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. Peter Kreeft, Ph.D.  "Here is one of the most wonderful and terrifying sentences I have ever read, from William Law’s S erious Call:  'If you will look into your own heart in utter honesty, you must admit that there is one and only one reason why you are not even now a saint.  You do not wholly want to be'.”  (From  How to Win the Culture War: A Christian Plan   Jesus to St. Catherine of Siena  “My daughter, if you wish to acquire strength, you must imitate Me. I could, with My divine power, have thwarted Satan’s efforts and taken other measures to nullify them, but I wish to instruct you through My example and teach you to conquer him through the Cross. If you wish to have power over your enemies, take the Cross as your safeguard. Have not My apostles taught you that I ran with joy to a ...

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 Henri Dominic Lacordaire, O.P. “What is difficult is to carry the cross each day, the cross which is not blood-stained but which bruises the skin a little without making it bleed, and which is composed of restraint, tediousness and languor. If one could only mount Calvary once and for all, and give one's body once and for all to the executioners, what pleasure! But no, the torment is in detail: a little cut of the whip, a little slap in the face, a little humiliation.” (From  St. Dominic’s Family   by Sister Mary Jean Dorcy, O.P.)   Plinio Correa de Oliveira “If I am truly grateful for the fact that our Lord is my God and my Savior Who shed His blood to the last drop for me and would have done it for me alone, I must react when I see Him attacked, insulted derided, blasphemed and His Church persecuted. That is t...

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. Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart.  "Life is a journey. Provided we keep going, all is well. What God cannot tolerate - what is, indeed, intolerable - are those stationary souls who either are inert by nature or persuade themselves that they have reached the summit, and that there is nothing more for them." (From Where Silence Is Praise: From the Writings of Dom Augustin Guillerand, O. Cart. )   Father Dismas Sayre, O.P In our modern world, man sees Jesus's forgiveness and mercy as almost givens, taken for granted. Of course, even the most permissive and “merciful” want whatever they might consider evil to be punished, but never their own evil . It's funny how that works. As has often been stated by various authors, two thieves were crucified with Christ. One was saved, so we should not despair, but one was lost, so we should not ...

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. Alphonsus Liguori  "With regard to evil thoughts, there may be a twofold delusion. God-fearing souls who have little or no gift of discernment, and are inclined to scruples, think that every wicked thought that enters their mind is a sin. This is a mistake, for it is not the wicked thoughts in themselves that are sins, but the yielding or consenting to them. The wickedness of mortal sin consists in the perverse will that deliberately yields to sin with a complete knowledge of its wickedness with full consent. And therefore St. Augustine teaches that when the consent of the will is absent, there is no sin. However much we may be tormented by temptations, the rebellion of the senses, or the inordinate motions of the inferior part of the soul, as long as there is no consent, there is no sin. For the comfort of suc...

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. Dom Lorenzo Scupoli "No creature ever loved Jesus Christ more ardently, nor showed more perfect submission to His will, than Mary, His mother. If then, this Savior, immolated for us sinners, gave His mother to us, an advocate and intercessor for all time, she cannot but comply with His request, and will not refuse us her assistance. Let us, then, not hesitate to implore her pity; let us have recourse to her with great confidence in all our necessities, as she is an inexhaustible source of blessing, bestowing her favors in proportion to the confidence placed in her."   (From Spiritual Combat )   Alice von Hildebrand “But the recognition of our nothingness should go hand in hand with an awareness that God, the infinitely good and merciful God, loves His creatures, these poor beggars that He has knighted by making them to His image ...

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. Ignatius of Loyola "Man was created for a certain end. This end is to praise, to reverence and to serve the Lord his God and by this means to arrive at eternal salvation. All other beings and objects that surround us on the earth were created for the benefit of man and to be useful to him, as means to his final end; hence his obligation to use, or to abstain from the use of, these creatures, according as they bring him nearer to that end, or tend to separate him from it." (From The Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius ) Deacon Alex Jones "How do you tell God no? How do you look into the face of truth and say, ‘That’s nice, but it will cause me problems?’ I said yes, and that yes has cost me dearly. But deep down in my heart is a passion for our Lord and a love for his Church. I...

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. Hubert Van Zeller, O.S.B. "The weight of evil in the world seems overwhelming. We feel it everywhere and our effort to resist is smothered. But God does not  see things in this way. God must still see the world as good or he would not allow it to continue its existence. H e prefers, so St. Augustine tells us, to draw good out of evil rather than not to permit any evil at all." (From The Mystery of Suffering) Father Benedict Baur, O.S.B.  "Think of all of our omissions with regard to opportunities for and impulses toward prayer. All those free moments we have in the course of each day: we could use them for prayer, but we omit to do so…Think of all the inspirations of grace and all the impulses to good we neglect or to which we turn a deaf ear. We know that God is speaking to us ...

Pondering Tidbits of Tr uth   is my simple and inadequate way of providing nuggets of spiritual wisdom for you to chew on from time to time. St. John of the Cross "What more do you want, O soul! And what else do you search for outside, when within yourself you possess your riches, delights, satisfactions, fullness, and kingdom - your Beloved Whom you desire and seek? Be joyful and gladdened in your interior recollection with Him, for you have Him so close to you. Desire Him there, adore Him there. Do not go in pursuit of Him outside yourself. You will only become distracted and wearied thereby, and you shall not find Him, nor enjoy Him more securely, nor sooner, nor more intimately by seeking Him within you." (From The Spiritual Canticle ) Mother Julienne Morrell, O.P. “Human praises are indeed to be shunned on account of the great harm they produce. They are nothing else, in the words of St. Bernard, but a hollow whistle, a little wind in the ears, blinding and inflating the...

 

  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.       David Torkington  “ ‘Prayer’, he [Cardinal Hume] said, ‘is trying to raise the heart and mind to God.’… The quality of our prayer is ultimately determined by the quality of our endeavor. It was for this reason that the great Mystic and mother Saint Angela of Foligno said that prayer is the School of Divine Love. In other words, it is the place where we learn how to love God by trying daily to raise our hearts and minds to him. I intend to introduce you to the different means and methods that tradition is given us to help us keep trying to turn and open our minds and hearts to God in this book but first let me say this. There are no perfect means to help us keep trying to raise the heart and mind to God, just different means. What helps you at the beginning, may not help you later. What helps you in the morning...