Wisdom is a sacred communion.

Wisdom is a sacred communion.

Where every day is not the Lord's, the Sunday is his least of all. There may be a sickening unreality read more

Where every day is not the Lord's, the Sunday is his least of all. There may be a sickening unreality even where there is no conscious hypocrisy.

Commemoration of Johann Sebastian Bach, musician, 1750 Let us go and wake up the universe... and sing His read more

Commemoration of Johann Sebastian Bach, musician, 1750 Let us go and wake up the universe... and sing His praises.

I am persuaded that love and humility are the highest attainments in the school of Christ and the brightest evidences read more

I am persuaded that love and humility are the highest attainments in the school of Christ and the brightest evidences that he is indeed our Master.

If your every human plan and calculation has miscarried, if, one by one, human props have been knocked out, and read more

If your every human plan and calculation has miscarried, if, one by one, human props have been knocked out, and doors have shut in your face, take heart. God is trying to get a message through to you, and the message is: "Stop depending on inadequate human resources. Let me handle the matter.".

The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up; for read more

The Jews would not willingly tread upon the smallest piece of paper in their way, but took it up; for possibly, they say, the name of God may be on it. Though there was a little superstition in this, yet truly there is nothing but good religion in it, if we apply it to men. Trample not on any; there may be some work of grace there, that thou knowest not of. The name of God may be written upon that soul thou treadest on; it may be a soul that Christ thought so much of, as to give His precious blood for it; therefore despise it not.

The old pagans had to choose between a brilliant, jangling, irresponsible universe, alive with lawless powers, and the serene and read more

The old pagans had to choose between a brilliant, jangling, irresponsible universe, alive with lawless powers, and the serene and ordered universe of God and law. We modern pagans have to choose between that divine order, and the grey, dead, irresponsible, chaotic universe of atheism. And the tragedy is that we may make that choice without knowing it -- not by clear conviction but by vague drifting, by losing interest in Him. A nominal deist will say: "Yes, of course there must be some sort of Force that created the galaxy. But it's childish to imagine that It has any personal relation to me!" In that belief atheism exists as an undiagnosed disease. The man who says, "One God," and does not care, is an atheist in his heart. The man who speaks of God and will not recognize him in the burning bush -- that man is an atheist, though he speak with the tongues of men or angels, and appear in his pew every Sunday, and make large contributions to the church.

Feast of Boniface (Wynfrith) of Crediton, Archbishop of Mainz, Apostle of Germany, Martyr, 754 The separate creaturely life, as read more

Feast of Boniface (Wynfrith) of Crediton, Archbishop of Mainz, Apostle of Germany, Martyr, 754 The separate creaturely life, as opposed to life in union with God, is only a life of various appetites, hungers, and wants, and cannot possibly be anything else. God Himself cannot make a creature to be in itself, or in its own nature, anything else but a state of emptiness. The highest life that is natural and creaturely can go no higher than this: it can only be a bare capacity for goodness and cannot possibly be a good and happy life but by the life of God dwelling in it and in union with it. And this is the two-fold life that, of all necessity, must be united in every good and happy and perfect creature.

Commemoration of Gilbert of Sempringham, Founder of the Gilbertine Order, 1189 It is well to have specifically holy read more

Commemoration of Gilbert of Sempringham, Founder of the Gilbertine Order, 1189 It is well to have specifically holy places, and things, and days, for, without these focal points or reminders, the belief that all is holy and "big with God" will soon dwindle into a mere sentiment. But if these holy places, things, and days cease to remind us, if they obliterate our awareness that all ground is holy and every bush (could we but perceive it) a Burning Bush, then the hallows begin to do harm. Hence both the necessity, and the perennial danger, of "religion".