Saints

"The sight of Jesus in distress caused me great pain, so I wanted to ask him why he was suffering so much. I received no answer. However, his gaze returned to those priests. But shortly afterwards, almost horrified and as if tired of looking, he withdrew his gaze and when he raised it towards me, to my great horror, I saw two tears running down his cheeks. He moved away from that crowd of priests, with a great expression of disgust on his face, shouting: Butchers! (350, 1995)"

"Here, finally, is the return of the month of beautiful Mommy. (357, 1995)"

"This blessed war will be a salutary purge for our Italy, for the Church of God; it will reawaken in the Italian heart the faith that lay there hidden, as if asleep and suffocated by evil desires; it will cause beautiful flowers to bloom in the Church of God, from soil that was almost parched and dry. But, my God, before this happens, what a harsh trial awaits us. We must go through an entire night covered in the thickest darkness, the likes of which our homeland has never seen before. (583, 1995)"

"But what torments me most are those strong and sharp pains in my chest. At times they cause me such great discomfort that it seems as if they want to break my back and chest. (107, 1995)"

"Oh, how sweet was the conversation I had with heaven this morning! It was such that, even if I wanted to try to tell you everything, I could not; there were things that cannot be translated into human language without losing their profound and heavenly meaning. The Heart of Jesus and mine, if I may say so, merged. There were no longer two hearts beating, but only one. My heart had disappeared, like a drop of water lost in the sea. Jesus was paradise, the king. The joy within me was so intense and profound that I could no longer contain myself; the most delightful tears flooded my face. (273, 1995)"

"Jesus tells me that in love it is he who delights me; in pain, however, it is I who delight him. (335, 1995)"

"I seek God, but where can I find him? (1028, 1995)"

"I am not worthy to tell you what happened during this period of superlative martyrdom. I was confessing our boys on the evening of the fifth, when all of a sudden he was filled with extreme terror at the sight of a heavenly figure who appeared before my mind's eye. He was holding a kind of tool, similar to a very long iron blade with a sharp point, from which fire seemed to be coming out. Seeing all this and watching this figure violently hurl the aforementioned tool into my soul was all one and the same thing. I barely uttered a moan; I felt like I was dying. I told the boy to leave, because I felt ill and no longer had the strength to continue. (1065, 1995)"

"I want to suffer. This is my desire. (1051, 1995)"

"Patience!... I suffer, it is true, but I enjoy it very much. (206, 1995)"

"Poor my dear Mum, how much you love me! (276, 1995)"

"(At the beginning of Giacomo Gaglione‘s book, ’'Allo specchio della mia anima'‘ (In the Mirror of My Soul)) Never let the Passion of Christ leave your mind if you want to share in his triumphs."

"Before coming here to see me... go to Monte Sant'Angelo and invoke the help and protection of the Archangel Michael."

"God's omnipotence is not limited to planet Earth alone. On other planets there are creatures and other beings who have not sinned as we have and who pray to God."

"(About the wife of the champion, when they went to San Giovanni Rotondo in 1953; a week later, as widely predicted by journalists at the time, Coppi left his wife to go and live with Giulia Occhini) Mrs. Coppi, be careful not to get hit on."

"The most beautiful creed is the one that bursts from your lips in the darkness, in sacrifice, in pain, in the supreme effort of an infallible will for good; it is the one that, like a bolt of lightning, pierces the darkness of your soul; it is the one that, in the flash of the storm, lifts you up and leads you to God."

"Blasphemy brings God's curse upon your home and is the surest way to go to hell."

"Circumstances make the hero, but everyday courage makes the righteous man."

"Better a mouse between two cats than a sick man between two doctors."

"Is he a saint? Giacomino is a great saint!"

"(About Giacomo Gaglione) With Jesus on the Cross, with Jesus in holy Paradise."

"Where there is more sacrifice, there is more generosity."

"I will never tire of praying to Jesus. It is true that my prayers are more deserving of punishment than reward, because I have disgusted Jesus too much with my countless sins; but in the end, he will take pity on me. (209, 1995)"

"Every holy Mass, heard with devotion, produces in our souls marvelous effects, abundant spiritual and material graces which we, ourselves, do not know. It is easier for the earth to exist without the sun than without the holy Sacrifice of the Mass."

"Bless the hand that strikes you, for it is always the hand of a father."

"I no longer understand anything. I do not know if my prayers are such, or if they are strong resentments that my heart directs toward its God in the fullness of its pain. (1029, 1995)"

"Even at the altar, my father, God alone knows how much violence I must do to myself to avoid further sins. (278, 1995)"

"At roughly the same time, on the other end of the Roman world in Syria, Ignatius, the bishop of Antioch, was considering and writing about the same topics as Clement. Ignatius had been a disciple of John, and tradition in the Eastern Orthodox Church holds that Ignatius was personally appointed by Peter to be the bishop of Antioch. Like Clement, Ignatius's concern for orthodoxy dominates his writings. Many of the most recognizable features of Christianity are described therein. Ignatius functioned as the most prolific link between the apostles and the early church, and in the words of one scholar, "his testimony must necessarily carry with it the greatest weight and demand the most serious consideration." All of Ignatius's surviving letters were written on a journey to Rome, where he would meet death by being torn to pieces by lions. Consequently, his letters to the churches around the Roman world are wrought with a desperate love and concern for his brothers and sisters. One of Ignatius's main themes is a pleading that the churches would reject the heresies that were creeping into the church. "I entreat you... not to nourish yourselves on anything but Christian fare, and have no truck with the alien barbs of heresy," he wrote. Rejection of heresy included shunning those who claimed to be Christians but adhered to false teaching: "You must keep away from these men as you would from a pack of savage animals, they are rabid curs who snap at peoples unawares, and you need to be on guard against their bites, because they are by no means easy to heal." Ignatius also emphasized the importance of the Eucharist (the Lord's Supper), declaring it the "medicine of immortality." As one who was personally instructed by at least one of the apostles, he had much to say on the subject."

"The first-century Christian writer Ignatius called for an abolition of warfare. This would happen, according to him and other Christian writers, once the world embraced the teachings of Jesus Christ—to love one's enemies, to do good even to those who do evil, to respond to evil with goodness. Such determined love and goodness was not meant to be pacifistic but a program for actively fighting evil. Given their stance against soldiers and soldiering, even against police work, it is striking that Christians sought and got converts among the Roman Legion. Some historians believe that it was converted Roman soldiers who first brought Christianity to Britain."

"καταμάθετε δὲ τοὺς ἑτεροδοξοῦντας εἰς τὴν χάριν Ἰησοῦ Χριστοῦ τὴν εἰς ἡμᾶς ἐλθοῦσαν, πῶς ἐναντίοι εἰσὶν τῇ γνώμῃ τοῦ θεοῦ. περὶ ἀγάπης οὐ μέλει αὐτοῖς, οὐ περὶ χήρας, οὐ περὶ ὀρφανοῦ, οὐ περὶ θλιβομένου, οὐ περὶ δεδεμένου ἢ λελυμένου,οὐ περὶ πεινῶντος ἢ διψῶντος."

"τόπος μηδένα φυσιούτω· τὸ γὰρ ὅλον ἐστὶν πίστις καὶ ἀγάπη, ὧν οὐδὲν προκέκριται."

"προφυλάσσω δὲ ὑμᾶς ἀπὸ τῶν θηρίων τῶν ἀνθρωπομόρφων."

"What people value highly is detestable in God’s sight."

"All the believers were together and had everything in common. They sold property and possessions to give to anyone who had need."

"We must obey God rather than men."

"When someone invites you to a wedding feast, do not take the place of honor, for a person more distinguished than you may have been invited. If so, the host who invited both of you will come and say to you, ‘Give this person your seat.’ Then, humiliated, you will have to take the least important place. But when you are invited, take the lowest place, so that when your host comes, he will say to you, ‘Friend, move up to a better place.’ Then you will be honored in the presence of all the other guests. For all those who exalt themselves will be humbled, and those who humble themselves will be exalted."

"You Pharisees clean the outside of the cup and dish, but inside you are full of greed and wickedness. You foolish people! Did not the one who made the outside make the inside also? But now as for what is inside you—be generous to the poor, and everything will be clean for you."

"You experts in the law, woe to you, because you load people down with burdens they can hardly carry, and you yourselves will not lift one finger to help them. ... Woe to you experts in the law, because you have taken away the key to knowledge. You yourselves have not entered, and you have hindered those who were entering."

"Serve the Lord joyfully! [Servite Domino in laetitia!]"

"Those who pray take care of the most important of all."

"With the works of charity we closed the doors of hell and open ourselves to the sky."

"Not with violence, but with words."

"If young people are educated properly, we have moral order; if not, vice and disorder prevail. Religion alone can initiate and achieve a true education."

"I'll wait for all my young people in heaven."

"Be cheerful, do good, and let the sparrows chirp."

"Kindness of speech, in word, in advising conquers everything and all."

"The aim of life is to attain peace. No one can give us peace. We can't buy or borrow it. We have to cultivate it by practicing yama and niyama (yoga restraints and observances)."

"Don't think that you are carrying the whole world; make it easy. Make it play, make it a prayer."

"All sadhanas or methods are for simply tricking the mind. The trick is to not let the mind spread out in a form of thoughts."

"Q: What can I do to overcome my fear of death? A: Attachment to the body causes fear of death. It is the strongest attachment. Even a newborn infant has this attachment. To overcome the fear of death it is necessary to accept that we all have to die."