Saint Quote : Saint Fulgentius of Ruspe

For the cup we drink is a participation in the blood of Christ, and the bread we break is a participation in the body of Christ. Because there is one loaf, we who are many are one body, since we all share the same bread. And so we pray that, by the same grace which made the Church Christ's body, all its members may remain firm in the unity of that body through the enduring bond of love.

-- Saint Fulgentius of Ruspe

Saint Quote of the Day Poll!

On the right hand sidebar I have posted a new poll (just for fun) that I am going to leave up until January 6, 2011. Vote for the saint who's quotations you enjoy reading the most. If you don't have a favorite, you can still vote for "I like them all". 

You can also vote for your patron saint. If you choose to vote for your patron saint, please use the comments on the polling site and enter the saints name in the comments section. You can also use the comments section to mention a particular saint whom you admire or have a devotion to.

Remember, this will be up for one week, and then I will post the results here in a new post.

Saint Quote: Saint Teresa of Avila

 

 

Whenever we think of Christ we should recall the love that led Him to bestow on us so many graces and favors, and also the great love God showed in giving us in Christ a pledge of His love; for love calls for love in return. Let us strive to keep this always before our eyes and to rouse ourselves to love Him. For if at some time the Lord should grant us the grace of impressing His love on our hearts, all will become easy for us and we shall accomplish great things quickly and without effort.

-- Saint Teresa of Avila

Saint Quote : Saint Thomas Beckett

Remember then how our fathers worked out their salvation; remember the sufferings through which the Church has grown, and the storms the ship of Peter has weathered because it has Christ on board. Remember how the crown was attained by those whose sufferings gave new radiance to their faith. The whole company of saints bears witness to the unfailing truth that without real effort no one wins the crown.

-- Saint Thomas Beckett from a letter

Saint Quote : Saint Augustine of Hippo

The garden of the Lord, brethren, includes - yes, it truly includes - includes not only the roses of martyrs but also the lilies of virgins, and the ivy of married people, and the violets of widows. There is absolutely no kind of human beings, my dearly beloved, who need to despair of their vocation; Christ suffered for all. It was very truly written about him: who wishes all men to be saved, and to come to the acknowledgement of the truth.

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo

Something You May Find Interesting

On Jennifer Fulwiler's blog, "Conversion Diary", she has a post about a program she created called "Saint's Name Generator", which will choose a saint at random for your patron saint for 2011.

You can read about it on her post here or to go directly to her Saint's Name Generator click here.

Saint Quote : Saint Quodvultdeus

A tiny child is born, who is a great king. Wise men are led to him from afar. They come to adore one who lies in a manger and yet reigns in heaven and on earth. When they tell of one who is born a king, Herod is disturbed. To save his kingdom he resolves to kill him, though if he would have faith in the child, he himself would reign in peace in this life and for ever in the life to come.

Why are you afraid, Herod, when you hear of the birth of a king? He does not come to drive you out, but to conquer the devil. But because you do not understand this you are disturbed and in a rage. To destroy one child whom you seek, you show your cruelty in the death of so many children.

You are not restrained by the love of weeping mothers and fathers mourning the deaths of their sons, nor by the cries and sobs of the children. You destroy those who are tiny in body because fear is destroying your heart. You imagine that if you accomplish your desire you can prolong you own life, though you are seeking to kill Life himself.

The children die for Christ, though they do not know it. The parents mourn for the death of martyrs. The Christ child makes of those as yet unable to speak fit witnesses to himself. But you, Herod, do not know this and are disturbed and furious. While you vent your fury against the child, you are already paying him homage, and do not know it.

To what merits of their own do the children owe this kind of victory? They cannot speak, yet they bear witness to Christ. They cannot use their limbs to engage in battle, yet already they bear off the palm of victory. 

-- Saint Quodvultdeus from a sermon about the Holy Innocents

Season's Greetings!

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Leo the Great

The Child, the Lord Jesus Christ… Word in our flesh, Wisdom in infancy, Power in weakness, and in true Man, the Lord of Majesty. 

-- Pope Saint Leo the Great.

Saint Quote : Saint Paul of the Cross

 

 

Celebrate the feast of Christmas every day, even every moment in the interior temple of your spirit, remaining like a baby in the bosom of the heavenly Father, where you will be reborn each moment in the Divine Word, Jesus Christ.

-- Saint Paul of the Cross

Saint Quote : Saint Robert Southwell

 

 

As I in hoary winter's night stood shivering in the snow,
Surprised I was with sudden heat which made my heart to glow;
And lifting up a fearful eye to view what fire was near,
A pretty babe all burning bright did in the air appear;
Who, scorchëd with excessive heat, such floods of tears did shed
As though his floods should quench his flames which with his tears were fed.
Alas, quoth he, but newly born in fiery heats I fry,
Yet none approach to warm their hearts or feel my fire but I!
My faultless breast the furnace is, the fuel wounding thorns,
Love is the fire, and sighs the smoke, the ashes shame and scorns;
The fuel justice layeth on, and mercy blows the coals,
The metal in this furnace wrought are men's defiled souls,
For which, as now on fire I am to work them to their good,
So will I melt into a bath to wash them in my blood.
With this he vanished out of sight and swiftly shrunk away,
And straight I called unto mind that it was Christmas day.

-- "The Burning Babe" by Saint Robert Southwell

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Gregory the Great

 

 

There are in truth three states of the converted: the beginning, the middle, and the perfection. In the beginning they experience the charms of sweetness; in the middle the contests of temptation; and in the end the fullness of perfection.

-- Pope Saint Gregory the Great

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Pius X

 

 

My hope is in Christ, who strengthens the weakest by His Divine help. I can do all in Him who strengthens me. His Power is infinite, and if I lean on him, it will be mine. His Wisdom is infinite, and if I look to Him for counsel, I shall not be deceived. His Goodness is infinite, and if my trust is stayed in Him, I shall not be abandoned.

-- Pope Saint Pius X

Saint Quote : Saint Isidore of Seville

 

 

Heresy is from the Greek word meaning 'choice'.... But we are not permitted to believe whatever we choose, nor to choose whatever someone else has believed. We have the Apostles of God as authorities, who did not choose what they would believe but faithfully transmitted the teachings of Christ. So, even if an angel from heaven should preach otherwise, he shall be called anathema.

-- Saint Isidore of Seville

Saint Quote : Saint John Chrysostom

 

 

Whoever denigrates marriage also diminishes the glory of virginity. Whoever praises it makes virginity more admirable and resplendent. What appears good only in comparison with evil would not be truly good. The most excellent good is something even better than what is admitted to be good.

-- Saint John Chrysostom

Saint Quote : Saint John Vianney

 

 

Prayer is nothing else but union with God. In this intimate union, God and the soul are fused together like two bits of wax that no one can ever pull apart. This union of God with a tiny creature is a lovely thing. It is a happiness beyond understanding.

-- Saint John Vianney

Saint Quote : Saint Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi

A little drop of simple obedience is worth a million times more than a whole vase of the choicest contemplation. 

-- Saint Mary Magdalen de' Pazzi

Saint Quote: Saint Charles of Sezze

 

 

God does not command us to live in hair shirts and chains, or to chastise our flesh with scourges, but to love Him above all things and our neighbor as ourselves.

-- Saint Charles of Sezze

Saint Quote : Saint John of the Cross

Though holy doctors have uncovered many mysteries and wonders, and devout souls have understood them in this earthly condition of ours, yet the greater part still remains to be unfolded by them, and even to be understood by them. 

We must then dig deeply in Christ. He is like a rich mine with many pockets containing treasures: however deep we dig, we will never find their end or their limit. Indeed, in every pocket new seams of fresh riches are discovered on all sides. 

For this reason the apostle Paul said of Christ, "In him are hidden all the treasures of the wisdom and knowledge of God." The soul cannot enter into these treasures, nor attain them, unless it first crosses into and enters the thicket of suffering, enduring interior and exterior labors, and unless it first receives from God very many blessings in the intellect and in the senses, and has undergone long spiritual training. 

The gate that gives entry into these riches of his wisdom is the cross; because it is a narrow gate, while many seek the joys that can be gained through it, it is given to few to desire to pass through it. 

-- Saint John of the Cross from a spiritual canticle

Saint Quote: Saint Jeanne de Chantal

We should go to prayer with deep humility and an awareness of our nothingness. We must invoke the help of the Holy Spirit and that of our good angel, and then remain still in God's presence, full of faith that he is more in us than we are in ourselves. 

-- Saint Jeanne de Chantal

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Damasus I

 

 

He who walking on the sea could calm the bitter waves, who gives life to the dying seeds of the earth; he who was able to loose the mortal chains of death, and after three days' darkness could bring again to the upper world the brother for his sister Martha: he, I believe, will make Damasus rise again from the dust.

 -- Pope Saint Damasus I

Saint Quote : Saint John Climacus

 

 

A man who has embraced poverty offers up prayer that is pure, while a man who loves possessions prays to material images.

-- Saint John Climacus

Saint Quote : Saint Hipparchus of Samosata

 

 

Him we adore who hung upon the cross. Him we confess to be God, and the Son of God begotten, not made, co-essential with the Father, by whose deity we believe this whole world is created, preserved, and governed.

-- Saint Hipparchus of Samosata

Saint Quote: Saint Vincent de Paul

Read some chapter of a devout book....It is very easy and most necessary, for just as you speak to God when at prayer, God speaks to you when you read.

-- Saint Vincent de Paul

Saint Quote : Saint Ambrose of Milan

 

 

Our own evil inclinations are far more dangerous than any external enemies.

-- Saint Ambrose of Milan

Saint Quote : Saint Therese of Lisieux

The greatest honor God can do a soul is not to give it much, but to ask much of it.

-- Saint Therese of Lisieux

Saint Quote : Blessed Carlos Manuel Cecilio Rodriguez Santiago

We need Catholics who are alert to the present moment…modern Catholics who know how to nourish themselves in the past but whose eyes are fixed on the future. 

-- Blessed Carlos Manuel Cecilio Rodriguez Santiago (Puerto Rico's first Blessed)

Saint Quote : Saint John of Damascus

 

 

The saints must be honored as friends of Christ and children and heirs of God, as John the theologian and evangelist says: 'But as many as received him, he gave them the power to be made the sons of God....' Let us carefully observe the manner of life of all the apostles, martyrs, ascetics and just men who announced the coming of the Lord. And let us emulate their faith, charity, hope, zeal, life, patience under suffering, and perseverance unto death, so that we may also share their crowns of glory.

-- Saint John of Damascus

Saint Quote : Saint Chromatius of Aquileia

Since he is the Sun of Justice, he fittingly calls his disciples the light of the world. The reason for this is that through them, as through shining rays, he has poured out the light of the knowledge of himself upon the entire world. For by manifesting the light of truth, they have dispelled the darkness of error from the hearts of men. 

-- Saint Chromatius of Aquileia

Saint Quote: Saint Francis Xavier

 

 

I have not stopped since the day I arrived. I conscientiously made the rounds of the villages. I bathed in the sacred waters all the children who had not yet been baptized. This means that I have purified a very large number of children so young that, as the saying goes, they could not tell their right hand from their left. The older children would not let me say my Office or eat or sleep until I taught them one prayer or another. Then I began to understand: “The kingdom of heaven belongs to such as these.”

-- Saint Francis Xavier

Saint Quote: Saint Edmund Campion

 

 

And touching our Society, be it known to you that we have made a league - all the Jesuits in the world - cheerfully to carry the cross you shall lay upon us, and never to despair your recovery, while we have a man left to enjoy your Tyburn, or to be racked with your torments or consumed with your prisons. The expense is reckoned, the enterprise is begun; it is of God, it cannot be withstood. So the faith was planted; so it must be restored.

-- Saint Edmund Campion, from Campion’s Brag

Saint Quote: Saint Andrew the Apostle

We have found the Messiah.

-- Saint Andrew the Apostle to Saint Peter (John 1: 41)

Saint Quote : Saint John Chrysostom

After Andrew had stayed with Jesus and had learned much from him, he did not keep this treasure to himself, but hastened to share it with his brother Peter. Notice what Andrew said to him: "We have found the Messiah, that is to say, the Christ." Notice how his words reveal what he has learned in so short a time. They show the power of the master who has convinced them of this truth. Andrew's words reveal a soul waiting with the utmost longing for the coming of the Messiah, looking forward to his appearing from heaven, rejoicing when he does appear, and hastening to announce so great an event to others. To support one another in the things of the spirit is the true sign of good will between brothers, loving kinship and sincere affection.

-- Saint John Chrysostom

Saint Quote: Saint Thomas More

Whoever bids other folks to do right, but gives an evil example by acting the opposite way, is like a foolish weaver who weaves quickly with one hand and unravels the cloth just as quickly with the other.

-- Saint Thomas More

Saint Quote : Saint John of the Cross

 

 

In giving us His Son, His only Word, He spoke everything to us at once in this sole Word -- and He has no more to say...because what he spoke before to the prophets in parts, he has now spoken all at once by giving us the All Who is His Son.

-- Saint John of the Cross

Saint Quote : Saint Leonard of Port Maurice

If the Lord at the moment of my death reproves me for being too kind to sinners, I will answer, 'My dear Jesus, if it is a fault to be too kind to sinners, it is a fault I learned from you, for you never scolded anyone who came to you seeking mercy.'

-- Saint Leonard of Port Maurice

Saint Quote : Saint Catherine of Siena

 

 

Everything comes from love, all is ordained for the salvation of man, God does nothing without this goal in mind.

-- Saint Catherine of Siena

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Leo the Great

 

 

Dear friends, now that we have received instruction in this revelation of God's grace, let us celebrate with spiritual joy the day of our first harvesting, of the first calling of the Gentiles. Let us give thanks to the merciful God, "who has made us worthy," in the words of the Apostle, "to share the position of the saints in light; who has rescued us from the power of darkness, and brought us into the kingdom of this beloved Son."

-- Pope Saint Leo the Great

Saint Quote: Saint John of the Cross

 

 

The Lord measures our perfection neither by the multitude nor the magnitude of our deeds, but by the manner in which we perform them.

-- Saint John of the Cross

Saint Quote : Pope Saint Clement I

We are writing this, beloved, not only for your admonition but also as a reminder to ourselves; for we are placed in the same arena, and the same contest lies before us. Hence we ought to put aside vain and useless concerns and should consider what is good, pleasing and acceptable in the sight of him who made us. Let us fix our gaze on the blood of Christ, realizing how precious it is to his Father, since it was shed for our salvation and brought the grace of repentance to all the world.

-- Pope Saint Clement I

Saint Quote : Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque

What a weakness it is to love Jesus Christ only when He Caresses us, and to be cold immediately once He afflicts us. This is not true love. Those who love thus, love themselves too much to love God with all their heart. 

 -- Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque

Saint Quote : Saint Francis of Assisi

Jesus is happy to come with us, as truth is happy to be spoken, as life to be lived, as light to be lit, as love is to be loved, as joy to be given, as peace to be spread.

-- Saint Francis of Assisi

Saint Quote : Saint Raphael Kalinowski

Our Redeemer, ever present in the most Blessed Sacrament, extends His hand to everyone. He opens His heart and says, 'Come to Me, all of You.'

-- Saint Raphael Kalinowski

Saint Quote : Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne

 

 

We cultivate a very small field for Christ, but we love it, knowing that God does not require great achievements but a heart that holds back nothing for self.

-- Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne

Saint Quote of the Day: Pope Saint Gregory the Great

 

 

He who would climb to a lofty height must go by steps, not leaps.

-- Pope Saint Gregory the Great

Saint Quote of the Day : Saint Madeleine Sophie Barat

 

 

Let us ask our Lord to work in us and through us, and let us do our utmost to draw Him down into our hearts, for He Himself has said: "Without Me you can do nothing.

-- Saint Madeleine Sophie Barat

Saint Quote : Saint Chromatius of Aquileia

 If we fail to live in the light, we shall, to our condemnation and that of others, be veiling over and obscuring by our infidelity the light men so desperately need. As we know from Scripture, the man who received the talent should have made it produce a heavenly profit, but instead he preferred to hide it away rather than put it to work and was punished as he deserved.

Consequently, that brilliant lamp which was lit for the sake of our salvation should always shine in us. For we have the lamp of the heavenly commandment and spiritual grace, to which David referred: Your law, is a lamp to my feet and a light to my path. Solomon also says this about it: For the command of the law is a lamp.

Therefore, we must not hide this lamp of law and faith. Rather, we must set it up in the Church, as on a lamp stand, for the salvation of many, so that we may enjoy the light of truth itself and all believers may be enlightened.

-- Saint Chromatius of Aquileia from an essay on the Gospel of Matthew

Saint Quote : Saint Peter Chrysologus

 

 

He (Christ) really made His body a living sacrifice, because, though slain, He continues to live. In such a victim death receives its ransom, but the victim remains alive. Death itself suffers the punishment. This is why death for the martyrs is actually a birth, and their end a beginning. Their execution is the door to life, and those who were thought to have been blotted out from the earth shine brilliantly in heaven.

-- Saint Peter Chrysologus

Saint Quote : Saint Albert the Great

 

 

"Do this in remembrance of me." Two things should be noted here. The first is the command that we should use this sacrament, which is indicated when Jesus says, "Do this." The second is that this sacrament commemorates the Lord's going to death for our sake.

This sacrament is profitable because it grants remission of sins; it is most useful because it bestows the fullness of grace on us in this life. "The Father of spirits instructs us in what is useful for our sanctification." And his sanctification is in Christ's sacrifice, that is, when he offers himself in this sacrament to the Father for our redemption to us for our use.

-- Saint Albert the Great from a commentary on The Gospel of Luke

Saint Quote : Saint Genoveva Torres Morales

Even if I must suffer greatly, thanks be to God's mercy, I will not lack courage. 

-- Saint Genoveva Torres Morales