Hope in His goodness and redouble your
confidence in proportion as your troubles increase.
We should always look to God as in
ourselves, no matter in what manner we meditate upon Him, so as to accustom
ourselves to dwell in His divine presence. For when we behold Him within our
souls, all our powers and faculties, and even our senses, are recollected
within us. If we look at God apart from ourselves we are easily distracted by
exterior objects.
Love to be looked at as a mere nothing in
the house of God.
I think that this fear which Our Lord makes
you feel is the result of His very great love for you; for seeing that your
love for Him is not powerful enough to make you do good and avoid evil, He
mingles fear with love, that the two together may make you do what He desires
of you.
Crosses, contempt, sorrows and afflictions
are the real treasures of the lovers of Jesus Christ crucified.
You see plainly that I do not mean to
advise you to perform great austerities, but rather generously to mortify your
passions and inclinations, detaching your heart and emptying it of all that is
earthly, and exercising charity towards your neighbor and liberality towards
the poor.
Though Jesus [in His Sacred Humanity] is
solitary in the Blessed Sacrament, He is always communing with God. Therefore,
in order to be conformed to Him, I will make a solitude in my heart, so that
everywhere I may converse alone with Jesus.
I believe that He will confirm these words
which His unworthy slave continually heard in the depths of her heart, amidst
all the difficulties and opposition that beset the beginning of this devotion:
"I shall reign in spite of My enemies and all those who would oppose
Me."
Keep your heart in peace and let nothing
trouble you, not even your faults. You must humble yourself and amend them
peacefully, without being discouraged or cast down, for God's dwelling is in
peace.
I think He intends to try you like gold in
the crucible, so as to number you amongst His most faithful servants. Therefore
you must lovingly embrace all occasions of suffering, considering them as
precious tokens of His love. To suffer in silence and without complaint is what
He asks of you.
You know that there is no middle course,
and that it is a question of being saved or lost for all eternity. It depends
on us: either we may choose to love God eternally with the Saints in Heaven
after we have done violence to self here below by mortifying and crucifying
ourselves as they did, or else renounce their happiness by giving to nature all
for which it craves.
If you wish to pray well, be faithful in
the practice of mortification, avoid dissipation of mind during the day, and
never commit any willful faults.
On coming away from prayer I used to say:
"O my Jesus, as I cannot remain in Thy presence, I would rather die than
be separated from Thee by sin. Come Thou with me to sanctify all my actions,
since all are done for Thee."
When we give ourselves up entirely to His
guidance and allow Him to do as He pleases with us, He enables us to make great
progress in a short time, almost without our knowing it, except for the
struggles in which His grace continually engages our immortified nature.
He only asks of you abandonment and perfect
submission. Nothing displeases Him so much as your uneasiness and despondency.
What do you fear? Is He not powerful enough to support you? Why, then, are you
so reserved with Him? Let Him act!
I was greatly consoled by the pleasure you gave our Lord in embracing His cross with joy and submission. It is true that He covered it entirely with roses, lest it should frighten you. But it is not so much in this that you should rejoice, but rather that you feel the pricks of the thorns hidden beneath.
I was greatly consoled by the pleasure you gave our Lord in embracing His cross with joy and submission. It is true that He covered it entirely with roses, lest it should frighten you. But it is not so much in this that you should rejoice, but rather that you feel the pricks of the thorns hidden beneath.
This divine heart is an abyss filled with
all blessings, and into the poor should submerge all their needs. It is an
abyss of joy in which all of us can immerse our sorrows. It is an abyss of
lowliness to counteract our foolishness, an abyss of mercy for the wretched, an
abyss of love to meet our every need.
Our Lord would fain be your sole Support,
Friend and Delight, provided you seek neither support nor delight in creatures.
Nevertheless, you must not be ill at ease or constrained in your intercourse
with your neighbor, but always humble, bright, kind and gracious in your
manner.
Our Lord Jesus Christ desires that we
should, for sanctifying ourselves, glorify His all-loving Heart; for it was His
Heart that suffered the most in His Sacred Humanity.
Keep your heart in peace and let nothing
trouble you, not even your faults. You must humble yourself and amend them
peacefully, without being discouraged or cast down, for God's dwelling is in
peace.
Since God wishes it - there is nothing to
be done. . . Why should you thus torment yourself? Get rid of whatever He shows
you to be an obstacle to His love, for His only desire is that you should live
stripped of all that is not Himself.
If we wish to have the love of the Divine
Heart as our guest, we must empty and detach our heart from its affection for
creatures and for ourselves.
We can tell Him all the secrets of our
heart, disclosing our want and misery to Him Who alone can remedy them, and
saying: O Friend of my heart, she whom Thou lovest is sick. Visit and heal me,
for I well know that Thou canst not love me and yet leave me alone in my
distress.
Be humble towards God and gentle with your
neighbor. Judge and accuse no one but yourself, and ever excuse others. Speak
of God always to praise and glorify Him, speak of your neighbor only with
respect -- do not speak of yourself at all, either well or ill.
Photo Credit Lawrence OP
Thank you for a wonderful collection of quotes. And a blessed feast day to you today.
ReplyDeleteSt Margaret Mary, pray for us