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

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.

Keep your conscience keen and bright, and refrain from hankering after, or expecting, consolation. Leave that to God. He knows when, where, and how to give it to you.

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

Do not disregard your conscience, which always counsels you of the best. It puts before you divine and angelic advice; it frees you from the hidden stains of your heart, and will make you the gift of free speech with God at the time of your departure.

Leaves, whether of gold or lead, placed over the eyes, obstruct the sight equally, for the value of gold does not affect the blindness it produces. Similarly, anger, whether reasonable or unreasonable, obstructs our spiritual vision.

When one gets angry, he is deprived of God's protection.

The conscience is nature's book. He who applies what he reads there experiences God's help.

True joy is the joy of consolation, the joy that wells up in the knowledge of one's own weakness and the Lord's mercy, and that does not need the bared teeth of laughter to express itself.

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

Of the Only Case in Which Anger is Good... But we have a use for anger most properly planted within us, and for this use alone it is profitable and healthful for us to entertain it, namely, when we burn with wrathful indignation against the lustful motions of our own hearts, and are enraged to find that those things which we should be ashamed to do or to speak of before men have found admittance into the secret places of our minds. We may then well dread and fear exceedingly the presence of the Angels and the Omnipresence of God Himself, and His all-seeing Eye from which no secrets of our hearts can lie hid.

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

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.

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.

As a general rule, decide whether a thing is permissible by the effect it produces within. Permit yourself what is constructive, but never what is destructive.

One must by every means strive to preserve peace of soul and not be disturbed by offenses from others; for this one must in every way strive to restrain anger and by means of attentiveness to keep the mind and heart from improper feelings. And therefore we must bear offenses from others with equanimity and accustom ourselves to such a disposition of spirit that these offenses seem to concern not us, but others. Such a practice can give quietness to the human heart and make it as dwelling for God Himself.

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

When God, using our conscience, calls us to righteousness and yet our self-will opposes Him, He respects our freedom and lets our own will be done; but then, alas, our minds grow dull, our will slack, and we commit iniquities without number. On the other hand, the fruits of the spirit are soon granted to them who follow the commandments of Christ our Lord.

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

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