Talk about the Saints that inspire you, share some of your favorite quotes.

[Saint wannabe]

"However great may be the temptation, if we know how to use the weapon of prayer well we shall come off conquerors at last, for prayer is more powerful than all the devils. He who is attacked by the spirits of darkness needs only to apply himself vigorously to prayer and he will beat them back with great success."

St Bernard of Clairvaux

[Saint wannabe]

I wanted to share this quote that I found from Francis of Assisi and how he feels about Priests.

"Listen my brothers: if the blessed Virgin is so honored, as it is right, since she carried him in her most holy womb; if the blessed Baptist trembled and did not dare to touch the holy head of God; if the tomb in which he lay for some time is so venerated, how holy, just, and worthy must be the person who touches Him with his hands, receives Him in his heart and mouth, and offers Him to others to be received."

Saint Francis of Assisi

[Saint wannabe]

"If her priests are saints, what good they are able to do! But whatever they are, never speak against them."

John Vianney

[Bailey2]

Speaking of martyrs: When I spent a year as a Franciscan postulant, many talked about the 4 martyrs of El Salvador. You can look them up on the internet.

But, there are two prospective martyr-saints I am truly inspired by: Blessed Franz Jagerstatter, (as some of you already know). When Fr. Jochmann (jail chaplain) offered to read spiritual readings on the day of execution, Franz replied, "I am completely bound in inner union with the Lord, and any reading would only interrupt my communication with my God." I cannot imagine walking to a torturous Nazi beheading machine in that holy state (pics on Internet--chills up the spine).

The second is Sr. Dorothy Stang who was murdered on Feb 12, 2005. She knew she was on the hit list; she went home to the US (Dayton, OH) to visit family then went back. When the gunmen came, she pulled out her Bible and began to read out loud to them. Then they shot her 6 times. They call her the martyr of the rainforest.

I guess I am partial to these people because we tend to view Saints as beyond the rest of us. There were many sisters in my Franciscan community who did similar missionary work as Dorothy and the 4 martyrs of El Salvador and would have accepted death also. There were many Stangs in religious life in that area including the community I was in. Franz appeals to me because he had an illegitimate child before he married and was fond of adventure and motorcycles. I find those kinds of things make Sainthood more real, regular, and attainable.

[GwenL]

St. Augustine, in Confessions, praying to God:

"The house of my soul is too small for you to come to it. May it be enlarged by you. It is in ruins: restore it."

I nearly fell out of my chair when I first read this. He wrote this explaining his conversion, after spending his entire life (to that point) denying God. Exactly where I was, starting my journey not too long ago. "The house of my soul is in ruins" summarizes perfectly the result of a life spent denying God. The plea to God to "restore it" summarizes perfectly the solution. Reading this is incredibly inspiring to me, knowing that a saint who lived 1600 years ago went through the same thing as I am now.

[Jan Bolbot]

After a Polish prisoner had escaped from the infamous Auschwitz camp, the commandant called the Polish prisoners together and as punishment picked ten to die by starvation. One of the ten, Francis Gajowniczek, cried out that he wanted to see his wife and children again. From the ranks of the other prisoners stepped a forty-three year old priest named Maksymilian Maria Kolbe. It was unheard of for prisoners to step out of line, but Kolbe did and somehow walked past the guards and right up to the commandant. "Who are you and what do you want?" the commandant asked. "I am a Catholic priest and I would like to take that man's place," Kolbe answered.

jb

[Lief Erikson]

Originally Posted by GwenL

St. Augustine, in Confessions, praying to God:

"The house of my soul is too small for you to come to it. May it be enlarged by you. It is in ruins: restore it."

I nearly fell out of my chair when I first read this. He wrote this explaining his conversion, after spending his entire life (to that point) denying God. Exactly where I was, starting my journey not too long ago. "The house of my soul is in ruins" summarizes perfectly the result of a life spent denying God. The plea to God to "restore it" summarizes perfectly the solution. Reading this is incredibly inspiring to me, knowing that a saint who lived 1600 years ago went through the same thing as I am now.

Wow . Praise God!

[Saint wannabe]

These last couple of posts remind me that this thread is more than just quotes from Saints, and I'm glad that I have been reminded of that. I'm glad that people are writing stories about Saints that inspire them, and Saints that they can relate to. I find many of the quotes that I read from Padre Pio very inspiring and I can kind of relate to what he has to say in many of them. Padre Pio suffered spiritual dryness at times, a real fear of not being able to do enough to please God, etc. I know that Mother Teresa is not a Saint (yet), but it blew my mind to hear that she lived her life on the inside "in perpetual darkness". Padre Pio also experienced the same thing. if any of you get a chance, I would highly suggest reading a book called - WORDS OF LIGHT inspiration from the letters of Padre Pio. its published by Paraclete Press, and it really gives you a keen insight into this great mans soul.

[Saint wannabe]

"When I am before the Blessed Sacrament I feel such a lively faith that I can't describe it. Christ in the Eucharist is almost tangible to me, I kiss his wounds continually and embrace Him. When it's time for me to leave, I have to tear myself away from his sacred presence."

Anthony Mary Claret

[dashso40]

I love Blessed Mother Teresa...She said..

Do ordinary things with extraordinary love.

http://www.motherteresa.org

[djeter]

A Saint I never understood for the longest time until Fr. Robert Barron wrote a piece about her in The Priority of Christ:

The Noncompetitive Divine Reality Of Divine Love

Thèrése tells us that she endeavored to write down her spiritual memoir at the prompting of her sister, who was also her religious superior to whom she was bound in obedience After praying that she say nothing displeasing to Christ, she took up the Gospel of Mark, and her eyes fell on these words “Jesus, having gone up the mountain, called to him those whom he chose, and they came to him.

“This verse, she says, is the interpretive key to her life, for it describes the way Christ has worked in her soul “he does not call those who are worthy, but those whom he pleases “ Hers will be a story of a divine love, graciously willing the good of the other that awakens an imitative reaction in the one who is loved. It is not a narrative of economic exchange — rewards for worthiness — but of the loop of grace, unmerited love engendering disinterested love, the divine life propagating itself in what is other

But there is more to it. She says that for a long time this purely gracious quality of the divine love bothered her, for it smacked of injustice how could we explain how God gives more to some and less to others, if all reference to merit is removed’ ‘What solved the problem for her was a comparison with the varietyof flowers.

“I understood that if all the flowers wanted to be roses, nature would lose her springtime beauty, and the fields would no longer be decked with little wild flowers.” Aquinas said that God is an artist and his canvas the whole of creation and that the variety of created goods contributes to the beauty and complexity of the design that God is crafting. Thèrése will tell how, then, God the artist of creation worked in her case, cultivating one of his smaller flowers.

Then Thèrése uses a magnificent metaphor that shows that she grasped something about the divine-nondivine relationship that was also central to Aquinas “Just as the sun shines simultaneously on the tall cedars and on each little flower as though it were alone on the earth, so Our Lord is occupied particularly with each soul as though there were no others like it.”

The noncompetitive divine reality, which does not become ingredient in the created world, is not “closer” to the greatest of his creatures than to the least and cannot be preoccupied with one at the expense of the other. Thus, Thèrése can honestly speak of herself, one of God’s smallest flowers, as though she were the privileged object of God’s affection and interest.

More reading selections from this wonderful piece here on how St. Thèrése Of Lisieux embodies "elevated prudence" and what that theological virtue means for the rest of us:

http://payingattentiontothesky.com/2...ated-prudence/

regards

dj

[Saint wannabe]

"The truth is I can love a person in this life only so far as he strives to advance in the service and praise of God our Lord; for he who loves anything for itself and not for God, does not love God with his whole heart."

IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA

[Shin]

Originally Posted by Saint wannabe

"The truth is I can love a person in this life only so far as he strives to advance in the service and praise of God our Lord; for he who loves anything for itself and not for God, does not love God with his whole heart."

IGNATIUS OF LOYOLA

Very good quote!

"If you do not wish to be punished, be your own judge chastise and amend yourself."

St. John Chrysostom

[Saint wannabe]

"When we do something we dislike, let us say to God: My God, I offer you this in honor of the moment when you died for me."

JOHN VIANNEY

[eastdown]

I like this website page and the prayer at the bottom to Saint Joseph i use it alot have a peek http://www.catholic-prayers.org/life...nt-joseph.html
Ed












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