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

Do not befoul your intellect by clinging to thoughts filled with anger and sensual desire. Otherwise you will lose your capacity for pure prayer and fall victim to the demon of listlessness.

I am a Christian, you say, and content yourself with this. This is the first deceit - transferring to yourself the privileges and promise of Christianity, without any care to root true Christianity into yourself; or to ascribe to yourself that which can only be acquired by your strength and inner worthiness. Explain to yourself that it is illusory to hope in a name, that God can raise a son of Abraham from a stone and can take away your promise at any time if the conditions for participating in them are not soon fulfilled. Mainly, clarify to yourself what it means to be a Christian, unite yourself to this ideal, and you will see just how stable is this buttress to your blindness.

If some Christians cannot comprehend our Orthodox faith, its Sacraments, it proves that the minds and hearts of such persons are too impure and passionate to bear its purity and brightness, just as sick eyes cannot bear the light of the sun. This heavenly treasure can only be comprehended by the hearts of those who free their minds and feelings from worldly attachments.

If you want to pray properly, do not let yourself be upset or you will run in vain.

The Christian ought not to be of doubtful mind, nor by anything drawn away from the recollection of God and of His purposes and judgments. The Christian ought in all things to become superior to the righteousness existing under the law, and neither swear nor lie. The Christian ought to be patient, whatever he has to suffer, and to convict the wrong-doer in season, not with the desire of his own vindication, but of his brother's reformation, according to the commandment of the Lord.

My children, desire to purify your hearts from envy and from anger with each other, lest death should overcome you, and you will be counted among the murderers. For whosoever hates his brother, kills a soul.

He who is not indifferent to fame and pleasure, as well as to love of riches that exists because of them and increases them, cannot cut off occasions for anger. And he who does not cut these off cannot attain perfect love.

Unless a man keeps the commandments of God, he cannot progress, even in a single virtue.

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

Prayer is the seed of gentleness and the absence of anger.

The designation of a Christian consists in glorifying the Heavenly Father by one's life. Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works, and glorify your Father which is in heaven (Matt. 5:16). But true glorification of God is possible only if one rightly believes and expresses his right belief in words and deeds.

Silence of lips is better and more wonderful than any edifying conversation. Strive to acquire humility and submissiveness. Never insist that anything should be according to your will, for this gives birth to anger. Do not judge or humiliate anyone, for this gives birth to anger. Do not judge or humiliate anyone, for this exhausts the heart and blinds the mind, and thereon leads to negligence and makes the heart unfeeling.

Wrath is a reminder of hidden hatred, that is to say, remembrance of wrongs. Wrath is a desire for the injury of the one who has provoked you. Irascibility is the untimely blazing up of the heart. Bitterness is a movement of displeasure seated in the soul. Anger is an easily changeable movement of one’s disposition and disfiguration of soul.

Through anger the brightness of the Holy Spirit is shut out from the soul.

Struggle until death to fulfill the commandments: purified through them, you will enter into life.

Apt silence bridles anger.

It is the binding duty of every Christian, when he reaches maturity, to know his faith thoroughly.

Empty your mind of these two things: the belief that you are deserving of great things, or the thought that any man is beneath you. If you do this anger will never be permitted to rise up within you.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)