QUOTATION: How the Saints Die

It seems in the sight of the unwise that the servants of God die with sorrow, and unwillingly, even as the worldly do ; but no, for God knows well how to comfort His children when they are dying ; and amidst the pains of their death, He makes them feel a certain incomparable sweetness, as a foretaste of that Paradise, which within a short time He will bestow upon them. Like those who die in sin, who even upon their death-bed experience certain foretastes of hell, such as remorse, fear, and despair; so on the contrary do the saints, by the acts of love which at that time they often make towards God, by the desire and by the hope that is in them, of very soon enjoying God, begin even before death to feel that peace which they will afterwards fully enjoy in heaven. Death to the saints is not a punishment, but a reward.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori, Preparation for Death

QUOTATION: Holiness

Not all saints have the same sort of holiness. There are those who could never have lived with other saints. Not all have the same path. But all arrive at God.

--St. Jean Vianney

QUOTATION: Prayer and Penance

It is impossible to find a Saint who did not take the “two P’s” seriously: prayer and penance.

--St.Francis Xavier

QUOTATION: The Usual Condition of the Saints

The condition of the saints has been ordinarily one of dryness, not of sensible consolations.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Way of Salvation and Perfection

QUOTATION: Jesus' Life of Humility

Jesus Christ, by choosing for himself so humble a birth, so despicable a life, and so ignominious a death, has ennobled and taken away all bitterness from contempt and opprobrium. It is for this that the saints in this world were always so fond and even desirous of being despised; they seemed not to be able to desire or seek for anything but to be despised and trodden underfoot for the love of Jesus Christ.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Incarnation, Birth and Infancy of Jesus Christ 

QUOTATION: Divine Mercy Created Saints

There are saints who are the work of divine mercy, and who became greater saints by the power of mercy and by the constant homage they afterward rendered to it, than they would have been by innocence and virginity. Witness Saint Peter, far greater, far more devoted after his sin than before, also Saint Paul and Saint Magdalen. Their sanctity was nourished on mercy, their tears were the food of their love.

--St. Peter Julian Eymard

QUOTATION: Saints

The saint is often a martyr; he is mistaken for a poison because he is an antidote. He will generally be found restoring the world to sanity by exaggerating whatever the world neglects, which is by no means always the same element in every age.

 
--G.K. Chesterton,  St. Thomas Aquinas

QUOTATION: Agreement

The saints were so completely dead to themselves they cared very little whether others agreed with them or not.

--St. Jean Vianney, the Curé of Ars

QUOTATION:

The greatest saints are truly persuaded that they are only great sinners, and they say it as they think it. Some look upon this expression as exaggerated. They cannot believe it, they say. And yet the saints are really convinced that they are the greatest sinner before God, because they have true humility and patience, which are the means of knowing one's misery in its very depths.

--St. Peter Julian Eymard

QUOTATION: Saints Are Former Sinners

Ponder this truth well, my brethren, and let it be your comfort. Among the Preachers, among the Priests of the Gospel, there have been Apostles, there have been Martyrs, there have been Doctors;—Saints in plenty among them; yet out of them all, high as has been their sanctity, varied their graces, awful their gifts, there has not been one who did not begin with the old Adam; not one of them who was not hewn out of the same rock as the most obdurate of reprobates; not one of them who was not fashioned unto honour out of the same clay which has been the material of the most polluted and vile of sinners; not one who was not by nature brother of those poor souls who have now commenced an eternal fellowship with the devil, and are lost in hell. Grace has vanquished nature; that is the whole history of the Saints. Salutary thought for those who are tempted to pride themselves in what they do, and what they are; wonderful news for those who sorrowfully recognise in their hearts the vast difference that exists between them and the Saints; and joyful news, when men hate sin, and wish to escape from its miserable yoke, yet are tempted to think it impossible!

--Blessed John Henry Newman

QUOTATION: The Blessed

They are not called blessed who are esteemed by the world, who are honored and praised, as noble, as learned, as powerful; but they who are spoken ill of by the world, who are persecuted and calumniated; for it is for such that a glorious reward is prepared in heaven, if they only bear all with patience.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Holy Eucharist

QUOTATION: St. Joseph

Some saints are privileged to extend to us their patronage with particular efficacy in certain needs, but not in others; but our holy patron St. Joseph has the power to assist us in all cases, in every necessity, in every undertaking.

--St. Thomas Aquinas

QUOTATION: The Sins of Saints

When persons of the world wish to praise those whom they love, they always relate their accomplishments, their virtues, and their excellent qualities, giving them all the titles which may render them more honourable, carefully hiding their sins and imperfections, and scrupulously forgetting every thing that might make them appear mean or contemptible; but our holy mother the Church acts in quite a different manner; for, though she singularly loves her children, nevertheless, when she wishes to praise and exalt them, she exactly relates the sins which they committed before their conversion, in order to render more honour and glory to the majesty of Him who sanctified them, showing forth resplendently His infinite mercy by which He has raised them from their miseries and sins, loading them afterwards with His graces, and giving them His holy love, by means of which they arrived at the height of sanctity.

--St. Francis de Sales, Consoling Thoughts

QUOTATION: The Sins of the Saints

To every man, however holy he may be, there always remains some imperfection, because he has been drawn from nothingness: so that we do no injury to the saints when, in recounting their virtues, we relate their sins and defects; but, on the contrary, those who write their lives seem, for this reason, to do a great injury to making by concealing the sins and imperfections of the saints, under pretence of honouring them, not referring to the commencement of their lives, for fear of diminishing the esteem of their sanctity. Oh, no, indeed, this is not to act properly; but it is to wrong the saints and all posterity.

--St. Francis de Sales, Consoling Thoughts

QUOTATION: Saints and Sinners

There is no saint without a past, no sinner without a future.

--St. Augustine

QUOTATION: Saints

Follow the saints, because those who follow them will become saints.

--Pope St. Clement I

QUOTATION: Fear of Good People

The wicked fear the good because the good are a constant reproach to their conscience.

--Archbishop Fulton J. Sheen

QUOTATION: Sanctity

To acquire courage it is very useful to read the lives of the saints, especially of those who, after living in sin, attained great sanctity.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori