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

How then shall we escape the disasters that anger brings? By training the force of our feelings not to rush ahead of the power of reason.

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.

Dispassion is a peaceful condition of the soul in which the soul is not easily moved to evil.

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.

Do not let the sun go down on the anger of your brother (Eph. 4:26); that is, let no one be angry and enraged against his brother until the setting of the sun.

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

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

When anyone is disturbed or saddened under the pretext of a good and soul-profiting matter, and is angered against his neighbor, it is evident that this is not according to God: for everything that is of God is peaceful and useful and leads a man to humility and to judging himself.

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.

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

Apt silence bridles anger.

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

If, wishing to correct another, you are moved to anger, you gratify your own passion. Do not lose yourself in order to save another.

Almsgiving heals the soul's incensive power; fasting withers sensual desire; prayer purifies the intellect and prepares it for contemplation of created beings. For the Lord has given us commandments which correspond to the powers of the soul.

It is necessary most of all for one who is fasting to curb anger, to accustom himself to meekness and condescension, to have a contrite heart, to repulse impure thoughts and desires, to examine his conscience, to put his mind to the test and to verify what good has been done by us in this or any other week, and which deficiency we have corrected in ourselves in the present week. This is true fasting.

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

A brother asked Abba Isidore the priest, 'Why are the demons so frightened of you?' The old man said to him, 'Because, ever since the day I began practicing ascesis, I have striven to prevent anger from reaching my lips.'

The first step toward freedom from anger is to keep the lips silent when the heart is stirred; the next, to keep thoughts silent when the soul is upset; the last, to be totally calm when unclean winds are blowing.

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5025 E. Mill Rd
Broadview Heights, Ohio 44147

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