• Vespers: Saturdays 5PM
  • Divine Liturgy: Sundays 9:30AM
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Quotes

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

It is natural for the poor man to beg, and it is natural for man made poor by the fall into sin to pray.

The soul of prayer is attentiveness. As the body without a soul is dead, so prayer without attentiveness is dead.

Think also of this: the person who is bound to earthly things may rejoice but may also be upset or disturbed or grieved over earthly things: his mind is exposed to continual changes. But the joy of your master (Matthew 25:21) is enduring, for God is unchangeable. Thus control your tongue at the same time as you discipline your body with fasting and strictness. Talkativeness is a great enemy of prayer. A spate of fluttering words stands in the way of the words of prayer. This is the reason that we shall render account for every careless word we utter (Matthew 12:36). One does not bring the dust of the road into a room that one wishes to keep clean; thus keep your heart free from gossip and chatter about the events of the day that is past.

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

Pray humbly. If you should proudly think your prayer agreeable to the Lord and worthy of being answered, take it from me that it won't be heard.

Only the benumbed soul doesn’t pray. Preserve in yourselves the feeling of need, and you will always have stimulation for prayer.

Prayer demands that the mind should be pure of all thought and should admit nothing not belonging to prayer, even if it were good in itself. As if inspired by God the mind should withdraw from all things and hold its converse with Him alone.

There is yet another reason that may cause our prayer to go unanswered: namely, that though we pray we yet continue in sin.

Undistracted prayer is the highest doing of the mind.

When we return to prayer after a period of reading we find a rejuvenated and invigorated soul, stirred by the desire for God. The best form of prayer is one that implants the clearest idea of God in the soul and thus makes space for the presence of God within us. We become a temple of God when our continuous meditation on Him is not constantly interrupted by ordinary worries, and the spirit is not disturbed by unexpected emotions. Thus, in flight from all things, the spirit who loves God can approach God who drives out everything that leads us to evil, and holds steadfastly to everything that leads to virtue.

Pray firstly to be purified of passions, secondly to be freed from ignorance and forgetfulness, and thirdly to be delivered from all temptation and forsaking.

When you pray fervently, watch, for there will be temptations. This happens to everyone.

The more a man's tongue flees verbosity, the more his intellect is illumined so as to be able to discern deep thoughts; for the rational intellect is befuddled by verbosity.

Whatever you have endured out of love of wisdom will bear fruit for you at the time of prayer.

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

He who guards his lips preserves his soul; but he who is bold with his lips dishonors himself.

Do not attempt to assess the quality of your prayer. God alone can judge its value. To us, our own prayer must always appear so poor an effort, so inadequate an achievement, that the cry of the publican spontaneously rises from our lips.

Go, sell all that belongs to you and give it to the poor and taking up the cross, deny yourself; in this way you will be able to pray without distraction.

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Parish

Mailing Address

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

Email, Phone, and Fax

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