• 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.

Virtue can only be attained by unremitting effort.

Fear God and keep His commandments both in your feelings and in your intellect. If you force yourself to keep them in your intellect, bit by bit you will attain to fulfilling them in your feelings.

The intellect becomes a stranger to the things of this world when its attachment to the senses has been completely sundered.

True virtue consists in victory over one’s own self, not to do what our corrupt nature wills, but what the holy will of God desires.

The foundation of every virtue is the realization of human weakness.

Virtue is not accounted virtue if it is not accompanied by difficulty and labors.

Do not neglect the practice of the virtues; if you do, your spiritual knowledge will decrease, and when famine occurs you will go down into Egypt (Genesis 41:57, 46:6).

Do not be surprised that when you draw near to virtue, grievous and intense tribulations come to you on all sides: for virtue is not considered virtue, if it does not involve hard work.

Virtues do not stop demons attacking us, but keep us unscathed by them.

You will pay glorious homage to God if, through virtues, you imprint His likeness on your soul.

Rejoice when you perform the virtues, but do not become exalted, lest, arriving at the pier, you suffer a shipwreck.

There is nothing more burdensome and grievous then when conscience accuses us in anything, and there is nothing dearer then calmness and approval of the conscience.

According to the degree to which the intellect is stripped of the passions, the Holy Spirit initiates the intellect into the mysteries of the age to be.

We must with unflagging zeal and care give ourselves to the pursuit of virtue, and constantly occupy ourselves in its practice, lest at any time progress may cease, and regress immediately take its place.... To cease to acquire means to lose, for the will which goes no longer forward will not be far from peril of falling back.

A Christian has great difficulty in attaining three things: grief (over sins), tears, and the continual memory of death. Yet these contain all of the other virtues.

As a general rule, decide whether a thing is permissible by the effect it produces within. Permit yourself what is constructive, but never what is destructive.

The virtues follow one from another in succession, so that the path of virtue does not become grievous and burdensome, and so that by being achieved in order progressively they may be made light; thus the hardships endured for virtue's sake should be cherished by a man as is the good itself.

The abstinent withdraws from gluttony, the uncovetous from covetousness, the silent from wordiness, the pure from attachment to sensory pleasures, the chaste from fornication, he who is content with what he has from love of money, the meek from agitation (anger), the humble from vanity, the obedient from objection, he who is honest with himself from hypocrisy; equally, he who prays withdraws from despair, the willing pauper from acquisitiveness, he who professes his faith from denying it, the martyr from idolatry – so you see that each virtue, performed even unto death, is nothing but withdrawal from sin; and withdrawal from sin is a natural action, not an action which could be rewarded by the kingdom.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)