Saint Quote: Saint Vincent Ferrer

Do you wish to study to your advantage? Let devotion accompany all your studies. Consult God more than your books. Ask Him to make you understand what you read. Never begin or end your study except by prayer. Science is a gift of God. Do not consider it merely the work of your own mind and effort.

-- Saint Vincent Ferrer

Saint Quote: Saint Therese of Lisieux

Kneeling before the tabernacle, I can think of only one thing to say to our Lord: "My God, you know that I love You." And I feel that my prayer does not weary Jesus; knowing my weakness, He is satisfied with my good will. 

-- Saint Therese of Lisieux

Saint Quote: Saint Francis de Sales

Some torment themselves in seeking means to discover the art of loving God, and do not know - poor creatures - that there is no art or means of loving Him but to love those who love Him - that is, to begin to practice those thing which are pleasing to Him. 

-- Saint Francis de Sales

Saint Quote: Saint Bede the Venerable On Saint John the Baptist

There is no doubt that blessed John suffered imprisonment and chains as a witness to our Redeemer, whose forerunner he was, and gave his life for him. His persecutor had demanded not that he should deny Christ, but only that he should keep silent about the truth. Nevertheless, he died for Christ. Does Christ not say: “I am the truth”? Therefore, because John shed his blood for the truth, he surely died for Christ. Through his birth, preaching and baptizing, he bore witness to the coming birth, preaching and baptism of Christ, and by his own suffering he showed that Christ also would suffer. Such was the quality and strength of the man who accepted the end of this present life by shedding his blood after the long imprisonment. 

-- Saint Bede the Venerable on the death of John the Baptist

Saint Quote: Saint Augustine of Hippo

If physical things please you, then praise God for them, but turn back your love to Him who created them, lest in the things that please you, you displease Him. If souls please you, love them in God; for in themselves they are changeable, but in Him they are firmly established. Without Him they pass away and perish. In Him, then, let them be loved, and carry along with you to Him as many souls as you can, and say to them, “Let us love Him, let us love Him; He made the world and is not far from it. He did not make all things and then leave them, but they are of Him and in Him. See, there He is wherever truth is loved. He is within the very heart, yet the heart has strayed from Him. Return to your heart, O you transgressors, and hold fast to Him who made you. Stand with Him and you will stand fast. Rest in Him and you shall be at rest.” 

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo from The Confessions

Saint Quote: Saint Monica

Bury my body wherever you will; let not care of it cause you any concern. One thing only I ask you, that you remember me at the altar of the Lord wherever you may be.

-- Saint Monica to her son Saint Augustine from her deathbed

Saint Quote: Saint Thomas Aquinas

Man cannot live without joy; therefore when he is deprived of true spiritual joys it is necessary that he become addicted to carnal pleasures.

-- Saint Thomas Aquinas

Saint Quote: Saint Augustine of Hippo

Question the beauty of the earth, question the beauty of the sea, question the beauty of the air distending and diffusing itself, question the beauty of the sky. . . question all these realities. All respond: "See, we are beautiful." Their beauty is a profession. These beauties are subject to change. Who made them if not the Beautiful One who is not subject to change?

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo

Saint Quote: Saint Bartholomew the Apostle

Rabbi, thou art the Son of God, thou art the King of Israel.

-- Saint Bartholomew the Apostle from the Gospel of John 1:41

Saint Quote: Saint Rose of Lima

If only mortals would learn how great it is to possess divine grace, how beautiful, how noble, how precious. How many riches it hides within itself, how many joys and delights! No one would complain about his cross or about troubles that may happen to him, if he would come to know the scales on which they are weighed when they are distributed to men.

-- Saint Rose of Lima

Saint Quote: Saint Aloysius Gonzaga

O Holy Mary! My Mother; into thy blessed trust and special custody, and into the bosom of thy mercy, I this day, and every day, and in the hour of my death, commend my soul and body. To thee I commit all my anxieties and sorrows, my life and the end of my life, that by thy most holy intercession, and by thy merits, all my actions may be directed and governed by thy will and that of thy Son. 

-- Saint Aloysius Gonzaga

Saint Quote: Pope Saint Pius X

Let us be leaders; but not of the worldly type, who accomplish by forcing, urging and driving to get things done; rather leaders who lead as Christ did: "Come, follow me!"

-- Pope Saint Pius X

Saint Quote: Saint Bernard of Clairvaux

Love is sufficient of itself; it gives pleasure by itself and because of itself. It is its own merit, its own reward. Love looks for no cause outside itself, no effect beyond itself. Its profit lies in the practice. Of all the movements, sensations and feelings of the soul, love is the only one in which the creature can respond to the Creator and make some sort of similar return however unequal though it be. For when God loves, all he desires is to be loved in return. The sole purpose of his love is to be loved, int he knowledge that those who love him are made happy by their love of him.

-- Saint Bernard of Clairvaux from a sermon

Saint Quote: Saint John Eudes

The Christian life is a continuation and completion of the life of Christ in us. We should be so many Christs here on earth, continuing His life and His works, laboring and suffering in a holy and divine manner in the spirit of Jesus. 

-- Saint John Eudes

Saint Quote: Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Few souls understand what God would accomplish in them if they were to abandon themselves unreservedly to Him and if they were to allow His grace to mold them accordingly.

-- Saint Ignatius of Loyola

Saint Quote: Pope Saint Clement I

Since all things lie open to His eyes and ears, let us hold Him in awe and rid ourselves of impure desires to do works of evil, so that we may be protected by His mercy from the judgement that is to come. Which of us can escape His mighty hand?

-- Pope Saint Clement I

Saint Quote: Blessed John Cardinal Henry Newman

Liberalism in religion is the doctrine that there is no positive truth in religion, but that one creed is as good as another. . . . [it holds that] Revealed religion is not a truth, but a sentiment and a taste; not an objective fact, not miraculous; and it is the right of each individual to make it say just what strikes his fancy.

-- Blessed John Cardinal Henry Newman

Saint Quote: Saint Cyril of Alexandria

That anyone could doubt the right of the holy Virgin to be called the Mother of God fills with astonishment. Surely she must be the Mother of God if our Lord Jesus Christ is God, and she gave birth to him! Our Lord's disciples may not have used those exact words, but they delivered to us the belief those words enshrine, and this has also been taught us by the holy fathers. 

The divinely inspired Scriptures affirm that the Word of God was made flesh, that is to say, he was united to a human body endowed with a rational soul. He undertook to help the descendants of Abraham, fashioning a body for himself from a woman and sharing our flesh and blood, to enable us to see in him not only God, but also, by reason of this union, a man like ourselves. 

It is held, therefore, that there is in Emmanuel two entities, divinity and humanity. Yet our Lord Jesus Christ is nonetheless one, the one true Son, both God and man; not a defied man on the same footing as those who share the divine nature by grace, but true God who for our sake appeared in human form. We are assured of this by Saint Paul's declaration: "When the fullness of time came, God sent his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law and to enable us to be adopted as sons." 

-- Saint Cyril of Alexandria

Saint Quote: Saint Maximilian Kolbe

No one in the world can change Truth. What we can do and should do is to seek truth and to serve it when we have found it. The real conflict is the inner conflict. Beyond armies of occupation and the hecatombs of extermination camps, there are two irreconcilable enemies in the depth of every soul: good and evil, sin and love. And what use are the victories on the battlefield if we ourselves are defeated in our innermost personal selves?

-- Saint Maximilian Kolbe

Saint Quote: Saint Cyril of Jerusalem

This synthesis of faith was not made to accord with human opinions, but rather what was of the greatest importance was gathered from all the Scriptures, to present the one teaching of the faith in its entirety. And just as the mustard seed contains a great number of branches in a tiny grain, so too this summary of faith encompassed in a few words the whole knowledge of the true religion contained in the Old and the New Testaments.

-- Saint Cyril of Jerusalem

Saint Quote: Saint Gerard Majella

Here the will of God is done, as God wills, and as long as God wills.

-- Saint Gerard Majella

Saint Quote of the Day: Saint Clare of Assisi

Go forth without fear, for he who created you has made you holy, has always protected you, and loves you as a mother. 

-- Saint Clare of Assisi 

Saint Quote: Saint Augustine of Hippo (From Sermon On Saint Lawrence the Deacon)

The Roman Church commends to us today the anniversary of the triumph of Saint Lawrence. For on this day he trod the furious pagan world underfoot and flung aside its allurements, and so gained victory over Satan’s attack on his faith.

As you have often heard, Lawrence was a deacon of the Church at Rome. There he ministered the sacred blood of Christ; there for the sake of Christ’s name he poured out his own blood. Saint John the apostle was evidently teaching us about the mystery of the Lord’s supper when he wrote: “Just as Christ laid down his life for us, so we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren.” My brethren, Lawrence understood this and, understanding, he acted on it. In his life he loved Christ; in his death he followed in his footsteps.

Brethren, we too must imitate Christ if we truly love him. We shall not be able to render better return on that love than by modeling our lives on his. “Christ suffered for us, leaving us an example, that we should follow in his steps.” The holy martyrs followed Christ even to shedding their life’s blood, even to reproducing the very likeness of his passion. They followed him, but not they alone. It is not true that the bridge was broken after the martyrs crossed; nor is it true that after they had drunk from it, the fountain of eternal life dried up.

On no account may any class of people despair, thinking that God has not called them. Christ suffered for all. What the Scriptures say of him is true: “He desires all men to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.”

I tell you again and again, my brethren, that on no account may any class of people despair, thinking that God has not called them. Christ suffered for all. What the Scriptures say of him is true: “He desires all men to be saved and to come to knowledge of the truth.”

-- Saint Augustine of Hippo from a sermon

Saint Quote: Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

One cannot desire freedom from the Cross when one is especially chosen for the Cross.

-- Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross (Edith Stein)

Saint Quote: Saint Dominic de Guzman

A man who governs his passions is master of his world. We must either command them or be enslaved by them. It is better to be a hammer than an anvil.

-- Saint Dominic de Guzman

Saint Quote: Saint Albert of Trapani

O my God, you have created the human race by your wonderful power. It is an act of your clemency that has called us to share your glory and eternal life. When the first sin condemned us to suffer death, out of your goodness you wished to redeem us through the blood of your Son, to unite us to you through our faith and your great mercy. You have brought us back from the shame of our sin; you have veiled our dishonour in the brightness of your glory. Look now and see that what you have created, giving it subtle limbs and joints and made beautiful through its immortal soul, is now subject to the attack of Satan. Be pleased Lord to reconstitute your work and heal it. May your power be glorified and may the malice of the enemy be stunned. Amen

-- Saint Albert of Trapani from a prayer for healing attributed to him

Saint Quote: Pope Saint Leo the Great (On The Transfiguration)

The Lord reveals his glory in the presence of chosen witnesses. His body is like that of the rest of mankind, but he makes it shine with such splendor that his face becomes like the sun in glory, and his garments as white as snow.

The great reason for this transfiguration was to remove the scandal of the cross from the hearts of his disciples, and to prevent the humiliation of his voluntary suffering from disturbing the faith of those who had witnessed the surpassing glory that lay concealed.

With no less forethought he was also providing a firm foundation for the hope of holy Church. The whole body of Christ was to understand the kind of transformation that it would receive as his gift. the members of that body were to look forward to a share in that glory which first blazed out in Christ their head.

-- Pope Saint Leo the Great from a homily

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 Ansgar

If I were worthy of such a favor from my God, I would ask that he grant me this one miracle: that by His grace He would make of me a good man.

-- Saint Ansgar

Saint Quote: Saint Thomas Aquinas

The certainty that the divine light gives is greater than that which the light of natural reason gives.

-- Saint Thomas Aquinas

Saint Quote: Saint Peter Julian Emyard

Belief in the Eucharist is a treasure we must seek by submissiveness, preserve by piety, and defend at any cost. Not to believe in the Blessed Sacrament is the greatest of misfortunes.

-- Saint Peter Julian Emyard

Saint Quote of the Day: Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

God says to each of us: "Give me your heart, that is, your will." We, in turn, cannot offer anything more precious than to say: "Lord, take possession of us; we give our whole will to you; make us understand what it is that you desire of us, and we will perform it."

-- Saint Alphonsus Maria de Liguori