Our knowledge is piecemeal. When our will and action build on it alone, they cannot achieve a perfect structure. Nor can that knowledge, because it does not have complete power over the self and often collapses before reaching the goal. And so this inner shaping power that is in bondage…
Good works wrought in the season of spiritual dryness and hardness are like the freshness of the winter morning. What we then do for God in dryness of spirit is most precious in His eyes. It is then that we acquire abundant virtues and graces, and what we achieve with…
The soul must forget about understanding, and abandon itself into the arms of love, and His Majesty will teach it what to do next. – St. Teresa of Avila
“To watch in prayer”- this is to say the same thing that Elijah said with the words, “to stand before the face of God.” Prayer is looking up into the face of the Eternal. We can do this only when the spirit is awake in its inmost depths, freed from…
You are nearer to me than myself more intimate than my inmost being. And yet no one touches you or understands you and you break the bonds of every name: Holy Spirit – Eternal Love! – St. Teresa Benedicta (Edith Stein)
Preserve a habitual remembrance of eternal life, recalling that those who hold themselves the lowest and poorest and least of all will enjoy the highest dominion and glory in God. – St. John of the Cross
I cannot understand how humility exists, or can exist, without love, or love without humility, and it is impossible for these two virtues to exist save where there is great detachment from all created things. – St. Teresa of Avila
Love proves itself by deeds. I will scatter flowers, perfuming the Divine Throne, and I’ll sweetly sing my hymn of love. These flowers are every little sacrifice, every glance and word, and the doing of the least actions for love. -St. Therese
Let them trust in the mercy of God and not at all in themselves, and they will see how His Majesty brings them from the dwelling places of one stage to these of another and settles them in a land where these wild animals cannot touch or tire them, but…
Some of these beginners, too, make little of their faults, and at other times become over-sad when they see themselves fall into them, thinking themselves to have been saints already; and thus they become angry and impatient with themselves, which is another imperfection. – St. John of the Cross