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Desire to be empty and poor for Christ's sake. This state must be embraced with a perfect heart and you must really want it. If your heart is truly engaged in these efforts you shall speedily attain to great joy and consolation.

Between Jesus and certain souls there exists a love so great that the soul always lives in the presence of the Beloved.  Such a soul will not allow anything created to interfere with this, and that is why this soul seeks solitude.

In order to allow an entire human existence to be pervaded with divine life, it is not enough to kneel down once a year in front of the manger and allow oneself to be taken in by the spell of the Holy Night. One must be actively engaged with God one's entire life long, listen to the word which He spoke, which have been handed down to us, and then comply with these words. Above all, one must pray as the Savior himself has taught...

Let go of your plans. The first hour of your morning belongs to God. Tackle the day's work that he charges you with, and he will give you the power to accomplish it.

Jesus deigns to point out to me the only way which leads to Love's divine furnace, and that way is self-surrender: it is the confidence of the little child who sleeps without fear in its father's arms.

This path of self knowledge must never be abandoned, nor is there on this journey a soul so much a giant that it has no need to return often to the stage of an infant and a suckling. And this should never be forgotten.

In order to show that human power and human wisdom are incapable of achieving salvation, he gives salvific power to what appears to human estimation to be weak and foolish, to him who wishes to be nothing on his own, but allows the power of God alone to work in him, who has "emptied himself" and "become obedient to death on the cross."

When the time had come

for him to be born,

he went forth like the

bridegroom

from his bridal chamber,

embracing his bride,

holding her in his arms,

whom the gracious Mother

laid in a manger

among some animals

that were there at that time.

Men sang songs

and angels melodies

celebrating the marriage

of Two such as these.

But God there in the manger

cried and moaned;

and these tears were jewels

the bride brought to the

wedding.

The Mother gazed in sheer wonder

on such an exchange:

in God, man's weeping,

and in man, gladness,

to the one and the other

things usually so strange.

I understood the great blessing there is in not paying attention to what doesn't bring us closer to God.

I have always desired to become a saint, but in comparing myself with the saints I have always felt that I am as far removed from them as a grain of sand, trampled underfoot by the passer-by is from the mountain whose summit is lost in the clouds.

Though the path is plain and smooth for people of good will, those who walk it will not travel far, and will do so only with difficulty if they do not have good feet, courage, and tenacity of spirit.

Let us confidently place all preoccupation about the future in the hands of God and let us allow Him to guide us like a child. After that we may be sure that we will not be able to take the wrong road.