St. Francis de Sales

Have patience with all things, but chiefly have patience with yourself. Do not lose courage in considering your own imperfections but instantly set about remedying them -- every day begin the task anew.

John Cardinal O'Connor

The Christ of Bethlehem
is the Christ of Galilee,
is the Christ of the Crucifixion,
is the Christ of the Resurrection,
is the Christ of the Eucharist...

St. Melito of Sardis

The Lord, though he was God, became man. He suffered for the sake of whose who suffer, he was bound for those in bonds, condemned for the guilty, buried for those who lie in the grave; but he rose from the dead, and cried aloud: "Who will contend with me? Let him confront me." I have freed the condemned, brought the dead back to life, raised men from their graves. Who has anything to say against me? I, he said, am the Christ; I have destroyed death, triumphed over the enemy, trampled hell underfoot, bound the strong one, and taken men up to the heights of heaven: I am the Christ.

St. Thomas More

Grant me, my Lord, a desire to be with You, not so as to avoid the calamities of this world, nor even to avoid the pains of purgatory nor those of hell, not to gain the joys of Heaven, not out of consideration for my own profit, but simply through true love for Thee.

St. Justin Martyr

This food we call the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake except one who believes that the things we teach are true, and has received the washing for forgiveness of sins and for rebirth, and who lives as Christ handed down to us. For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Savior being incarnate by God's Word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the Word of prayer which comes from him, from which our flesh and blood are nourished by transformation, is the flesh and blood of that incarnate Jesus.

C.S. Lewis

I do not wish the ordinary reader to read no modern books. But if he must read only the new or only the old, I would advise him to read the old….We may be sure that the characteristic blindness of the twentieth century—the blindness about which posterity will ask, 'But how could they have thought that?'—lies where we have never suspected it. …None of us can fully escape this blindness, but we shall certainly increase it, and weaken our guard against it, if we read only modern books. Where they are true they will give us truths which we half knew already. Where they are false they will aggravate the error with which we are already dangerously ill. The only palliative is to keep the clean sea breeze of the centuries blowing through our minds, and this can be done only by reading old books"

Prayer in Times of Disappointment

O God, you know me better than I know myself
and you know how disappointed I have been at this time.

The things that I had set my heart on
were not for me.

The friends I trusted proved untrue.

I honestly tried so hard,
and yet I failed.

Help me, O God,
To accept things as they are.
Help me not to waste my time
on vain regrets and unhappy memories.

Help me to begin again
and to try again.

Help me always to look forward
and not back.

Help me to forget the things
that are behind and
Ever to press forward
to the things which are ahead.

This I ask for your love’s sake, Amen.

(From Turn Back to God)