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  • Divine Liturgy: Sundays 9:30AM
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Quotes

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

Bear in mind that prayer alone, unaccompanied by moral improvement, is useless.

Some people when praised for their virtue are delighted, and attribute this pleasurable feeling of self-esteem to grace. Others when reproved for their sins are pained, and they mistake this beneficial pain for the action of sin.

Prayer is truly a heavenly armor, and it alone can keep safe those who have dedicated themselves to God. Prayer is the common medicine for purifying ourselves from the passions, for hindering sin and curing our faults. Prayer is an inexhaustible treasure, an unruffled harbor, the foundation of serenity, the root and mother of myriads of blessings.

When you are praying alone, and your spirit is dejected, and you are wearied and oppressed by your loneliness, remember then, as always, that God the Trinity looks upon you with eyes brighter than the sun; also all the angels, your own Guardian Angel, and all the Saints of God. Truly they do; for they are all one in God, and where God is, there are they also. Where the sun is, thither also are directed all its rays. Try to understand what this means.

The most important thing in any good effort and the height of all activities is to persevere in prayer, by means of which we can always acquire through supplication the other virtues from God as well.

Do not shun poverty and affliction, the fuel that gives wings to prayer.

The enemy of our salvation especially strives to draw our heart and mind away from God when we are about to serve Him, and endeavours to adulterously attach our heart to something irrelevant. Be always, every moment, with God, especially when you pray to Him. If you are inconstant, you will fall away from life, and will cast yourself into sorrow and straitness.

Do you wish God to hear your prayer immediately, brother? When you lift your hands up to heaven, pray first of all, with your heart, for your enemies and God will grant you speedily whatever else you request.

Everything you do in revenge against a brother who has harmed you will come back to your mind at the time of prayer.

Do not pray that things may be according to your desires, for they are not always in keeping with the will of God. Better pray as you were taught, saying: ‘Thy will be done’ on me (Matt. vi 10). And ask thus about all things, for He always desires what is good and profitable for your soul, whereas you do not always seek it.

If someone should ask: how am I to pray?, the answer is very simple: fear God. Experience of the fear of God arouses attention and consciousness in the heart and forces it to stand with devotion before God.

Do you consider you have done some good action? Give thanks to God, and do not set yourself above your neighbor.

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.

Ask the angels and the saints to intercede for you, just as you'd ask people who are alive. Stand face to face with them, in the belief that they are also standing face to face with you.

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

Try to know yourself, your own wickedness. Think on the greatness of God and your wretchedness. Meditate on the suffering of Christ, the magnitude of Whose love and suffering surpass our understanding. Ascribe the good that you do to God alone. Do not think about the sin of a brother but about what in him is better than in yourself.... Flee from glory, honors and praise, but if this is impossible, be sorry that such is your lot. Be benevolent to people of low origin. Be freely and willingly obedient not only to those above you but to those below .... The lowlier we are in spirit, the better we know ourselves, and without humility we cannot see God.

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

Prayer requires the inseparable presence and cooperation of the attention. With attention, prayer becomes the inalienable property of the person praying; in the absence of attention, it is extraneous to the person praying. With attention, it bears abundant fruit; without attention, it produces thorns and thistles. The fruit of prayer consists in illumination of mind and compunction of heart; in the quickening of the soul with the life of the Spirit. Thorns and thistles are a sign of deadness of soul and pharisaical self-esteem which springs from the hardening of a heart which is contented and elated by the quantity of the prayers and the time spent in reciting those prayers.

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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)