Feast of Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, c.326 If I now want to add something of my own read more

Feast of Nicholas, Bishop of Myra, c.326 If I now want to add something of my own (i.e., inner assurances) to this faith, if this great and glorious faith is defective and saves me not till I can add my own sense and my own feeling to it at such a time or place, is not this saying in the plainest manner that faith alone cannot justify me? ... All I would say of these inward delights and enjoyments is this: they are not holiness, they are not piety, they are not perfection, but they are God's gracious allurements and calls to seek after holiness and spiritual perfection.

Commemoration of Lanfranc, Prior of Le Bec, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1089 The great danger facing all of us... is read more

Commemoration of Lanfranc, Prior of Le Bec, Archbishop of Canterbury, 1089 The great danger facing all of us... is not that we shall make an absolute failure of life, nor that we shall fall into outright viciousness, nor that we shall be terribly unhappy, nor that we shall feel [that] life has no meaning at all -- not these things. The danger is that we may fail to perceive life's greatest meaning, fall short of its highest good, miss its deepest and most abiding happiness, be unable to tender the most needed service, be unconscious of life ablaze with the light of the Presence of God -- and be content to have it so -- that is the danger: that some day we may wake up and find that always we have been busy with husks and trappings of life and have really missed life itself. For life without God, to one who has known the richness and joy of life with Him, is unthinkable, impossible. That is what one prays one's friends may be spared -- satisfaction with a life that falls short of the best, that has in it no tingle or thrill that comes from a friendship with the Father.

Feast of Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath & Wells, Hymnographer, 1711 Now the world should be able to see read more

Feast of Thomas Ken, Bishop of Bath & Wells, Hymnographer, 1711 Now the world should be able to see in the Church those marks [which show] that there is a substantial sociological healing possible in the present generation. It is not enough for the Church to be engaged with the State in healing social ills, though this is important at times. But when the world can turn around and see a group of God's people exhibiting substantial healing in the area of human relationships in their present life, then the world will take notice. Each group of Christians is, as it were, a pilot plant, showing that something can be done in the present situation, if only we begin in the right way.

No man ever did, nor ever shall, truly go forth to convert the nations, nor to prophesy in the present read more

No man ever did, nor ever shall, truly go forth to convert the nations, nor to prophesy in the present state of witnesses against Antichrist, but by the gracious inspiration and instigation of the Holy Spirit of God... I prejudice not an external test and call, which was at first and shall be again in force at the resurrection of the churches, ... but in the present state of things I cannot but be humbly bold to say that I know no other true sender but the most Holy Spirit. And when He sends, His messengers will go, His prophets will prophesy, though all the world should forbid them.

Feast of Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, Teacher, 1153 Commemoration of William & Catherine Booth, Founders of the Salvation Army, 1912 read more

Feast of Bernard, Abbot of Clairvaux, Teacher, 1153 Commemoration of William & Catherine Booth, Founders of the Salvation Army, 1912 & 1890 Bernard [of Clairvaux] did not stop with love for God or Christ, he insisted also that the Christian must love his neighbors, including even his enemies. Not necessarily that he must feel affection for them -- that is not always possible in this life, though it will be in heaven -- but that he must treat them as love dictates, doing always for others what he would that they should do for him. ... A. C. McGiffert, A History of Christian Thought August 21, 2000 At the very moment when the pulpit has fallen strangely silent about sin, fiction can talk of little except evil, not indeed viewed as sin, but apparently as the invariable ways of a peculiarly repulsive insect, which it can't help, poor thing; and there is no manner of use expecting anything from it, except the nastiness natural to it.

A vocation to marriage is a vocation to glorify God in a particular state with its necessary rights and duties. read more

A vocation to marriage is a vocation to glorify God in a particular state with its necessary rights and duties. It can only be combined with the vocation of a pioneer missionary of the classic type if matrimony is felt to be spiritually neutral, irrelevant to God's calling. Marriage can be irrelevant only if we believe that the body -- matter -- is neutral, irrelevant, or evil. Man can not believe that and believe the Christian faith. God made matter, and was incarnate in it: the comparison of the relation of husband and wife to that between Christ and the Church naturally follows. But this conclusion is not always drawn, for orthodox Christians are often prone to speak and behave as if the Lord... became not flesh but spirit.

Commemoration of Jack Winslow, Missionary, Evangelist, 1974 My God, how endless is Thy love! Thy gifts are every evening new, read more

Commemoration of Jack Winslow, Missionary, Evangelist, 1974 My God, how endless is Thy love! Thy gifts are every evening new, And morning mercies from above Gently distill like early dew. Thou spread'st the curtains of the night, Great guardian of my sleeping hours; Thy sov'reign word restores the light, And quickens all my drowsy powers. I yield my powers to Thy command, To Thee I consecrate my days; Perpetual blessings from Thine hand Demand perpetual songs of praise.

Commemoration of Richard Rolle of Hampole, Writer, Hermit, Mystic, 1349 Love ... is very noticeable as fervour and devotion read more

Commemoration of Richard Rolle of Hampole, Writer, Hermit, Mystic, 1349 Love ... is very noticeable as fervour and devotion and jubilation, and is yet not always the best thing; for sometimes it is not from love but is caused by nature that one has such taste and sweetness; or it may be a heavenly impression or it may be produced by the senses, and those who have most of this are not always the best. For even if it should be from God, our Lord gives this to such men in order to attract and charm them, and also to detach them from others. But if these same people later grow in love, they may not have so many feelings, and then it will become clear that they have love, if they remain wholly faithful to God without any such support.

The various moral and theological and sociological disputes of the day, however progressively resolved with ecclesiastical connivance, have nothing to read more

The various moral and theological and sociological disputes of the day, however progressively resolved with ecclesiastical connivance, have nothing to say to this spiritual hunger, which is not assuaged by legalized abortion and homosexuality, solaced by contraception, or relieved by majority rule. Nor will it take comfort in the thought that God is dead, or that mankind has come of age, or even in ecumenical negotiations for writing off Papal Infallibility against the validity of Anglican Orders. The only means of satisfying it remains that bread of life which Jesus offered, with the promise that those who are of it should never hunger again. The promise stands.