You are currently browsing the monthly archive for October 2016.
“All idols will fail us. We will never have enough money to satisfy our desires, no matter how much we amass. Success disappears as easily as it comes; power is temporary and partial at best. Likewise, pleasure is fleeting. What is worse, when we follow an idol, we tend to recalibrate our worldview to fit our idol.”
–from What Pope Francis Really Said
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“Christ Himself is our mouth through which we speak to the Father, our eye through which we see the Father, our right hand through which we offer to the Father. Without His intercession neither we nor all the saints have anything with God.”
— St. Ambrose
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“Let the sinner know that he will be tortured throughout all eternity, in those senses which he made use of to sin. I am writing this at the command of God, so that no soul may find an excuse by saying there is no hell, or that nobody has ever been there, and so no one can say what it is like. I, Sister Faustina, by the order of God, have visited the abysses of hell so that I might tell souls about it and testify to its existence.”
— St. Faustina Kowalska
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Jesus, be Master and Lord of my heart!
“The Ten Commandments don’t enslave us to God: They free us from false masters and allow us to find our way to our true end. They were not meant to keep us in line so much as they were meant to keep us out of danger.”
–from What Pope Francis Really Said
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“Don’t spend your energies on things that generate worry, anxiety and anguish. Only one thing is necessary: Lift up your spirit, and love God.”
— St. Padre Pio
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“We should recall that no man is an island, entire of itself. Our lives are involved with one another, through innumerable interactions they are linked together. No one lives alone. No one sins alone. No one is saved alone. The lives of others continually spill over into mine: in what I think, say, and do, and achieve. And conversely, my life spills over into that of others: for better or for worse. So my prayer for another is not something extraneous to that person, something external, not even after death.”
— Pope Benedict XVI
“Let all creation help you to praise God. Give yourself the rest you need. When you are walking alone, listen to the sermon preached to you by the flowers, the trees, the shrubs, the sky, the sun and the whole world. Notice how they preach to you a sermon full of love, of praise of God, and how they invite you to proclaim the greatness of the one who has given them being.”
— St. Paul of the Cross
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“True devotion to Our Lady is holy; that is to say, it leads the soul to avoid sin and to imitate the virtues of the Blessed Virgin, particularly her profound humility, her lively faith, her blind obedience, her continual prayer, her universal mortification, her divine purity, her ardent charity, her heroic patience, her angelic sweetness and her divine wisdom.”
— St. Louis De Montfort
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“When a sinner trusts the Lord, he talks to him, studies him, takes his cues from his decisions, and tries to react to life’s events the way Jesus would. In doing so, he finds peace, happiness and a fulfilling sense of purpose in his life. Then he wants to spread that peace, happiness, and purpose to as many people as he can. He becomes a missionary.”
“Admitting you are a sinner frees you from having to keep up appearances, it frees you from having to be right all the time, it gives you the humility to be able to drop your own agenda and simply adopt Jesus Christ’s. It is also the only honest self-assessment that a human being can have, so it frees you from illusions about yourself or others.”
-from What Pope Francis Really Said
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“The Holy Bible is like a mirror before our mind’s eye. In it we see our inner face. From the Scriptures we can learn our spiritual deformities and beauties. And there too we discover the progress we are making and how far we are from perfection.”
— Pope St. Gregory the Great
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“Just as God’s creature, the sun, is one and the same the world over, so also does the Church’s preaching shine everywhere to enlighten all men who want to come to a knowledge of the truth. Now of those who speak with authority in the churches, no preacher however forceful will utter anything different—for no one is above the Master—nor will a less forceful preacher diminish what has been handed down. Since our faith is everywhere the same, no one who can say more augments it, nor can anyone who says less diminish it.”
— St. Ignatius of Antioch
“Many things happen that God does not will. But he still permits them, in his wisdom, and they remain a stumbling block or scandal to our minds. God asks us to do all we can to eliminate evil. But despite our efforts, there is always a whole set of circumstances which we can do nothing about, which are not necessarily willed by God but nevertheless are permitted by him, and which God invites us to consent to trustingly and peacefully, even if they make us suffer and cause us problems. We are not being asked to consent to evil, but to consent to the mysterious wisdom of God who permits evil. Our consent is not a compromise with evil but the expression of our trust that God is stronger than evil. This is a form of obedience that is painful but very fruitful.”
— Fr. Jacques Philippe
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“When you have free moments, go faithfully to prayer. The good God is waiting for you there.”
— St. Julie Billiart
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“The goodness of God is the highest object of prayer, and it reaches down to our lowest need. It quickens our soul and gives it life, and makes it grow in grace and virtue.”
— St. Julian of Norwich
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“Know this: just as the wood of the ark saved the just from drowning, so too, by the mystery of His wooden Cross, does Christ, the Church’s God and King, save us from drowning in the sea of this world. In the symbol of a thing made of wood He gave human beings a foreshadowing of both the judgment to come and the salvation of the just.”
— St. Augustine
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“We are creating the life we live. We are shaping our reality by what we pay attention to. All crises bring us to the same question: Will I consent to know love, whatever form it takes?”
–from Stars at Night
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“This is the great passage: to see deep into our own nature by meeting its reflection in everything around us. To swim with something very big. To allow the Universe to love us and to love deeply in return.”
–from Stars at Night
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“Many live like angels in the midst of the world. Why not you?”
— St. Josemaria Escriva
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“Many beginners, delighting in the sweetness and joy of their spiritual occupations, strive after spiritual sweetness rather than after purity and discretion, which is that which God regards and accepts in the whole course of the spiritual way. For this reason, over and above their imperfection in seeking after sweetness in devotion, that spirit of gluttony, which has taken possession of them, forces them to overstep the limits of moderation, within which virtue is acquired and consists. . . Inasmuch then as all extremes are vicious, and as in this course of conduct men follow their own will, the consequences are that they grow in vice and not in virtue; at least they minister to their spiritual gluttony and pride, for they do not walk in the way of obedience.”
— St. John of the Cross
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I am a Christian – a follower of Jesus Christ!
“An inner nature (the true self) is waking up and life is no longer a series of events through which we pass, but rather a mystery within which we awaken. There is a growing awareness that we are made for something more than the small story of our human life. We are intended to reach a greater potential.”
–from Stars at Night
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“In the old days, people demanded ‘an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,’ and to repay evil for evil. Patience was not yet on the earth, because faith was not on the earth either. Of course, impatience made full use of the opportunities the Law gave it. That was easy when the Lord and Master of patience was not here. But now that he has come and put the grace of faith together with patience, we are no longer allowed to attack someone even with a word—not even to call someone a fool without facing the danger of judgment. The Law found more than it lost when Christ said, ‘Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, so that you may be sons of your Father who is in heaven’ (Matthew 5:44-45). This most important commandment summarizes in a word the universal discipline of patience, since it does not allow us to do evil even to people who deserve it.”
— Tertullian
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The coming of the dawn is the rising up of an inner light. In that undefiled dawn, the soul opens wide to life’s essential wonder, and the hidden meaning of being here knocks on the door of the heart.
–from Stars at Night
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“We frequently need other people’s help to figure out what God wants of us. It is relatively easy to sort out what is bad from what is good, but it is much more difficult to sort out what is good from what is better and what is bad from what is worse. The Holy Spirit gives us the counsel we need through external and internal signs of grace.”
— Rev. Jude Winkler
Windows Toward the World 
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