You will never enjoy the sweetness of a quiet prayer unless you shut your mind to all worldly desires and temporal affairs. (Saint Norbert of Xanten, +1134)
Quotes
In her voyage across the ocean of this world, the Church is like a great ship being pounded by the waves of life’s different stresses. Our duty is not to abandon ship but to keep her on her course. (Saint Boniface, Bishop and Martyr, +754)
To preserve our cheerfulness amid sicknesses and troubles, is a sign of a right and good spirit. (Saint Philip Neri)
It is as if you are pouring water on me. Please repent and become a Christian like me. (Saint Charles Llwanga as he was being burnt, to his executioner)
No one can have God for his Father, who does not have the Church for his mother (Saint Cyprian of Carthage, +258 A.D.)
The Lord grants in a moment what we may have been unable to obtain in dozens of years. (Saint Philip Neri)
All battles are first won or lost, in the mind (Saint Joan of Arc, +1431)
Modern man listens more willingly to witnesses than to teachers, and if he does listen to teachers, it is because they are witnesses. (Pope Saint Paul VI, +1978)
Hope has two beautiful daughters; their names are Anger and Courage. Anger at the way things are, and Courage to see that they do not remain as they are. (Saint Augustine of Canterbury, +604)
If history records good things about good people, the thoughtful hearer is encouraged to imitate what is good; or if it records the evil of wicked people, the godly listener or reader is encouraged to avoid all that is sinful and bad, and to do what he knows to be good and pleasing to God.[…]