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From the treatise On Spiritual Perfection by Diadochus of Photice, bishop
(Cap. 12. 13. 14: PG 65, 1171-1172)

No one who is in love with himself is capable of loving God. The man who loves God is the one who mortifies his self-love for the sake of the immeasurable blessings of divine love. Such a man never seeks his own glory but only the glory of God. If a person loves himself he seeks his own glory, but the man who loves God loves the glory of his Creator. Anyone alive to the love of God can be recognized from the way he constantly strives to glorify him by fulfilling all his commandments and by delighting in his own
abasement. Because of his great majesty it is fitting that God should receive glory, but if he hopes to win God’s favor it becomes man to be humble. If we possess this love for God, we too will rejoice in his glory as Saint John the Baptist did, and we shall never stop repeating: His fame must increase, but mine must diminish.

I know a man who, though lamenting his failure to love God as much as he desires, yet loves him so much that his soul burns with ceaseless longing for God to be glorified, and for his own complete effacement. This man has no feeling of self-importance even when he receives praise. So deep is his desire to humble himself that he never even thinks of his own dignity. He fulfills his priestly duty be celebrating the Liturgy, but his intense love for God is an abyss that swallows up all consciousness of his high office. His humility makes him oblivious of any honor it might bring him, so that in his own estimation he is never anything but a useless servant. Because of his desire for self-abasement, he regards himself as though degraded from his office. His example is one that we ourselves should follow
by fleeing from all honor and glory for the sake of the immeasurable blessings of God’s love, for he has loved us so much!

Anyone who loves God in the depths of his heart has already been loved by God. In fact, the measure of a man’s love for God depends upon how deeply aware he is of God’s love for him. When this awareness is keen it makes whoever possesses it long to be enlightened by the divine light, and this longing is so intense that it seems to penetrate his very bones. He loses all consciousness of himself and is entirely transformed by the love of God.

Such a man lives in this life and at the same time does not live in it, for although he still inhabits his body, he is constantly leaving it in spirit because of the love that draws him toward God. Once the love of God has released him from self-love, the flame of divine love never ceases to burn in his heart and he remains united to God by an irresistible longing. As the Apostle says: If we are taken out of ourselves it is for the love of God; if we are brought back to our senses it is for your sake.

Faith is not a magic formula.  But it does give us the key to learning for ourselves.  So that we can get answers and find out for ourselves who we are.  It is always the case that a person first recognizes himself in others and through others.  No one can arrive at knowledge of himself just by looking within himself and trying to build up his personality from what he finds there.  Man as a being is so constructed for relationships that he grows in relation to others.  So that his own meaning, his task in life, his advancement in life, and his potential are unlocked in his meeting with others.  From the starting point of this basic structure of human existence we can understand faith and our meeting with Jesus.

Faith is not just a system of knowledge, things we are told; at the heart of it is a meeting with Jesus.  This meeting with Jesus, among all those other meetings we have need of, is the truly decisive one.  All our other meetings leave the ultimate goal unclear, where we are coming from, where we are going.  At our meeting with him the fundamental light dawns, by which I can understand God, man, the world, mission, and meaning ~ and by which all the other meetings fall into place.

Pope Benedict XVI 

Christians are Sunday people.  What does that mean?  Before we ask ourselves how we “observe Sunday,” we have to consider what we Christians actually celebrate on Sunday.  The real and first reason for celebrating Sunday lies in the fact that on this day Christ rose from the dead.  In doing so, he inaugurated a new age.  For the first time someone returns  from the dead and will not die again.  For the first time someone has broken the bonds of time that holds us all in captivity.  But Jesus did not pass quickly into heaven.  He did not simply shed time as one might shed  a worn-out garment; on the contrary, he remains with us.  He has returned and will never leave us again.  The feast of Sunday is, therefore, above all a profession of faith in the Resurrection.  It is a profession of faith that life is good.  Very early in the history of the Church Christians asked themselves: “Why did the Lord choose this day? What meaning did he intend to convey thereby?”  According to Jewish reckoning, Sunday was the first day of the week.  It was therefore the day on which God created the world.  It was the day on which God ended his rest and spoke: “Let there be light” (GN 1:3).  Sunday is the first day of the week, the day of thanks and creation….. Creation has been given us by God as our living space, as the scene of our labour and our leisure, in which we find both the necessities and the superfluities of life, the beauty of images and sounds, which we need precisely as much as we need food and clothing.

Pope Benedict XVI

From the Detailed Rules for Monks by Saint Basil the Great, bishop
(Resp. 2, 1: PG 31, 908-910)

Love of God is not something that can be taught. We did not learn from someone else how to rejoice in light or want to live, or to love our parents or guardians. It is the same-perhaps even more so—with our love for God: it does not come by another’s teaching. As soon as the living creature (that is, man) comes to be, a power of reason is implanted in us like a seed, containing within it the ability and the need to love. When the school of God’s law admits this power of reason, it cultivates it diligently, skillfully nurtures it, and with God’s help brings it to perfection.

For this reason, as by God’s gift, I find you with the zeal necessary to attain this end, and you on your part help me with your prayers. I will try to fan into flame the spark of divine love that is hidden within you, as far as I am able through the power of the Holy Spirit.

First, let me say that we have already received from God the ability to fulfill all his commands. We have then no reason to resent them, as if something beyond our capacity were being asked of us. We have no reason either to be angry, as if we had to pay back more than we had received. When we use this ability in a right and fitting way, we lead a life of virtue and holiness. But if we misuse it, we fall into sin. 

This is the definition of sin: the misuse of powers given us by God for doing good, a use contrary to God’s commands. On the other hand, the virtue that God asks of us is the use of the same powers based on a good conscience in accordance with God’s command.

Since this is so, we can say the same about love. Since we received a command to love God, we possess from the first moment of our existence an innate power and ability to love. The proof of this is not to be sought outside ourselves, but each one can learn this from himself and in himself. It is natural for us to want things that are good and pleasing to the eye, even though at first different things seem beautiful and good to different people. In the same way, we love what is related to us or near to us, though we have not been taught to do so, and we spontaneously feel well disposed to our benefactors.

What, I ask, is more wonderful than the beauty of God? What thought is more pleasing and wonderful than God’s majesty? What desire is as urgent and overpowering as the desire implanted by God in a soul that is completely purified of sin and cries out in its love: I am wounded by love? The radiance of divine beauty is altogether beyond the power of words to describe.

From a treatise on John by Saint Augustine, bishop

The Lord, the teacher of love, full of love, came in person with summary judgment on the world, as had been foretold of him, and showed that the law and the prophets are summed up in two commandments of love.

Call to mind, brethren, what these two commandments are. They ought to be very familiar to you; they should not only spring to mind when I mention them, but ought never to be absent from your hearts. Keep always in mind that we must love God and our neighbor: Love God with your whole heart, your whole soul, and your whole mind, and your neighbor as yourself.

These two commandments must be always in your thoughts and in your hearts, treasured, acted on, fulfilled. Love of God is the first to be commanded, but love of neighbor is the first to be put into practice. In giving two commandments of love Christ would not commend to you first your neighbor and then God but first God and then your neighbor.

Since you do not yet see God, you merit the vision of God by loving your neighbor. By loving your neighbor you prepare your eye to see God. Saint John says clearly: If you do not love your brother whom you see, how will you love God whom you do not see!

Consider what is said to you: Love God. If you say to me: Show me whom I am to love, what shall I say if not what Saint John says: No one has ever seen God! But in case you should think that you are completely cut off from the sight of God, he says: God is love, and he who remains in love remains in God.Love your neighbor, then, and see within yourself the power by which you love your neighbor; there you will see God, as far as you are able.

Begin, then, to love your neighbor. Break your bread to feed the hungry, and bring into your home the homeless poor; if you see someone naked, clothe him, and do not look down on your own flesh and blood.

What will you gain by doing this? Your light will then burst forth like the dawn.Your light is your God; he is your dawn, for he will come to you when the night of time is over. He does not rise or set but remains for ever.

In loving your neighbor and caring for him you are on a journey. Where are you traveling if not to the Lord God, to him whom we should love with our whole heart, our whole soul, our whole mind? We have not yet reached his presence, but we have our neighbor at our side. Support, then, this companion of your pilgrimage if you want to come into the presence of the one with whom you desire to remain for ever.

From a sermon by Saint Bernard, abbot
(Sermo 1, in Epiphania Domini, 1-2: PL 133, 141-143)

The goodness and humanity of God our Savior have appeared in our midst. We thank God for the many consolations he has given us during this sad exile of our pilgrimage here on earth. Before the Son of God became man his goodness was hidden, for God’s mercy is eternal, but how could such goodness be recognized? It was promised, but it was not experienced, and as a result few have believed in it. Often and in many ways the Lord used to speak through the prophets. Among other things, God said: I think thoughts of peace and not of affliction. But what did men respond, thinking thoughts of affliction and knowing nothing of peace? They said: Peace, peace, there is no peace. This response made the angels of peace weep bitterly, saying: Lord, who has believed our message? But now men believe because they see with their own eyes, and because God’s testimony has now become even more credible. He has gone so far as to pitch his tent in the sun so even the dimmest eyes see him.

Notice that peace is not promised but sent to us; it is no longer deferred, it is given; peace is not prophesied but achieved. It is as if God the Father sent upon the earth a purse full of his mercy. This purse was burst open during the Lord’s passion to pour forth its hidden contents—the price of our redemption. It was only a small purse, but it was very full. As the Scriptures tell us: A little child has been given to us, but in him dwells all the fullness of the divine nature. The fullness of time brought with it the fullness of divinity. God’s Son came in the flesh so that mortal men could see and recognize God’s kindness. When God reveals his humanity, his goodness cannot possibly remain hidden. To show his kindness what more could he do beyond taking my human form? My humanity, I say, not Adam’s—that is, not such as he had before his fall.

How could he have shown his mercy more clearly than by taking on himself our condition? For our sake the Word of God became as grass. What better proof could he have given of his love? Scripture says: Lord, what is man that you are mindful of him; why does your heart go out to him? The incarnation teaches us how much God cares for us and what he thinks and feels about us. We should stop thinking of our own sufferings and remember what he has suffered. Let us think of all the Lord has done for us, and then we shall realize how his goodness appears through his humanity. The lesser he became through his human nature the greater was his goodness; the more he lowered himself for me, the dearer he is to me. The goodness and humanity of God our Savior have appeared, says the Apostle.

Truly great and manifest are the goodness and humanity of God. He has given us a most wonderful proof of his goodness by adding humanity to his own divine nature.

The third blind man is the soul which, by not understanding itself, disturbs and harms itself.  Since it only knows how to act by means of the senses and discursive reflection, it thinks it is doing nothing when God introduces it into that emptiness and solitude where it is unable to use the faculties and make acts, and as a result it strains to perform these acts.  The soul, therefore, that was enjoying the idleness of spiritual peace and silence, in which God was secretly adorning it, is distracted and filled with dryness and displeasure.

It will happen that while God persists in keeping the soul in that silent quietude, it persists in its desire to act through its own efforts with the intellect and the imagination.  It resembles a child who kicks and cries in order to walk when his mother wants to carry him, and thus neither allows his mother to make any headway nor makes any himself; or it resembles one who moves a painting back and forth while the artist is at work so that either nothing is accomplished or the painting is damaged.

A person should take note that even though he does not seem to be making any progress in this quietude or doing anything, he is advancing much faster than if he were treading along on foot, for God is carrying him.  Although he is walking at God’s pace, he does not feel this pace.  Even though he does no work with his faculties, he achieves much more than if he did, for God is the agent.

It is no wonder if he does not advert to this, for the senses do not attain to what God effects in the soul at this time.  As the Wise Man says: “The words of wisdom are heard in silence” (Qo 9:17).

A soul then, should abandon itself into God’s hands and not it’s own, nor those of the other blind men; for insofar as it abandons itself to God and does not apply its faculties to anything, it will advance securely.

Saint John Of The Cross +1591

The Lord of all comes as a slave amidst poverty. The hunter has no wish to startle his prey. Choosing for his birthplace an unknown village in a remote province, he is born of a poor maiden and accepts that poverty implies, for he hopes by stealth to ensnare and save us.

If he had been born to high rank and amidst luxury, unbelievers would have said the world had been transformed by wealth. If he had chosen as his birthplace the great city of Rome, they would have thought the transformation had been brought about by civil power. Suppose he had been the son of an emperor. They would Say:” How useful it is to be powerful!” Imagine him the son of a senator. It would have been: “Look what can be accomplished by legislation!”

But in fact what did he do? He chose surroundings that were poor and simple, so ordinary as to be almost unnoticed, so that people would know it was the Godhead alone that had changed the world. This was his reason for choosing his Mother from among the poor of a very poor country, and for becoming poor himself.

Theodotus Of Ancyra

+446 Bishop of Ancyra (modern Ankara)

With voices in harmony and hearts in concord we have begged the Lord for our own hearts by saying, Create a clean heart in me, O God and renew an upright spirit in my bowels (Ps 50:12) …..*see Ps 51:10 new nos. and translation.

It’s a psalm of someone repenting, someone wishing to retrieve the hope he had lost, lying where he had fallen, begging the Lord to give him a had to raise him up again; like someone quite capable of injuring himself but not of healing himself.  After all, we can stab and wound our own flesh whenever we want, but to heal it we look for a doctor; well, in the same way the soul is perfectly able to sin all by itself, but to heal the hurt it has caused by sinning, it implores the helping hand of God.

That’s why he says in another psalm, I myself have said, Lord. Have mercy on me, heal my soul since I have sinned against you (Ps 40:4).  see Ps 41:4 new nos. & translation  The reason he says I myself have said it, Lord, is to thrust before our eyes the fact that the will and decision to sin arises from the soul and that we are fully capable of destroying ourselves, while it takes God to seek that which was lost and to save that which has wounded itself.  For the Son of Man has come to seek and save that which was lost (Lk 19:10).  It is Him that we pour out our prayers and say Create a clean heart in me, O God, and renew an upright spirit in my bowels (Ps 50:12). *see Ps 51:10 new nos. and translation. Let the soul that has sinned say this, or it may perish twice over through despair, having lost itself once already by its delinquency.

Saint Augustine of Hippo +430

Can we content ourselves with such an unreal faith in Christ, as in no sufficient measure includes self abasement, or thankfulness, or the desire or effort to be holy?  For how can we feel our need of his help, or our dependence on him, or our debt to him, or the nature of his gift to us, unless we know ourselves? How can we in any sense be said to have that “mind of Christ,” to which the Apostle exhorts us, if we cannot follow him to the height above, or the depth beneath; if we do not in some measure discern the cause and the meaning of his sorrows….

Obedience to God’s commandments, which implies knowledge of sin and holiness, and the desire and endeavour to please him, this is the only practical interpreter of Scripture doctrine.  Without self-knowledge you have no root yourselves personally; you may endure for a time, but under affliction or persecution your faith will not last.  This is why many in this age (and in every age) become infidels, heretics, schismatics, disloyal despisers of the Church.  They cast off the form of truth, because it never has been to them more than a form.  They endure not, because they never have tasted that the Lord is gracious; and they never have had experience of his power and love, because they have never known their own weakness and need.

Blessed John Henry Newman

Is God then so ignorant of things, so unacquainted with the human heart that he has to find out about a man by testing him?  Of course not.  It is in order that a person may find out about himself……People are not as well known to themselves as well they are to their Creator, nor do the sick know themselves as well as the doctor does.  A man is sick; he is suffering, the doctor isn’t suffering, and the patient is waiting to hear what he is suffering  from the one who isn’t suffering.  That is why a man cries out in a psalm, From my hidden [faults] cleanse me, O Lord (Ps 18:13).  There are things in a person which are hidden from the person in whom they are.  And they won’t come out, or be opened up, or discovered, except through tests and trials and temptations.

If God stops testing, it means the master is stopping teaching.  God tempts or tests in order to teach, the devil tests or tempts in order to mislead.  But unless the one being tempted gives him a chance, his temptations can be driven off as as unsubstantial and ridiculous.  That is why the Apostle says, Do not give the devil a chance (Ep 4:27) People give the devil  a chance with their lusts and longings.  Now it is true that people cannot see the devil they are fighting with, but they have a very easy remedy for that;  let them conquer themselves within and they will triumph over him without.

Why am I saying this?  Because you do know yourself unless you learn yourself through trial, temptation and testing.  When you have learned yourself, don’t be heedless about yourself.  At least, if you were heedless about yourself when hidden from you, don’t be heedless about that self when it has became known to you.

Saint Augustine Of Hippo

+430 Doctor of Grace