The way to attain compunction is an attentive life. ‘The beginning of repentance comes from the fear of God and attention,’ as the holy martyr Boniface says.
If you give gladly, even if you give only a little, it is a big gift. If you give unwillingly, even if you give a big gift, you turn it into a small one.
Each Christian, especially a priest, should follow in example the goodness of the Lord, that everyone should be invited to partake of the Lord's food at your table. The miser is an enemy of the Lord.
Those who meditate unceasingly upon the holy and glorious name [of Jesus] in the depths of their heart can sometimes see the radiance of their own spirit-intelligence. For when the mind is profoundly concentrated on this invocation, we feel experientially how it starts burning off all the layers of dirt that normally suffocates the soul.
Compunction comes when you consider how much you have grieved God Who is so good, so sweet, so merciful, so kind, and entirely full of love; Who was crucified and suffered everything for us. When you meditate on these things and other things the Lord has suffered, they bring compunction.
