Each of these foregoing states has its time, its variety of workings, its trials, temptations, and purifications, which can only read more

Each of these foregoing states has its time, its variety of workings, its trials, temptations, and purifications, which can only be known by experience in the passage through them. The one only and infallible way to go safely through all the difficulties, trials, temptations, dryness, or opposition of our own evil tempers is this: It is to expect nothing from ourselves, to trust to nothing in ourselves, but in everything to expect and depend upon God for relief. Keep fast hold of this thread, and then let your way be what it will -- darkness, temptation, or the rebellion of nature -- you will be led through it all, to an union with God: for nothing hurts us in any state but an expectation of some thing in it and from it, which we should only expect from God. (Continued tomorrow).

Feast of Clare of Assisi, Founder of the Order of Minoresses (Poor Clares), 1253 Commemoration of John Henry Newman, Priest, read more

Feast of Clare of Assisi, Founder of the Order of Minoresses (Poor Clares), 1253 Commemoration of John Henry Newman, Priest, Teacher, Tractarian, 1890 In the first ages, [catechizing] was a work of long time; months, sometimes years, were devoted to the arduous task of disabusing the mind of the incipient Christian of its pagan errors, and of moulding it upon the Christian faith. The Scriptures indeed were at hand for the study of those who could avail themselves of them, but St. Iranaeus does not hesitate to speak of whole races who had been converted to Christianity, without being able to read them. To be unable to read or write was in those times no evidence of want of learning; the hermits of the deserts were, in one sense of the word, illiterate, yet the great St. Anthony, though he knew not letters, was a match in disputation for the learned philosophers who came to try him. ... John Henry Newman, "What is a University?" August 12, 2000 Any single verse of the Bible, taken in isolation, may actually be dangerous to your spiritual health. Every part of it must be read in relation to the whole message.

Feast of the Venerable Bede, Priest, Monk of Jarrow, Historian 735 Commemoration of Aldhelm, Abbot of Mamsbury, Bishop of Sherborne, read more

Feast of the Venerable Bede, Priest, Monk of Jarrow, Historian 735 Commemoration of Aldhelm, Abbot of Mamsbury, Bishop of Sherborne, 709 If you here stop and ask yourselves why you are not as pious as the primitive Christians were, your own heart will tell you that it is neither through ignorance nor through inability, but purely because you never thoroughly intended it.

Commemoration of Felix, Bishop, Apostle to the East Angles, 647 Christ claims our help in many a strange disguise: Now, read more

Commemoration of Felix, Bishop, Apostle to the East Angles, 647 Christ claims our help in many a strange disguise: Now, fever ridden, on a bed He lies; Homeless He wanders now beneath the stars; Now counts the number of His prison bars; Now bends beside us, crowned with hoary hairs. No need have we to climb the heavenly stairs And press our kisses on His feet and hands; In every man that suffers, He, the Man of Sorrows, stands. ... Anonymous March 5, 1998 When we have, through Christ, obtained mercy for our persons, we need not fear but that we shall have suitable and seasonable help for our duties.

Feast of Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely, c.678 O for a closer walk with God, A calm and heavenly frame, read more

Feast of Etheldreda, Abbess of Ely, c.678 O for a closer walk with God, A calm and heavenly frame, A light to shine upon the road That leads me to the Lamb Return, O holy Dove, return, Sweet messenger of rest! I hate the sins that made Thee mourn And drove Thee from my breast The dearest idol I have known, Whate'er that idol be, Help me to tear it from Thy throne, And worship only Thee. So shall my walk be close with God, Calm and serene my frame; So purer light shall mark the road That leads me to the Lamb.

Holy Saturday All night had shouts of men and cry Of woeful women filled His way; Until that noon read more

Holy Saturday All night had shouts of men and cry Of woeful women filled His way; Until that noon of sombre sky On Friday, clamour and display Smote Him; no solitude had He. No silence, since Gethsemane. Public was death; but power, but might, But life again, but victory, Were hushed within the dead of night, The shuttered dark, the secrecy. And all alone, alone, alone He rose again behind the stone.

The offertory is the first essential action of the Liturgy, because in it we make the costly and solemn oblation, read more

The offertory is the first essential action of the Liturgy, because in it we make the costly and solemn oblation, under tokens, of our very selves and all our substance; that they may be transformed, quickened, and devoted to the interests of God.

Commemoration of Giles of Provence, Hermit, c.710 The purpose of religion -- at any rate, the Christian religion read more

Commemoration of Giles of Provence, Hermit, c.710 The purpose of religion -- at any rate, the Christian religion -- is not to get you into heaven, but to get heaven into you. ... Frederick Ward Kates September 2, 2000 Commemoration of Martyrs of Papua New Guinea, 1942 The apostles were moved, not so much by an intellectual apprehension, as by a spiritual illumination. They met men, and the need of those men whom they met cried aloud to them. Their own desire for the revelation of the glory of Jesus in the salvation of men went out towards those whom they met, and was immediately answered by the recognition of the need of those whom they met for Jesus Christ. ... Roland Allen, Pentecost and the World ... Also see comments on this book in Bookworms September 3, 2000 Feast of Gregory the Great, Bishop of Rome, Teacher, 604 The task is not, in essence, the securing of uniformity, or cooperation, or Church reunion, or any of the external forms, through which nevertheless the unity may be manifested. Within the wide bounds of the Christian Church there is abundant scope for the multiplicity of races, languages, and social conditions; room also for separate organizations with different traditions of faith and order, and much diversity of operation. But there is no room for strife or hostility, for pride or selfassertion, for exclusiveness or unkind judgments, nor for that kind of independence which leads men to ignore their fellowship with the great company of believers, the communion of saints. These things are contrary to the revealed will of God, and should be made at once to cease. As these disappear, the outward manifestation of unity will come in such ways as the Spirit of God shall guide. ... G. T. Manley, Christian Unity September 4, 2000 Commemoration of Birinus, Bishop of Dorchester (Oxon), Apostle of Wessex, 650 If all you have found [in Christianity] is advantage, whether it is fun or profit or security, then you haven't started following Him yet. His way is the way of the Cross. The world can be very hard on those it hates. If it is not hard on you, perhaps it sees nothing in you to hate. But then it doesn't see Jesus in you, for it hates Jesus with an undying hatred. While your way is still all fun, all easy, all jolly, it is only your way: when you turn from it to follow His way, it will cost. It may cost you everything you have. That is what it cost Him.

Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: Prayer is co-operation with God. It is the purest exercise of the faculties read more

Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: Prayer is co-operation with God. It is the purest exercise of the faculties God has given us -- an exercise that links these faculties with the Maker to work out the intentions He had in mind in their creation. Prayer is aligning ourselves with the purposes of God... Prayer is commitment. We don't merely co-operate with God with certain things held back within. We, the total person, co-operate. This means that co-operation equals committment. Prayer means that the total you is praying. Your whole being reaches out to God, and God reaches down to you... Prayer is communion. Prayer is a means, but often it is an end in itself. There are times when your own wants and the needs of others drop away and you want just to look on His face and tell Him how much you love Him... Prayer is commission. Out of the quietness with God, power is generated that turns the spiritual machinery of the world. When you pray, you begin to feel the sense of being sent, that the divine compulsion is upon you...