Saint Gregory Nazianzen

Let it be assured that to do no wrong is really superhuman and belongs to God alone.

-- Saint Gregory Nazianzen

Saint Augustine of Hippo

God had one son on earth without sin, but never one without suffering. 

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo

Saint John Climacus

Our good Redeemer, by speedily granting what is asked, draws to His love those who are grateful. But He keeps ungrateful souls praying a long time before Him, hungering and thirsting for what they want, since a badly trained dog rushes off as soon as it is given bread and leaves the giver behind.

-- Saint John Climacus

Saint Teresa Eustochio Verzeri

To you and to your Institute Jesus Christ has given the precious gift of His Heart, for from no one else can you learn holiness, He being the inexhaustible source of true holiness. 

-- Saint Teresa Eustochio Verzeri to the first members of the Daughters of the Sacred Heart of Jesus

Saint Genoveva Torres Morales

I loved freedom of heart very much, and worked and am working to achieve it fully. It does the soul so much good that every effort is nothing compared with this free condition of the heart.

 -- Saint Genoveva Torres Morales

Saint John of Damascus

Being comes first, and afterwards, being good or evil. However, had God kept from being made those who through His goodness were to have existence but who by their own choice were to become evil, then evil would have prevailed over the goodness of God. Thus, all things which God makes He makes good, but each one becomes good or evil by his own choice.

-- Saint John of Damascus

Saint John Bosco

Fly from bad companions as from the bite of a poisonous snake. If you keep good companions, I can assure you that you will one day rejoice with the blessed in Heaven; whereas if you keep with those who are bad, you will become bad yourself, and you will be in danger of losing your soul. 

-- Saint John Bosco

Saint Justin Martyr

I have endeavored to learn all doctrines; but I have acquiesced at last in the true doctrines, those namely of the Christians, even though they do not please those who hold false opinions.

-- Saint Justin Martyr at his trial

Saint Vincent de Paul

It was His Will that after His death the Church should give us His image in the crucifix, that he might appear to us in a condition of utmost ignominy. And why? He did it because He knew the worth of humility and the danger of the sin which opposes it.

-- Saint Vincent de Paul

Saint Columbanus

All we Irish dwelling on the edge of the world are disciples of Saints Peter and Paul and of the disciples who, under the Holy Spirit, wrote the Sacred Canon. We accept nothing outside this evangelical and apostolic teaching. There was no heretic, no Jew, no schismatic, but the Catholic Faith, as first delivered to us by you, the successor of the apostles, is kept unshaken.... We, indeed, are, as I have said, chained to the Chair of Saint Peter; for although Rome is great and known afar, it is great and honored with us only by this Chair. 

-- Saint Columbanus

Saint Augustine of Hippo

The Kingdom of Heaven, O man, requires no other price than yourself. The value of it is yourself. Give yourself for it and you shall have it.

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo

Saint John Chrysostom

Eating and drinking don't make friendships - such friendship even robbers and murderers have. But if we are friends, if we truly care for one another, let's help one another spritually....Let's hinder those things that lead our friends away to hell.

-- Saint John Chrysostom

Saint Alphonsus Liguori

When we have to reply to anyone who has insulted us, we should be careful to do it always with gentleness. A soft answer extinguishes the fire of wrath.

-- Saint Alphonsus Liguori

Saint Bernardine of Siena

There is a general rule concerning all special graces granted to any human being. Whenever the divine favor chooses someone to receive a special grace, or to accept a lofty vocation, God adorns the person chosen with all the gifts of the Spirit needed to fulfill the task at hand. This general rule is especially verified in the case of Saint Joseph, the foster-father of our Lord, and the husband of the Queen of our world, enthroned above the angels. He was chosen by the eternal Father as the trustworthy guardian and protector of his greatest treasures, namely, his divine Son and Mary, Joseph’s wife. He carried out this vocation with complete fidelity until at last God called him, saying “Good and faithful servant, enter into the joy of your Lord.” Remember us, Saint Joseph, and plead for us to your foster child. Ask your most holy bride, the Virgin Mary, to look kindly upon us, since she is the mother of him who with the Father and the Holy Spirit lives and reigns eternally. Amen. 

-- Saint Bernardine of Siena from a sermon

Saint Gregory of Nyssa

If by a diligent life of virtue, you wash away the film of dirt that covers your heart, then the divine beauty will shine forth in you.

-- Saint Gregory of Nyssa

Saint Patrick of Ireland

That which I have set out in Latin is not my words but the words of God and of apostles and prophets, who of course have never lied. He who believes shall be saved, but he who does not believe shall be damned. God has spoken.

-- Saint Patrick of Ireland

Saint Anselm of Canterbury

O, Lord, through your Son you command us, no, you counsel us to ask, and you promise that you will hear us so that our joy may be complete. Give me then what you promise to give through your Truth. You, O God, are faithful; grant that I may receive my request, so that my joy may be complete. 

-- Saint Anselm of Canterbury

Saint Louise de Marillac

How good it is to trust God! Turn to Him often, as children look to their father and mother in their needs.

-- Saint Louise de Marillac

Saint Alcuin

In the morning, at the height of my powers, I sowed the seed in Britain, now in the evening when my blood is growing cold I am still sowing in France, hoping both will grow, by the grace of God, giving some the honey of the holy scriptures, making others drunk on the old wine of ancient learning. 

-- Saint Alcuin

Saint Joseph de Veuster

I make myself a leper with the lepers to gain all to Jesus Christ.

-- Saint Joseph de Veuster in a letter to his father

Saint Isidore of Seville

The more you devote yourself to study of the sacred utterances, the richer will be your understanding of them, just as the more the soil is tilled, the richer the harvest. 

-- Saint Isidore of Seville

Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne

I live now in solitude and am able to use my time reflecting on the past and preparing for death. I cannot put away the thought of the Indians and in my ambition I fly to the Rockies. 

-- Saint Rose Philippine Duchesne

Saint John Vianney

My little children, your hearts, are small, but prayer stretches them and makes them capable of loving God. Through prayer we receive a foretaste of heaven and something of paradise comes down upon us. Prayer never leaves us without sweetness. It is honey that flows into the souls and makes all things sweet. When we pray properly, sorrows disappear like snow before the sun. 

 -- Saint John Vianney

Saint Josemaria Escriva

The person with fortitude is the one who perseveres in doing what his conscience tells him he ought to do. He does not measure the value of a task exclusively by the benefit he derives from it, but rather by the service he renders to others.

-- Saint Josemaria Escriva

Saint John of God

If we look forward to receiving God's mercy, we can never fail to do good so long as we have the strength. For if we share with the poor, out of love for God, whatever He has given to us, we shall receive according to His promise a hundredfold in eternal happiness. What a fine profit, what a blessed reward! With outstretched arms He begs us to turn toward Him, to weep for our sins, and to become the servants of love, first for ourselves, then for our neighbors. Just as water extinguishes a fire, so love wipes away sin.

-- Saint John of God

Saint Teresa Margaret Redi of the Sacred Heart

Nobody comes to the Father except through Jesus. To come to God who is everything and consequently all good, no fatigue must seem to us too great; we must not be put off either by the difficulties we meet on the way, but accept bitterness and welcome every kind of cross with eagerness. By these means, which are precisely those of Jesus Christ, it is not difficult to come to the true God, to live in charity, to walk in love.

-- Saint Teresa Margaret Redi of the Sacred Heart

Saint Colette of Corbie

If there be a true way that leads to the Everlasting Kingdom, it is most certainly that of suffering, patiently endured. 

-- Saint Colette of Corbie

Saint Mark the Ascetic

Even though knowledge is true, it is still not firmly established if unaccompanied by works. For everything is established by being put into practice. 

-- Saint Mark the Ascetic

Saint Teresa of Avila

If Christ Jesus dwells in a man as his friend and noble leader, that man can endure all things, for Christ helps and strengthens us and never abandons us. He is a true friend. And I clearly see that if we expect to please him and receive an abundance of his graces, God desires that these graces must come to us from the hands of Christ, through his most sacred humanity, in which God takes delight. 

-- Saint Teresa of Avila 

Saint Katharine Drexel

It is a lesson we all need – to let alone the things that do not concern us.  He has other ways for others to follow Him; all do not go by the same path.  It is for each of us to learn the path by which He requires us to follow Him,  and to follow Him in that path.  

-- Saint Katharine Drexel

Saint Bernard of Clairvaux

Inordinate love for the flesh is cruelty, because under the appearance of pleasing the body, we kill the soul.

-- Saint Bernard of Clairvaux