• The greatest in the Kingdom of Heaven are not those who belong to the “more perfect state,” but those who love and suffer most. This is why they can move ahead of so many others whose lives, apparently, were more successful.

    VIRGINITY
    A Positive Approach to Celibacy for the Sake of the Kingdom of Heaven
    Raniero Cantalamessa, OFM Cap

  • At the time of your defeat, when you are bound both with languor and slothfulness, and subdued by the enemy in the most painful misery and wearisome labor of sin, ponder in your heart on the former time of your diligence, and how you used to concern yourself even over the most minute matters, and the valiant struggle which you displayed, and how you were stirred up with zeal against those who would hinder you in your progress. Furthermore, reflect upon the groans which you used to utter because of the small faults that you committed due to your negligence, and how in all these things you took the crown of victory. For thus, with such and so many recollections, your soul is wakened as if from the deep and is clad with the flame of zeal.

    The Ascetical Homilies of Isaac the Syrian

  • This transient life is cherished by every man whose way of life is corrupt; and second to him is the man deprived of knowledge. Well has one said, ‘The fear of death distresses a man with a guilty conscience but the man with a good witness within himself longs for death as for life.’

    The Ascetical Homilies of Isaac the Syrian

  • Some people do not feel forgiven after confession because they have not tasted the freedom of truly forgiving others.

    The Lord’s Prayer
    Fr. Mina Dimitri

  • the man who is born with enough to live upon is generally of a somewhat independent turn of mind; he is accustomed to keep his head up; he has not learned all the arts of the beggar; perhaps he even presumes a little upon the possession of talents which, as he ought to know, can never compete with cringing mediocrity; in the long run he comes to recognize the inferiority of those who are placed over his head, and when they try to put insults upon him, he becomes refractory and shy. This is not the way to get on in the world.

    The Wisdom of Life
    Arthur Schopenhauer

  • But the man who has been born into a poor position looks upon it as the natural one, and if by any chance he comes in for a fortune, he regards it as a superfluity, something to be enjoyed or wasted, because, if it comes to an end, he can get on just as well as before,

    The Wisdom of Life
    Arthur Schopenhauer

  • In the blessings as well as in the ills of life, less depends upon what befalls us than upon the way in which it is met.

    The Wisdom of Life
    Arthur Schopenhauer

  • The only thing that stands in our power to achieve, is to make the most advantageous use possible of the personal qualities we possess, and accordingly to follow such pursuits only as will call them into play, to strive after the kind of perfection of which they admit and to avoid every other; consequently, to choose the position, occupation and manner of life which are most suitable for their development.
    …

    Imagine a man endowed with herculean strength who is compelled by circumstances to follow a sedentary occupation, some minute exquisite work of the hands, for example, or to engage in study and mental labor demanding quite other powers, and just those which he has not got—compelled, that is, to leave unused the powers in which he is pre-eminently strong; a man placed like this will never feel happy all his life through.

    The Wisdom of Life
    Arthur Schopenhauer

  • As far as your family is concerned, your responsibility
    is to love and serve them, and to be a source of blessing
    for them. However, beware of assuming the position
    of teacher, preacher, or reproacher before your elders.
    through prayer, love and service, you will be able to win
    them over to Christ.

    From Heart to Heart
    Fr. Tadros Y. Malaty

  • Withdrawnness, on the other hand, represents the exact
    opposite of spirituality; this is because it constitutes the
    soul’s revolving around “Me, Myself and I.”

    For a withdrawn person, worship revolves around himself
    not around the Lord. His prayers will not probe the depths
    of his soul, soaring with it to the Lord’s heavenly heights.
    Rather, he locks himself up within his soul, seeking to submit the Lord to his own self. His prayers therefore only serve to appease his conscience and to elicit praise from others or even from himself. Such a person would not know how to talk candidly to the Lord as His Father. Fasting would only be practised to satisfy the person’s ego. He would talk much about himself seeking his and others’ admiration for his fasting and worship!

    Finally, when that person confesses, he would neither be broken-hearted nor contrite before the Holy Spirit; rather, he would have lengthy accounts of his iniquities with his Father in confession, with no hint of regret or repentance. His primary objective is to solicit his confessor’s attention and sympathy. He might even go so far as to serve and to evangelize, without knowing how to preach repentance to his own soul. He delights in the appearance of his service, and in everyone’s interest in him and his work.

    From Heart to Heart
    Fr. Tadros Y. Malaty