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

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

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

Concern for one's soul means hardship and humility, for through these God forgives us all our sins.

All sin is due to sensual pleasure, all forgiveness to hardship and distress.

You were commanded to keep the body as a servant, not to be unnaturally enslaved to its pleasures.

Self-love -- that is, friendship for the body -- is the source of evil in the soul.

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

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

The soul's health consists in dispassion and spiritual knowledge; no slave to sensual pleasure can attain it.

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

Love and self-control purify the soul.

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

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

Spiritual freedom is release from the passions; without Christ’s mercy you cannot attain it.

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

Worldly virtues promote human glory, spiritual virtues the glory of God.

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

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

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)