Harvesting The Fruits of Contemplation

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time. Father Anthony J. Paone, S.J.   “My Child, if you desire to make progress along the way to Heaven, keep in your heart a holy fear of the Divine Justice. It is only reasonable that you should be afraid to hurt yourself. When you bring sin into your life, you are making yourself an object of My justice. I, the Eternal Truth, cannot accept you as good if you have become bad by sin. Therefore, keep your earthly desires under control and refuse to surrender yourself to unnecessary or dangerous pleasures. This holy fear of My justice will help you to stay free of the slavery of earthly attractions… If your love of Me is not yet strong enough to hold you back from doing wrong, then let your fear of hell keep you from sinning. A man who lacks this wise and holy fear will not go on doing good things for long. He will soon fall into Satan's snares a...

All of us walking the face of this earth have become discouraged, even sometimes overwhelmed by the many challenges life throws at us. For some souls, this is just an occasional battle. For far too many of us, this is an on-going and debilitating one – especially if we do not realize we are embroiled in spiritual combat every day of our lives. It is nearly impossible to serve God and others when discouragement has taken root in our souls. Discouragement – spiritual discouragement - never originates with God. It is the Evil one who plants the seed, encourages its growth and seeks to destroy souls through it. His sole intent is to prevent us from doing God’s will in our lives. Few of us are well equipped to defeat this scoundrel! Overcoming Spiritual Discouragement – The Wisdom and Spiritual Power of Venerable Bruno Lanteri by Father Timothy Gallagher, O.M.V. will give you the insight and tools needed to fend off the demon’s unending attacks. It is with great gratitude that I than...

Pondering Tidbits of Truth is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time.     St. Vincent Ferrer, O.P. "The seven dispositions with relation to our Lord in which you should exercise yourself are as follows: Love Him with most ardent love; Fear Him above all things; Render Him the honor and respect which are His due; Have a most constant zeal in His service; in addition to which, Thank and praise Him ; Obey promptly and perfectly His commands; and Relish the divine sweetness as keenly as possible." (From A Treatise On The Spiritual Life )    Venerable Bruno Lanteri "Anxieties, temptations, aridity, heaviness of heart, tribulations, injuries, unpleasant situations, offenses, ingratitude, crosses, matters which do not go well, and sorrows of various kinds:  I will expect all these, even from those I love and whom I have helped. But I will never consider them as evil nor will I regard their origin...

For some days now, I have been reading and pondering excerpts from an outstanding book written by Father Timothy Gallagher, O.M.V. entitled Overcoming Spiritual Discouragement - The Wisdom and Spiritual Power of Venerable Bruno Lanteri . This is a book I highly recommend. Given the chaos in our Church, country and world - all rooted in our having turned our hearts, minds and souls away from God and His eternal Truths and, for the most part, in our having individually and as a Church, remained silent in the presence of evil - the following words of Venerable Lanteri which I read this morning, seem most timely: "I do not live except for the glory of God; to this alone I must dedicate all my abilities of soul and body. And when it is necessary to think, speak and labor for God, to give my very life, let all be lost, let whatever will happen, happen: This I must do." These were not just abstract words of Venerable Bruno. A time came when the pope was held captive by Napoleon, and...