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

But if you give a strong body rest and ease and idleness, all the passions dwelling in the soul are intensified. Then, even if the soul has a great desire for good, even the very thought of the good that is desired will be taken from you.

God smiles on the compassionate heart. Every time a beggar knocks at your door, try to perceive Christ Himself under the humble disguise. Would you, under any circumstances, let Christ knock in vain? The moral qualities of the individual beggar have nothing to do with it; that is Christ's concern, not yours. Who are you to judge your brother? Christ is using the beggar’s hand and mouth to test your compassion of Himself. Will you fail Him?

One who lives in idleness sins continually.

Ease and idleness are the destruction of the soul and they can injure her more than the demons.

If someone is judged worthy to receive the gift of knowledge but allows his heart to be full of bitterness or rancor or aversion to another, it is as if he had been struck in the eye by a thornbush. That is why knowledge is no good without charity.

Strive to walk worthily of the vocation to which you were called.

Compassion and humility are like the soul’s wings by which it flies up to heaven (Ps. 104:7). Without them prayer cannot rise off the ground...

If you have received from God the gift of knowledge, however limited, beware of neglecting charity and temperance. They are virtues which radically purify the soul from passions and so open the way of knowledge continually.

Those who yield themselves to idleness and apathy, even though they may be spiritual and holy, hurl themselves into unnatural subjection to passions.

It is a sin to spend time idly.

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5025 E. Mill Rd
Broadview Heights, Ohio 44147

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