By a man's reaction to Jesus Christ, that man stands revealed. By his reaction to Jesus Christ his houl is read more

By a man's reaction to Jesus Christ, that man stands revealed. By his reaction to Jesus Christ his houl is laid bare. If he regards Christ with love, even with wistful yearning, for him there is hope; but if in Christ he sees nothing lovely he has condemned himself. He who was sent in love has become to the man, judgment.

Feast of Hilda, Abbess of Whitby, 680 Commemoration of Elizabeth, Princess of Hungary, Philanthropist, 1231 Commemoration of Mechtild, Bèguine of read more

Feast of Hilda, Abbess of Whitby, 680 Commemoration of Elizabeth, Princess of Hungary, Philanthropist, 1231 Commemoration of Mechtild, Bèguine of Magdeburg, Mystic, Prophet, 1280 [At the Garden of Olives Monastery] "Why are you all so quiet all the time?" I say, still whispering at him in this hoarse voice. "We are teachers and workers," he says, "not talkers." "Workers, O.K.," I say, "but how can a teacher be quiet all the time and teach anybody anything?" "Christ was the best," he says, thinking of something. "He lived thirty-three years. Thirty years he kept quiet; three years he talked. Ten to one for keeping quiet.".

Commemoration of Peter Chanel, Religious, Missionary in the South Pacific, Martyr, 1841 Tell God all that is in your read more

Commemoration of Peter Chanel, Religious, Missionary in the South Pacific, Martyr, 1841 Tell God all that is in your heart, as one unloads one's heart, its pleasures and its pains, to a dear friend. Tell Him your troubles, that He may comfort you; tell Him your joys, that He may sober them; tell Him your longings, that He may purify them; tell Him your dislikes, that He may help you conquer them; talk to Him of your temptations, that He may shield you from them: show Him the wounds of your heart, that He may heal them; lay bare your indifference to good, your depraved tastes for evil, your instability. Tell Him how self-love makes you unjust to others, how vanity tempts you to be insincere, how pride disguises you to yourself and others. If you thus pour out all your weaknesses, needs, troubles, there will be no lack of what to say. You will never exhaust the subject. It is continually being renewed. People who have no secrets from each other never want for subjects of conversation. They do not weigh their words, for there is nothing to be held back; neither do they seek for something to say. They talk out of the abundance of the heart, without consideration they say just what they think. Blessed are they who attain to such familiar, unreserved intercourse with God.

If monotony tries me, and I cannot stand drudgery; if stupid people fret me and the little ruffles set me read more

If monotony tries me, and I cannot stand drudgery; if stupid people fret me and the little ruffles set me on edge; if I make much of the trifles of life, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

Feast of Francis of Assisi, Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor, 1226 Be not afraid that thou art read more

Feast of Francis of Assisi, Friar, Deacon, Founder of the Friars Minor, 1226 Be not afraid that thou art tempted, for the more thou art assailed by temptations, the greater friend and servant of God do I hold thee, and the greater love do I bear thee. Verily, I say to thee, let no man deem himself the perfect friend of God until he have passed through many temptations and tribulations... I am ready to endure patiently all things that my Lord would do with me.

Love is the greatest thing that God can give us; for Himself is love: and it is the greatest thing read more

Love is the greatest thing that God can give us; for Himself is love: and it is the greatest thing we can give to God; for it will also give ourselves, and carry with it all that is ours. The apostle calls it the band of perfection; it is the old, and it is the new, and it is the great commandment, and it is all the commandments; for it is the fulfilling of the Law. It does the work of all the graces without any instrument but its own immediate virtue. For as the love of sin makes a man sin against all his own reason, and all the discourses of wisdom, and all the advices of his friends, and without temptation and without opportunity, so does the love of God: it makes a man chaste without the laborious arts of fasting and exterior disciplines, temperate in the midst of feasts, and is active enough to choose it without any intermedial appetites, and reaches at glory through the very heart of grace, without any other aims but those of love. It is a grace that loves God for Himself, and our neighbors for God. The consideration of God's goodness and bounty, the experience of those profitable and excellent emanations from Him, may be, and most commonly are, the first motive of our love; but when we are once entered, and have tasted the goodness of God, we love the spring for its own excellency, passing from passion to reason, from thanking to adoring, from sense to spirit, from considering ourselves to union with God: and this is the image and little representation of heaven; it is beatitude in picture, or rather the infancy and beginning of glory.

Feast of Michael & All Angels When a man really gives up trying to make something out of himself read more

Feast of Michael & All Angels When a man really gives up trying to make something out of himself -- a saint, or a converted sinner, or a churchman, a righteous or unrighteous man, ... when in the fullness of tasks, questions, success or ill-hap, experiences and perplexities, a man throws himself into the arms of God... then he wakes with Christ in Gethsemane. That is faith, and it is thus that he becomes a man and Christian.

What is in ruins? The invisible church, composed of all Spirit-baptized persons, is indefectible, it cannot be ruined; against it read more

What is in ruins? The invisible church, composed of all Spirit-baptized persons, is indefectible, it cannot be ruined; against it "the gates of Hades shall not prevail." The local assembly may indeed by sadly ruined; but it can be restored, as, by the grace of God, has been seen times without number -- at Corinth, for example. The only other institution in question is that agglomeration of sects that is called "Christendom." But that is unrecognized by the New Testament -- it is not of God at all: and that it is "in ruins" is no matter for our regret.

God, to redeem us at the deepest portion of our nature -- the urge to love and be loved -- read more

God, to redeem us at the deepest portion of our nature -- the urge to love and be loved -- must reveal His nature in an incredible and impossible way. He must reveal it at a cross. At the cross God wrapped his heart in flesh and blood and let it be nailed to the cross for our redemption.