Those only are to be called poor and unhappy, who are in hell, who have lost God for eternity, not those who are poor on earth.'

St. Benedict Joseph Labre

[Shin]

'To conquer himself is the greatest victory that man can gain.'

St. Ignatius of Loyola

[Shin]

'Take care that your prayer becomes more and more interior, in pure faith; humble yourself, and seek no consolations but the great God Who gives them.'

St. Paul of the Cross

[Shin]

'How beautiful to look upon is the starry firmament! Yet it is only the portal of the blessed country where I hope to go one day.'

St. Paul of the Cross

[Shin]

'We must love this Sacred Heart, with all our strength and with all our capacity. Yes, we must love Him, and He will establish His empire and will reign in spite of all His enemies and their opposition.'

St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

[Shin]

'Among the things we ought to ask of God, is perseverance in well-doing and in serving the Lord; because, if we only have patience, and persevere in the good life we have begun to lead, we shall acquire a most eminent degree of spirituality.'

St. Philip Neri

[Shin]

'The saints suffered everything with joy, patience, and perseverance, because they loved. As for us, we suffer with anger, vexation, and weariness, because we do not love. If we loved God, we should love crosses, we should wish for them, we should take pleasure in them. . . We should be happy to be able to suffer for the love of Him who lovingly suffered for us.'

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars

[Shin]

'If you speak to Jesus about Himself, He in His turn will speak about you. Your heart will expand under the rays of the Sun of goodness as does the moist dew-kissed flower in the early morn of springtime. His sweet voice will pierce your soul. Then you will hearken to Him in silence and peace, or rather in the sweet working of love. You will live in Him!'

Bl. Peter Julian Eymard

[Shin]

'If you say, "Show me your God," I will say to you, "Show me what kind of person you are, and I will show you my God." Show me then whether the eyes of your mind can see, and the ears of your heart hear.

It is like this. Those who can see with the eyes of their bodies are aware of what is happening in this life on earth. They get to know things that are different from each other. They distinguish light and darkness, black and white, ugliness and beauty, elegance and inelegance, proportion and lack of proportion, excess and defect. The same is true of the sounds we hear: high or low or pleasant. So it is with the ears of our heart and the eyes of our mind in their capacity to hear or see God.

God is seen by those who have the capacity to see him, provided that they keep the eyes of their mind open. All have eyes, but some have eyes that are shrouded in darkness, unable to see the light of the sun. Because the blind cannot see it, it does not follow that the sun does not shine. The blind must trace the cause back to themselves and their eyes. In the same way, you have eyes in your mind that are shrouded in darkness because of your sins and evil deeds.

A person's soul should be clean, like a mirror reflecting light. If there is rust on the mirror his face cannot be seen in it. In the same way, no one who has sin within him can see God.'

St. Theophilus of Antioch

[Shin]

'My children, we are going to speak of hope: this is what makes the happiness of man on earth. Some people of this world hope too much, and others do not hope enough. Some say, "I am going to commit this sin again. It will not cost me more to confess four than three." It is like a child saying to his father, "I am going to give you four blows; it will cost me no more than to give you one: I shall only have to ask your pardon."

That is the way men behave towards the good God.

They say, "This year I shall amuse myself again; I shall go to dances and to the alehouse, and next year I will be converted. The good God will be sure to receive me, when I choose to return to Him." . . . Do you think that He will adapt Himself to everything in your will? Do you think He will embrace you after you have despised Him all your life? Oh, no, indeed! There is a certain measure of grace and of sin after which God withdraws Himself. . . God would not be just if He made no difference between those who serve Him and those who offend Him. My children, there is so little faith now in the world, that people either hope too much, or they despair. Some say, "I have done too much evil; the good God cannot pardon me." My children, this is a great blasphemy; it is putting a limit on the mercy of God, which has no limit -- it is infinite. You may have done enough to lose the souls of a whole parish, and if you confess, if you are sorry for having done this evil, and resolve not to do it again, the good God will have pardoned you.'

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars

[Shin]

'When you want to resolve a complex problem, seek God's will in the matter, and you will find a constructive solution.'

St. Mark the Ascetic

[Shin]

'It seems to me that I am awaiting a thousand years the happiness of going to my God, my supreme good.'

St. Paul of the Cross

[Shin]

'In his mercy the Lord supports all who fall, and raises up all who are bowed down' (Ps. 145:14).'

St. Thalassios the Libyan

[Shin]

'Purgatory is in those souls that are not dead to themselves; Hell is in the heart of the impious; Paradise in that of the perfect, who are closely united to Our Lord.'

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars