"Part of Marxist strategy is the theory of impoverishment: in a situation of unjust power, it is claimed, anyone who engages in charitable initiatives is actually serving that unjust system, making it appear at least to some extent tolerable. This in turn slows down a potential revolution and thus blocks the struggle for a better [...]
"In the first place, purity is an “ability” or, in the traditional language of anthropology and ethics, an attitude. And in this sense it is a virtue. When this ability, that is, virtue, leads to abstaining 'from unchastity,' it does so because the man who possesses it knows 'how to keep his own body with [...]
"A proud soul is the slave of cowardice. Trusting only itself, it is frightened by a sound or a shadow." Source: St. John Climacus, The Ladder of Divine Ascent
"Indeed, the more spiritual progress a person makes, so much heavier will he frequently find the cross, because as his love increases, the pain of his exile also increases." Source: Thomas a’ Kempis, The Imitation of Christ, Dover Thrift Editions, 1940.
"The cry of Jesus as He died, 'I thirst,' echoed every moment in my soul, inflaming my heart with a burning love. I longed to satisfy His thirst for souls; I was consumed myself with the same thirst, and yearned to save them from the everlasting fires of Hell, no matter what the cost." [...]
"Behold, then, how you ought to love Him by referring all that you are, all that you have, your merits and sufferings, your entire life to Him, by love. Give Him your mind, in order to think only of Him and for Him; your will, that it may be happy in obeying and serving Him [...]
"Christian charitable activity must be independent of parties and ideologies. " Source: Pope Benedict XVI, God is Love: Deus Caritas Est, Ignatius Press, 2006.
"For this sin of ultimate despair is much more displeasing to me and harmful to them than all the other evils they have committed. And this is why: Other sins are committed with some selfish sensual pleasure, and sometimes they are regretted, and they can be regretted in such a way that the regret will [...]
"Faith today is identified with a kind of feeling or instinctive urge toward the acceptance of an idea. Very few today realize that reason is the prelude to faith. Whether they know it or not, they follow the philosophy of Jean Jacques Rouseau, who wrote to Dom Deschamps in 1762, 'Order and method are your [...]
"How different our lives would become if we would take an hour a day not to think about the attributes of God and the moral law, but to make the love of God and the love of neighbor experientially present in our own heart and soul! Man does not want to be with God as [...]