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He will gaze on you with beautiful, compassionate eyes, and will forget His own grief to solace yours, only because you went to comfort Him, and turned to look at Him.

“What is grace” I asked God. And He said, “All that happens.” Then He added, when I looked perplexed,“Could not lovers say that every moment in their Beloved’s arms was grace? Existence is my arms, though I well understand how one can turn away from me until the heart has wisdom."

I can say that my life is a continuous prayer, for everything I do I do it out out of love for my Jesus.

Though I still had as keen an eye for the human weaknesses of others, I no longer made it an instrument for striking them at their most vulnerable point, but, rather, for protecting them.

As the soul abode in solitude, abandoning all created help and consolation in order to obtain fellowship and union with the Beloved, it deserved thereby the peace of solitude in the Beloved, in whom it reposes alone, undisturbed by any anxiety.

You may be sure, if you do all you can and prepare yourselves for contemplation as I have described, that if He does not grant it to you, He is keeping back this consolation in reserve only to give it to you all at once in heaven.

The soul which does not attain to the degree of purity corresponding with the light and vocation it has received from God can never be wholly content and at peace.

We find our peace in taking persons as they are and not wasting time wishing they were otherwise.

You will find that He suits Himself to whatever mood you are in. He longs so keenly for our glance that He will neglect no means to win it.

Is there any freedom greater than the freedom to serve God? Is there any freedom more complete than union with Him? Does He not free us from ties of money and property and selfishness, of avarice and pride and inconstancy? Is He not the only true Emancipator? Who is free who does not love God?

In the Passion and death of Christ our sins were consumed by fire. If we accept that in faith, and if we accept the whole Christ in faith-filled surrender, which means, however, that we choose and walk the path of the imitation of Christ, then He will lead us "through His Passion and cross to the glory of His Resurrection." This is exactly what is experienced in contemplation: passing through the expiatory flames to the bliss of the union of love. This explains its twofold character. It is death and resurrection.

To find God we must work ourselves according to our capacity. The soul therefore, remembering the saying of the Beloved 'Seek and you shall find', is resolved to seek Him actively and not rest until it finds Him. For there are many who do not want God to cost them anything except empty words.