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

The arrows of the enemy cannot touch one who loves quietness; but he who moves about in a crowd will often be wounded.

Except for unceasing prayer we cannot draw near to God.

A fish swiftly escapes a hook and a sensual soul shuns solitude.

Beware of reading the doctrines of heretics for they, more than anything else, can equip the spirit of blasphemy against you.

Solitude offers us an excellent opportunity for calming our passions and giving our reason time to remove them thoroughly from our soul. For just as wild animals can be soothed by being stroked, so all our anger, fear and stress, which poison and disrupt our soul, can be soothed by an atmosphere of peace where the freedom from constant disturbance ensures that our soul can be brought more easily under the power of reason.

Only with the greatest struggle and sacrifice is the chaff of heresy separated from the wheat of Orthodox truth.

Unceasing prayer means to have the mind always turned to God with great love, holding alive our hope in Him, having confidence in Him whatever we are doing and whatever happens to us. That is the attitude that the Apostle had when he wrote: ‘Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril? Neither death nor life nor any other creature shall be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus.’ [cf. Rom. 8:35-38]

Constant prayer is the strength, and the armor, and the wall of the soul.

Nothing so fills the heart with contrition and humbles the soul as solitude embraced with self-awareness, and utter silence.

And pray ye without ceasing in behalf of other men. For there is in them hope of repentance that they may attain to God. See, then, that they be instructed by your works, if in no other way. Be ye meek in response to their wrath, humble in opposition to their boasting: to their blasphemies return your prayers; in contrast to their error, be ye steadfast in the faith; and for their cruelty, manifest your gentleness. While we take care not to imitate their conduct, let us be found their brethren in all true kindness; and let us seek to be followers of the Lord (who ever more unjustly treated, more destitute, more condemned? ), that so no plant of the devil may be found in you, but ye may remainin all holiness and sobriety in Jesus Christ, both with respect to the flesh and spirit.

A mind from which the thought of God has been carried away and which has thus become far removed from remembering Him, is also indifferent to sin with the outer senses. For such a mind can guide neither the hearing nor the tongue, since zest to work on itself has gone out of it.

A holy man told us one day, that the source of all heresies and schisms in the church was, loving God too little, and ourselves too much.

Pray ceaselessly, and spend day after day in heedfulness unto the salvation of your soul.

Guard yourselves from soul-destroying heresy, communion with which is alienation from Christ.

Every man that loves God loves a quiet life.

Self-love, love of pleasure and love of praise banish remembrance of God from the soul.

Nothing is better for rendering the heart penitent and the soul humble than wise solitude and complete silence.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)