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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.

Love the poor, and through them you will find mercy.

Increasing self-criticism is the sign of increasing humility. Indeed, there is no clearer sign.

The more a man struggles to do good, the more fear grows in him, until it shows him his slightest faults, those which he thought of as nothing while he was still in the darkness of ignorance.

Be despised and rejected in your own eyes, and you will see the glory of God within yourself. For where humility blossoms, there God’s glory bursts forth.

One who is capable of seeing himself is better than one who has been made worthy to see angels.

The feeding of the needy is the purchase money of the heavenly kingdom and the free dispenser of things temporal is made the heir of things eternal.

Do not shun poverty and afflictions, these wings of buoyant prayer.

I wish I could persuade spiritual persons that the way of perfection does not consist in many devices, nor in much cogitation, but in denying themselves completely and yielding themselves to suffer everything for the love of Christ. And if there is failure in this exercise, all other methods of walking in the spiritual way are merely a beating about the bush, and profitless trifling, although a person should have very high contemplation and communication with God.

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

One must train oneself in self-reproach, that is, always accuse oneself & not others in one’s mind, reproach oneself and not others, and with a severe distrust of oneself accuse oneself of the failings which are covered up by our self-love, accuse ourself of our inclinations to sin. He who has self-reproach has peace, writes Abba Dorotheos, & will never be disturbed. If to such a one there should occur an illness, a wrong, a vexation, or some similar misfortune, he ascribes everything to his own sins & thanks God. If such a one is punished or reprimanded by the superior, he accepts all this as good & accepts every severe word against himself without murmuring or talking back, as the judgment of God.

As for uprooting your passions, begin with self-reproach and with awareness of your own weaknesses; and consider yourself to be deserving of afflictions.

Who has conquered the body? He who has made the heart contrite. Who then has made the heart contrite? He who has denied himself.

He who smells the smell of one's own foul odor doesn't smell the foul odor of anyone else.

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A prayer offered while one has any cause to reproach a fellow man is an impure prayer. There is only one whom the praying person may and must reproach, and that is himself. Without self-reproach, your prayer is as worthless as it is while you are reproaching someone else in your heart. Perhaps you ask: How can one learn this? The answer is: One learns it through prayer.

A sign of deliverance from our falls is the continual reckoning of ourselves as debtors.

Vanity is eliminated by acting secretly, and pride by ascribing to God all that is well done.

Humble yourself, reproach yourself, consider yourself the very last and the very worst of all, condemn no one - and you will receive God's mercy.

Self-accusation before God is something that is very necessary for us; and humility of heart is extremely advantageous in our lives, above all at the time of prayer. For prayer requires great attention and needs a proper awareness, otherwise it will turn out to be unacceptable and rejected, and `it will be turned back empty' to our bosom.

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

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440-526-5192 (Phone)