• 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.

And when you pray, see that you ask not for what is alien to your life, and provoke the Lord. Ask not for money, not for human glory, nor power, nor for any of the things that pass away. But seek for the kingdom of God, and all that is needed for your body will be provided; as the Lord Himself has said: Seek ye the kingdom of God, and his justice, and all these things will be added unto you (Matthew 6:33).

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

There is yet another reason that may cause our prayer to go unanswered: namely, that though we pray we yet continue in sin.

It is not always possible to fulfill the usual rules; one must take circumstances into account and try to fulfill what they make possible, as far as one can. The demons themselves are not unmindful of this law. So, being in constant enmity with us, they prevent us from doing what is possible and urge us to do what is impossible.

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.

What air is for the life of the body, the Holy Spirit is for the life of the soul. By means of prayer, the soul breathes this holy, mysterious air.

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.

Prayer is a great good if offered up from a thankful soul; if we are steadfast in it, so that whether we receive or do not receive what we pray for we at all times give thanks to God. For since He will sometimes grant what we ask and sometimes will not, in both cases it is to our gain... For oftentimes God will delay, not as denying our prayer, but in His wisdom seeking rather for our perseverance, and desiring to draw us nearer to Himself; as a loving father when asked by his son for something will often do; withholding consent, and not from the will to refuse, but rather to encourage him in steadfastness.

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

The soul of prayer is attentiveness. As the body without a soul is dead, so prayer without attentiveness is dead.

Let us then not lose heart, nor be slothful or timid in prayer. Even if we have been brought down to the depths of evil, prayer can speedily draw us back.

Just as a moth devours clothing and a worm devours wood, so dejection devours a man’s soul.

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

If a man tries to overcome temptations without prayer and patient endurance, he will become more entangled in them instead of driving them away.

Unless humility and love, simplicity and goodness regulate our prayer, this prayer - or, rather, this pretence of prayer - cannot profit us at all. And this applies not only to prayer, but to every labor and hardship undertaken for the sake of virtue.

A servant of the Lord is he who in body stands before men, but in mind knocks at Heaven with prayer.

Before the war begins, seek out your ally; before you fall ill, seek out your physician; and before grievous things come upon you, pray, and in the time of your tribulations you will find Him, and He will listen to you.

The joint prayer of husband and wife is a great force.

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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)