Archive

Terrible trials are suffered because we don’t understand ourselves, and that which isn’t bad at all but good we think is a serious fault. This lack of knowledge causes the afflictions of many people who engage in prayer; complaints about interior trials, at least to a great extent, by people who have no learning; melancholy and loss of health; and even the complete abandonment of prayer.

The saints rejoiced at injuries and persecutions, because in forgiving them they had something to present to God when they prayed to Him.

Now be on your guard, daughters, against some types of humility given by the devil in which great disquiet is felt about the gravity of our sins. This disturbance can afflict in many ways even to the point of making one give up receiving Communion and practicing private prayer. These things are given up because the devil makes one feel unworthy.

Prayer is looking up into the face of the Eternal. We can do this only when the spirit is awake in its innermost depths,
freed from all earthly occupations and pleasures that benumb it. Being awake in body does not guarantee this consciousness,
nor does rest required by nature interfere.

The Three Persons delight to contemplate their beauty in a soul and they are thus drawn to fill it more completely and they lavish still more gifts upon it so as to accomplish the great mystery of love and unity.

As Our Lord dwells within us, His prayer is ours, and I want to share in it unceasingly, remaining like a little vessel at the spring, at the fountain of life, and so be able to communicate it to others by letting its floods of charity overflow.

Oh, how sweet Your presence will be to me, You Who are the supreme good! I must draw near You in silence and uncover my feet before You that You may be pleased to unite me to You in marriage (Ruth 3:7), and I will not rest until I rejoice in Your arms. Now I ask You, Lord, not to abandon me at any time in my recollection, for I am a squanderer of my soul.

The person who is detached from creatures is not disturbed during prayer or otherwise, and so, without losing precious time, he easily acquires heavenly treasure.

Endeavor always that things be not for you, nor you for them, but forgetful of all, abide in recollection with your Bridegroom.

In the first place, we ought to be astonished by this fact: when we praise God or give him thanks for his benefits in general,
we are not particularly concerned whether or not our prayer is acceptable to him. On the other hand, we demand to see the
results of our petitions. What is the image of God that motivates our prayer: an instrument to be used or the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ?

Vocal prayer . . . must be accompanied by reflection. A prayer in which a person is not aware of Whom he is speaking to, what he is asking, who it is who is asking and of Whom, I don't call prayer-----however much the lips may move.

This is the reason for prayer my daughters, the purpose of this spiritual marriage: the birth always of good works, good works.