Many are the tribulations that ended good. Live them in hope and faith in the good that is about to come and not in the distress that is already here.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Words of Spiritual Benefit Vol. IV
Category: SUFFERING
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No one may use illness as an excuse for resting from the labor of spiritual living. “Perhaps some might think that illness and bodily weakness hinder the work of perfection since the works and accomplishments of one’s hands cannot continue. But it is not a hindrance” (St. Ambrose, Jacob and the Happy Life).
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“You are stricken by this sickness,” the Holy Fathers say, “so that you will not depart barren to God. If you can endure, and give thanks to God, this sickness will be accounted to you as a spiritual work” (Sts. Barsanouphius and John, Philokalia).
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The more debasing the experience, the more desperately we reach for shreds of meaning
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To think that you ought to understand something just because you lived it — that you are owed an explanation for your feelings just because you happen to be the one who felt them — strikes me as a supremely naive kind of power play
against narrative
a love story, or an essay about love stories, or the opposite of both
rayne fisher-quann -
In each difficulty that he faces and for each problem, he has hope that God will save him. No matter how hard it is and how late God will be, this person has hope that God will come, even in the last hours of the night. Therefore, he does not ever lose hope.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Words of Spiritual Benefit Vol. III
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The day he accepts a situation which hitherto has seemed to him unendurable, and which, on the other hand, is the normal situation of an immense number of people, he ceases to suffer and realizes that everything which seemed intolerable at one level is no longer so at a lower level.
Boredom
Alberto Moravia -
He who accepts present afflictions in the expectation of future blessings has found knowledge of the truth; and he will easily be freed from anger and remorse.
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Mother Erene suffered from many illnesses, including cancer, heart disease, headaches, and diabetes, but her face always radiated with a smile. On bearing her cross: “Once, my pains were unbearable. I was praying to thank God. I beseeched Our Lady the Virgin to pray for me. Then I beheld her before me in light. She smiled and asked, ‘Do you remember when I asked you if you would like to be a martyr?’ I answered, ‘Yes, I do.’ She said, ‘I told you that pain, illnesses and tribulations are forms of martyrdom, so bear them.’ Therefore, I constantly thank God. I am happy with illness because I previously asked for that cross. Tribulations bring me closer to God and confer on me many spiritual benefits.
source -
I always offer consolation to those who suffer from wearisome problems by saying to them:
“Problems always have a pyramid shape.
They rise up till they reach their peak, then go down in the
other direction.
There isn’t a problem which continues to rise up and up for
ever. Even the trial of the righteous Job himself reached its
peak and then ended, and it was the same for the upright
Joseph.
All of their problems were limited to a time, after which they
came to an end.
—H.H. Pope Shenouda III, Experiences in Life
SO GOOD QUOTES 