• Vespers: Saturdays 5PM
  • Divine Liturgy: Sundays 9:30AM
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Quotes

A collection of scriptural meditations from Saints and Fathers of the Church.

But, say the saints, now that you recognize the darkness in your own heart and the weakness of your flesh, you lose all desire to pass judgment on your neighbor. Out of your own darkness you see the heavenly light that shines in all created things reflected the clearer: you cannot detect the sins of others while your own are so great. For it is in your eager striving for perfection that you first perceive your own imperfection. And only when you have seen your imperfection, can you be perfected. Thus perfection proceeds out of weakness.

Break the bonds of your friendship for the body and give it only what is absolutely necessary.

One should not ponder divine matters on a full stomach, say the ascetics. For the well-fed, even the most superficial secrets of the Trinity lie hidden.

Your prayer must have four constituent parts, says Basil the Great: adoration, thanksgiving, confession of sin and petition for salvation.

Therefore we must not grow weary. We must be steadfast, immovable, always abounding in the work of the Lord, knowing that in the Lord our labor is not in vain (I Corinthians 15:58). Having once begun, we must not cease to perform deeds worthy of our repentance. To rest is the same as to retreat.

Just as desire and rage multiply our sins, so self-control and humility erase them.

Faith comes not through pondering but through action.

A prayer offered while one has any cause to reproach a fellow man is an impure prayer. There is only one whom the praying person may and must reproach, and that is himself. Without self-reproach, your prayer is as worthless as it is while you are reproaching someone else in your heart. Perhaps you ask: How can one learn this? The answer is: One learns it through prayer.

The person who is unaffected by the things of this world loves stillness; and he who loves no human thing loves all men.

He who fears God will pay careful attention to his soul and will free himself from communion with evil.

Strive to love every man equally, and you will simultaneously expel all the passions.

The intellect becomes a stranger to the things of this world when its attachment to the senses has been completely sundered.

Love and self-control purify the soul.

If you lay down rules for yourself, do not disobey yourself; for he who cheats himself is self-deluded.

Spiritual reading and prayer purify the intellect, while love and self-control purify the soul's passionate aspect.

If you are not willing to repent through freely choosing to suffer, unsought sufferings will providentially be imposed on you.

Only when you have seen your imperfection, can you be perfected.

A person standing at an open window hears the sounds from outside; it is impossible not to do so. But he can give the voices his attention or not, as he himself wishes. The praying person is continually beset by a stream of inappropriate thoughts, feelings and mental impressions. To stop this tiresome stream is as impracticable as to stop the air from circulating in an open room. But one can notice them or not. This, say the saints, one learns only through practice.

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Parish

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Archangel Michael Orthodox Church
5025 E. Mill Rd
Broadview Heights, Ohio 44147

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[email protected]
440-526-5192 (Phone)