QUOTATION: Self-Mastery

Control your appetites before they control you.

--St. John Climacus

QUOTATION: Warning About Hell

If I saw anyone about to fall into a pit or a fire, would I not run up to him and warn him, and do all in my power to help him from falling in? Why should I not do this much to keep sinners from falling into the pit and fires of Hell?

Neither can I understand why other priests who believe the selfsame truths as I do, as we all must do, do not preach or exhort their flock so that they might avoid this unbearable eternity of Hell. It is still a source of wonder to me how the laity - those men and women blessed with the Faith - do not give warning to those who need it. If a house were to catch fire in the middle of the night, and if the inhabitants of the same house and the other townsfolk were asleep and did not see the danger, would not the one who first noticed it shout and run along the streets, exclaiming: "Fire! Fire! In that house over there!" Then why should there not be a warning of eternal fire to waken those who are drifting in the sleep of sin in such a way that when they open their eyes they will find themselves burning in the eternal flames of Hell?

--St. Anthony Mary Claret, Autobiograpy

QUOTATION: Proof of the Afterlife

God would not have given us souls capable of contemplating and desiring holy eternity, if He had not intended to bestow on us the means of obtaining it.

--St. Francis de Sales, Consoling Thoughts

QUOTATION: The Speech of Angels

Christianity has always understood that the speech of angels is actually song, in which all the glory of the great joy they proclaim becomes tangibly present.

--Pope Benedict XVI, Jesus of Nazareth: The Infancy Narratives

QUOTATION: Prayer before the Examination of Conscience

Mother of my God, who art so charitable to sinners that desire to repent, assist me by thy intercession. My guardian angel, who hast been a spectator of all my crimes, help me to discover the sins which I have committed against my God. All ye saints of heaven, pray for me, that I may bring forth fruits of penance. Amen.

--St. Alphonsus Liguori, The Holy Eucharist