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The Savior hangs before you with a pierced heart. He has spilled His heart's blood to win your heart...The arms of the Crucified are spread out to draw you to His heart, He wants your life in order to give you His.

How I pray that you will know and love God. Don't imagine you have to become a nun to do this. In the world there are souls who love and serve Him.

Fortunately, while being Martha one can remain like Mary Magdalene always near the Master, contemplating Him with a wholly loving look.

Jesus is mysterious. When we approach Him, usually He remains silent. In this silence, what is His attitude towards us? He tells us in the parable of the Good Shepherd: He sees us with His love, He knows us, and even if He remains silent, He knows exactly what we are, what we think, what we love and what we do.

The nothingness of me is strangely loved:
Sustaining ever
The all of love, my need is strangely here:
Departing never.

The God I serve is a living God... A life of prayer is the essence of the Carmelite vocation; the heart to heart communion that never ends, because when one loves, one no longer belongs to oneself but to the Beloved, and so lives more in Him than in oneself.

If your nature provides you with ... a battleground, do not be discouraged ... love your wretchedness, for it is upon that that God exercises His mercy! When the sight of it plunges you into sadness, or drives you in upon yourself, that is self-love. In your hours of weakness, go and take refuge in the prayer of the Divine Master.

When I am in this state of spiritual dryness, unable to pray, or to practice virtue, I look for little opportunities, for the smallest trifles, to give pleasure to Jesus; a smile or a kind word, for instance, when I would wish to be silent, or to show that I am bored. If no such occasion offer, I try at least to say over and over again that I love Him. This is not heard, and it keeps alive the fire in my heart. Even should the fire of love seem dead, I would still throw my tiny straws on the ashes, and I am confident it would light up again.

It seems to the soul that the entire universe is a sea of love in which it is engulfed, for conscious of the living point or center of love within itself, it is unable to catch sight of the boundaries of this love.

Because we are so miserable, we become attached to sensible fervor, to experiencing the love of God sensibly, and often we go to prayer in search of the sensible consolation of God but not for God Himself.

Carmelites can repay God’s love by their everyday lives in no other way than by carrying out their daily duties faithfully in every respect; all the little sacrifices...day after day...and achieved with a loving smile; letting no opportunity go by for serving others in love.

It benefits me little to be alone making acts of devotion to our Lord, proposing and promising to do wonders in his service, if I then go away and when the occasion offers itself do everything the opposite. If his Majesty showed us his love by means of such works and frightful torments, how is it you want to please him only with words?