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

Keep the body properly slim so that you reduce the burden of the heart's warfare, with full benefit to yourself.

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

Nothing is more unsettling than talkativeness and more pernicious than an unbridled tongue, disruptive as it is of the soul’s proper state. For the soul’s chatter destroys what we build each day and scatters what we have laboriously gathered together.

Self-control and strenuous effort curb desire; stillness and intense longing for God wither it.

Long-suffering and readiness to forgive curb anger; love and compassion wither it.

Blessed stillness gives birth to blessed children: self-control, love and pure prayer.

We are sons of God or of Satan according to whether we conform to goodness or to evil.

It is an insult to the intelligence to be subject to what lacks intelligence and to concern itself with shameful desires.

Many times, weeping conquers God, if one can say that; and He is truly overcome. For gladly is the Merciful One constrained by tears -- But tears of the spirit And not those caused by afflictions of the body. Indeed, we weep for the dead, and we cry out over blows, For the flesh is clay and is subject to never-ending flow of tears. Let us, then, lament from our hearts In the way in which the Ninevites in their contrition opened Heaven And were heeded by the Savior. Indeed, He received their repentance.

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

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

Love and self-control purify the soul.

Fear of the Lord conquers desire, and distress that accords with God's will repulses sensual pleasure.

Make the body serve the commandments, keeping it so far as possible free from sickness and sensual pleasure.

Control your stomach, sleep, anger, and tongue, and you will not 'dash your foot against a stone.'

When you are praying alone, and your spirit is dejected, and you are wearied and oppressed by your loneliness, remember then, as always, that God the Trinity looks upon you with eyes brighter than the sun; also all the angels, your own Guardian Angel, and all the Saints of God. Truly they do; for they are all one in God, and where God is, there are they also. Where the sun is, thither also are directed all its rays. Try to understand what this means.

Keep the commandments, and you will find peace; love God, and you will attain spiritual knowledge.

Patient endurance is the soul's struggle for virtue; where there is struggle for virtue, self-indulgence is banished.

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Mailing Address

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

Email, Phone, and Fax

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