This insensibility of ours is a bad symptom. For one thing, it implies that we have no spiritual ambition, else read more

This insensibility of ours is a bad symptom. For one thing, it implies that we have no spiritual ambition, else we should not be satisfied with such poor lives; that we cannot have thought out the fact of Jesus Christ, and how immeasurably He has raised the standard. Will you hang your wretched daubs beside the works of Titian and Michelangelo and not be shamed by the enormous contrast -- stand back and say, with a satisfied smirk, "That is pretty good, you know!"? And can you live face to face with Jesus Christ, and be content with what you are?

Before I can have any joy in being alone with God I must have learned not to fear being alone read more

Before I can have any joy in being alone with God I must have learned not to fear being alone with myself. Shrinking from any deep self-scrutiny is by no means an uncommon thing, and often goes far to explain the feverish restlessness with which a world-loving heart plunges into perpetual rounds of gaieties and dissipations; they serve as an escape from troublesome questions about the soul, and help to get rid of the clamours of conscience.

I read in Shakespeare of the majesty of the moral law, in Victor Hugo of the sacredness of childhood, in read more

I read in Shakespeare of the majesty of the moral law, in Victor Hugo of the sacredness of childhood, in Tennyson the ugliness of hypocrisy, in George Eliot the supremacy of duty, in Dickens the divinity of kindness, and in Ruskin the dignity of service. Irving teaches me the lesson of cheerfulness, Hawthorne shows me the hatefulness of sin, Longfellow gives me the soft, tranquil music of hope. Lowell makes us feel that we must give ourselves to our fellow men. Whittier sings to me of divine Fatherhood and human brotherhood. These are Christian lessons: who inspired them? Who put it into the heart of Martin Luther to nail those theses on the church door of Wittenberg? Who stirred and fired the soul of Savonarola? Who thrilled and electrified the soul of John Wesley? Jesus Christ is back of these all.

Feast of Simon & Jude, Apostles Remember, a small light will do a great deal when it is in read more

Feast of Simon & Jude, Apostles Remember, a small light will do a great deal when it is in a very dark place. Put one little tallow candle in the middle of a large hall, and it will give a good deal of light.

We are separated from one another by an unbridgeable gulf of otherness and strangeness which resists all our attempts to read more

We are separated from one another by an unbridgeable gulf of otherness and strangeness which resists all our attempts to overcome it by means of natural association or emotional or spiritual union. There is no way from one person to another. However loving and sympathetic we try to be, however sound our psychology however frank and open our behaviour we cannot penetrate the incognito of the other man, for there are no direct relationships, not even between soul and soul. Christ stands between us, and we can only get into touch with our neighbors through Him.

Feast of Catherine of Siena, Mystic, Teacher, 1380 God is often faulted for creating a world full of suffering read more

Feast of Catherine of Siena, Mystic, Teacher, 1380 God is often faulted for creating a world full of suffering and evil. The issue is complex, both philosophically and theologically; but surely it is inappropriate to blame God for a problem He did not initiate, and [that is] in fact, one which He has sought to alleviate, at great cost to Himself. God sent His Son to inaugurate the Kingdom and to "destroy him who has the power of death, that is, the devil" (Heb. 2:14). God is not the cause of suffering and sickness; He is its cure! Jesus' ministry and death guarantee this.

Feast of Antony of Egypt, Abbot, 356 Commemoration of Charles Gore, Bishop, Teacher, Founder of the Community of the Resurrection, read more

Feast of Antony of Egypt, Abbot, 356 Commemoration of Charles Gore, Bishop, Teacher, Founder of the Community of the Resurrection, 1932 Any such distinction between disreputable and respectable sins... Jesus Christ absolutely refuses to allow. In His eyes avarice, pride, refusal to forgive, hypocrisy, are at least as bad as fornication or adultery or violence.

Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: The primary object of prayer is to know God better; we and our read more

Continuing a Lenten series on prayer: The primary object of prayer is to know God better; we and our needs should come second.

Whenever man decides that he is competent to do as he pleases he is soon enjoying Hell on earth, partly read more

Whenever man decides that he is competent to do as he pleases he is soon enjoying Hell on earth, partly because much of what he pleases, except he know he must obey God, is low-down disgusting and partly because, even when he pleases to do something decent, he is mostly too weak-willed and too addle-pated to bring the same to good effect. Man must be redeemed by a power outside himself. I do not regard the over-determined "optimists" as silly; they seem to me only the victims of a wishful thinking.