Signposts

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Fads, Trends, and Principles

When looking at the world, you can divide much of it into Fads, Trends or Principles. A little mantra for this is that we should Play with Fads, Work with Trends, and Live by Principles… in modern times, we are too often Seduced by Fads, Ignorant of Trends, and Resistant to Principles.

— David Zach

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When God Forgives Us

The literal truth is that when God forgives us he doesn’t change his mind about us. Out of his unconditional, unchanging, eternal love for us he changes our minds about him. It is God’s loving gift that we begin to think of repenting for our sin and of asking for his mercy. And that repentance does not earn his forgiveness. It is his forgiveness under another name. The gift, the grace, of contrition just is God’s forgiveness. The gift of contrition is, for example, the grace we celebrate in the sacrament of penance. If we go to confession, it is not to plead for forgiveness from God. It is to thank him for it. The gift of contrition is the gift of recognizing God’s unswerving love for us. It is the gift of having the confidence to confess our sins, to admit the truth. And if we do that, then, as Jesus told us, the truth will set us free (cf. John 8:32).

— Herbert McCabe, God, Christ and Us

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Boredom and Sloth

Habitual boredom, boredom not just with a specific task like chopping wood for ten hours a day but boredom that is like the sky spread over everything, not only leads to sin, but it is in itself a sin. The medievals called it sloth (acedia or akedia), one of the seven deadly sins.

Sloth is not simply laziness. In fact, it does not necessarily imply any physical laziness at all. It means the passivity and inactivity of the will and the passions even in the presence of the true good. In other word, it is the soul’s refusal to eat its food. As violence is spiritual junk food, boredom is spiritual anorexia.

— Peter Kreeft, “Shocking Beauty”

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love is the voice under all silences,
the hope which has no opposite in fear;
the strength so strong mere force is feebleness:
the truth more first than sun more last than star

— E.E. Cummings

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And I saw the River
over which every soul must pass
to reach the Kingdom of Heaven,
and the name of the River was SUFFERING…
and I saw the Boat which carries souls across the River,
and the name of that Boat was…LOVE.

— St. John of the Cross

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Actually one decides one’s life by responding to a word that is not well defined, easily explicable, safely accounted for. One decides to love in the face of an unaccountable void, and from the void comes an unaccountable truth. By this truth one’s existence is sustained in peace—until the truth is too firmly grasped and too clearly accounted for. Then one is relying on words—i.e., on his own understanding and his own ingenuity in interpreting existence and its “signs.” Then one is lost—has to be found once again in the patient Void.

— Thomas Merton, Learning to Love

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To Love at All

To love at all is to be vulnerable… If you want to make sure of keeping your heart intact, you must give your heart to no one, not even to an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements; lock it up safe in the casket of your selfishness. But in that casket—safe, dark, motionless, airless—it will change. It will not be broken—it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable… The only place outside of Heaven where you can be perfectly safe from love is Hell.

— C.S. Lewis

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The devil will try to upset you by accusing you of being unworthy of the blessings that you have received. Simply remain cheerful and do your best to ignore the devil’s nagging. If need be even laugh at the absurdity of the situation. Satan, the epitome of sin, accuses you of unworthiness! When the devil reminds you of your past, remind him of his future!

— St. Teresa of Avila

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Culture breeds and fosters the individual in his uniqueness and yet the individual feels cramped through participating in his culture. Strange, how culture itself brings in us the consciousness of being dissatisfied with it.

— S.N. Ganguly, “Culture, Communication and Silence”

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Silence is the limit of our world of description or language. Silence is silence and completely different from any kind of language.

— S.N. Ganguly

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Silence exists so that we might speak to God. And it is in silence that God communicates His graces to us.

— St. Vincent de Paul

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A virtuous life is simply impossible without the aid of prayer.

— St. John Chrysostom