Evelyn Underhill

The spiritual life is a stern choice. It is not a consoling retreat from the difficulties of existence, but an invitation to enter fully into that difficult existence, and there apply the Charity of God, and bear the cost.

The Infant St. John, The Baptist

O sweeter than the breath of southern wind
With all its perfumes is the whisper'd prayer
From infant lips, and gentler than the hind,
The feet that bear
The heaven-directed youth in wisdom's pathway fair.

And thou, the early consecrate, like flowers
Didst shed thy incense breath to heaven abroad;
And prayer and praise the measure of thy hours,
The desert trod
Companionless, alone, save of the mighty God.

As Phosphor leads the kindling glory on,
And fades, lost in the day-god's bright excess,
So didst thou in Redemption's coming dawn,
Grow lustreless,
The fading herald of the Sun of Righteousness.

But when the book of life shall be unsealed,
And stars of glory round the throne divine
In all their light and beauty be revealed,
The brightest thine
Of all the hosts of earth with heavenly light shall shine.

~ Nathan Covington Brooks

St. Augustine

"People travel to wonder

at the height of the mountains,

at the huge waves of the seas,

at the long course of the rivers,

at the vast compass of the ocean,

at the circular motion of the stars,

and yet they pass by themselves

without wondering. "

"Some people, in order to discover God, read books. But there is a great book: the very appearance of created things. Look above you! Look below you! Read it. God, whom you want to discover, never wrote that book with ink. Instead, He set before your eyes the things that He had made. Can you ask for a louder voice than that?"

"Late have I loved you, O Beauty ever ancient, ever new, late have I loved you! You were within me, but I was outside, and it was there that I searched for you. In my unloveliness I plunged into the lovely things which you created. You were with me, but I was not with you. Created things kept me from you; yet if they had not been in you they would not have been at all. You called, you shouted, and you broke through my deafness. You flashed, you shone, and you dispelled my blindness. You breathed your fragrance on me; I drew in breath and now I pant for you. I have tasted you, now I hunger and thirst for more. You touched me, and I burned for your peace."

As a Person

"Fanaticism refuses to look at another man as a person. It regards him only as a thing. He is either a 'member' or he is not a member. He is either part of one's own mob, or he is outside the mob. Woe to him, above all, if he stands outside the mob with the mute protest of his individual personality! That is what happened at the Crucifixion of Christ. Christ, the Incarnate Son of God, came as a person, seeking the understanding, the acceptance of the love of free persons. He found Himself face to face with a compact fanatical group, that wanted nothing of His Person. They feared HIs disturbing uniqueness. It was necessary, as Caiphas said, that this 'one man should die for the nation'--that the individual Person, and about all this Person, should be sacrificed to the collectivity. From its very birth, Christianity has been categorically opposed to everything that savors of the mass-movement." ~ Thomas Merton (DISPUTED QUESTIONS, page 132)

with thanks to the Thomas Merton group's "Words of Merton" .. this one was too profound not to share via blog (or via megaphone for that matter!!!)

Believe

"Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares."

~Hebrews 13:2

St. Bernard of Clairvaux

There are those who seek knowledge for the sake of knowledge-

That is curiosity.

There are those who seek knowledge to be known by others-

That is vanity.

There are those who seek knowledge in order to serve-

That is love. ~~~

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