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Quotes

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

Greater therefore is the rejoicing of heaven over the sinner converted than upon the soul that remained just. A captain in battle will feel a warmer regard for the soldier who at first faltered and ran, and then had bravely fought back, than over the one who had never yielded yet had never thrust bravely forward. So will the farmer love more the fields that cleaned of their weeds now bear a fruitful yield, than the land which had never known thorns, yet had never yielded a bountiful crop.

If you feel no pang in committing minor offences you will through them fall into major transgressions.

The man who has come to loathe sin has mounted the first rung of the heavenly ladder.

If Moses, who was a god to Pharaoh, was shut out from the Land of Promise because of one word, how much more will not the evil speech of our tongue, by which we offend and hurt both God and man, shut us out from heaven?

Think also of this: the person who is bound to earthly things may rejoice but may also be upset or disturbed or grieved over earthly things: his mind is exposed to continual changes. But the joy of your master (Matthew 25:21) is enduring, for God is unchangeable. Thus control your tongue at the same time as you discipline your body with fasting and strictness. Talkativeness is a great enemy of prayer. A spate of fluttering words stands in the way of the words of prayer. This is the reason that we shall render account for every careless word we utter (Matthew 12:36). One does not bring the dust of the road into a room that one wishes to keep clean; thus keep your heart free from gossip and chatter about the events of the day that is past.

Those who have sinned must not despair. Let that never be. For we are condemned not for the multitude of evils, but because we do not want to repent...

Every man who has committed sin, has stopped up the senses of his soul with the mud of pleasure.

Do not stir up a memory that will cover your prayer with mud, do not root around in the soil of your old sins.

He who guards his lips, watches over his soul; but he who is bold with his lips, dishonors himself. Silence gathers, but much talking scatters.

Sin, to one who loves God, is nothing other than an arrow from the enemy in battle. The true Christian is a warrior fighting his way through the regiments of the unseen enemy to his heavenly homeland.

A thick rope is composed of thin strands of hemp. One thin strand cannot hold you bound nor strangle you, for you will easily, with the lightest touch, break it and free yourself. But if a thick rope binds you, you will stay bound, and it will strangle you. You cannot easily break it and free yourself of it. As a thick rope is made from thin, weak strands, so men's passions are made up of smaller initial sins. The small, initial sins a man can still break and free himself of. But sin on sin, repeated, the weave becomes thicker and thicker until it becomes a passion, which masters a man as only it can do. You can neither cut it out easily nor cast it away from you nor be divorced from it. Oh, when will men guard themselves from these first sins? Then they would not have so much difficulty in freeing themselves from the passions.

Being delivered from bodily sins is not enough, we must also cleanse the inner energy which dwells in our souls.

But let us speak that which is good, to the edification of faith. That is, to speak only what will help to build up our neighbor in virtue; nothing more than that.

If we want to do something but cannot, then before God, Who knows our hearts, it is as if we have done it. This is true whether the intended action is good or bad.

For never is a man forced into sin by another’s fault, unless he have, stowed away in his heart, matter for evil deeds. Nor is a man to be held a victim of sudden deception if at the sight of a woman’s beauty he fall into an abyss of vile lust. Rather is it that diseases of soul, deeply hidden away and lost to view, come then to the surface on the occasion of the sight.

If you have received from God the gift of knowledge, however limited, beware of neglecting charity and temperance. They are virtues which radically purify the soul from passions and so open the way of knowledge continually.

Teach your mouth to say what is in your heart.

Nothing is more unsettling than talkativeness and more pernicious than an unbridled tongue, disruptive as it is of the soul’s proper state. For the soul’s chatter destroys what we build each day and scatters what we have laboriously gathered together.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)