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No Excuse
Provided they live a worthy life, both those who choose to dwell in the midst of noise and hubbub and those who dwell in monasteries, mountains and caves can achieve salvation. Solely because of their faith in Him God bestows great blessings on them. Hence those who because of their laziness have failed to attain salvation will have no excuse to offer on the Day of Judgment. For He who promised to grant us salvation simply on account of our faith in Him not a liar. "
- St. Symeon the New Theologian
"Truth You must know that only passions and sins are ours. Whatever good we do is from God, whatever foolish things we do come from us. When God’s Grace abandons us for just a little while, we become unable to do anything. As in natural life, when God removes oxygen from us we die immediately. The same is true for spiritual life: If God removes His Grace, we are lost. "
- Elder Paisios (+1994)
"Nowhere does the Gospel tell you to believe in yourself, but to believe in God --- that God can help, that God can heal. Some people, however, take this the wrong way, and say, ‘Man has powers, and must believe in himself.’ To believe in one’s self contains either egoism or demonism.
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- Elder Paisios
"On the third day, He freely rose again from the dead. He appeared to his disciples as He had been. However, He tarried for forty days so that they might be instructed by Him in the precepts of life and so that they might learn what they were to teach. Then, in a cloud spread around Him, He was lifted up into heaven - so that as a conqueror, He might bring humanity to the Father. For Christ loved man, He became man, and He shielded man from death.
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- St. Cyprian of Carthage
"Like the sun which shines on all alike, vainglory beams on every occupation. What I mean this. I fast, and turn vainglorious. I stop fasting so that I will draw no attention to myself, and I become vainglorious over my prudence. I dress well or badly, and am vainglorious in either case. I talk or I hold my peace, and each time I am defeated. No matter how I shed this prickly thing, a spike remains to stand Up against me.
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- St. John Climacus
"Storms are stirred up also in the Saints, but those are of another nature, they have another purpose: sometimes a trial helps them become more holy, or it is for their greater glory, or it is so that they may glorify God more, or it has to do with the storms raised against Orthodoxy, etc.
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- Elder Ephraim
His Royal Image
"If artists who make statues and paint portraits of kings are held in high esteem, will not God bless ten thousand times more those who reveal and beautify His royal image? - for man is the image of God. When we teach our children to be good, to be gentle, to be forgiving - all attributes of God, to be generous, to love their neighbor, to regard this present age as nothing, we install virtue in their souls, and reveal the image of God within them. This, then, is our task:
to educate both ourselves and our children in godliness; otherwise what answer will we have before Christ’s judgment seat? Let us be greatly concerned for our wives and our children, and for ourselves as well. The good God Himself will bring this work to perfection, so that all of us may be counted worthy of the blessings He has promised.
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- St. John Chrysostom
"Those who have crucified themselves together with their passions and desires, and who proclaim the death of Jesus in their mortal flesh (cf. II Cor. 4:10), have made the flesh tractable and obedient to the law of God, so that it proves an ally rather than an adversary...
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- St. Theodoros the Great Ascetic
No Spirit of Repentance
"Look what modern man has come to! The bad thing is that he himself obstructs divine intervention, because he has no spirit of repentance. If there was repentance, many things would have been corrected. But now we will go through storm after storm. God save us! We must ask for everyone to be granted a spirit of repentance. And for those who deliberately harm the Church and have no intention of correcting themselves, may God grant them repentance before they are taken from this life.
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- Elder Paisios
The Way of the Saints
"See here, I pray, how great is the difference between us and God; for the distance is immeasurable. He is slow to anger and long-suffering, of incomparable gentleness and love to mankind; but we children of earth are quick to anger, hasty to be impatient, and refuse with indignation to be judged by others when we are found out in committing any wrong act; while we are most ready to find fault with others.
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- St. Cyril of Alexandria
"Prayer is a conversation directly with God, being always with God, having one’s soul united with Him and one’s mind inseparable. A person becomes one with the angels and unites with them in perpetual praise and longing for God.
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- St. Symeon of Thessalonica
"Wherever we decide to withdraw or to settle, we will drag along our inner chaos; for just as everywhere is an earthly paradise to the humble soul, everywhere will be torture and hard labor
to the proud...
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- St. Anthony of Optina
"There was a wealthy man who became destitute. This was difficult, but it could be overcome. There was a healthy man who became ill, and this too could be remedied; for the poor and the sick, there is always Christ. However, if you lose your faith, it is a great tragedy. It is truly terrible for the man who has lost his faith, for he has no one to support him.
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- St. Barsanuphios of Optina
"On account of his sufferings, the man engaged in ascetic practice wants to leave this life and to be with Christ; the contemplative, on the contrary, is quite content to remain in the flesh, both because of the joy that he receives from prayer, and because of the use that he can be to his fellow-men (cf. Phil. 1:23-24).
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- Elias the Presbyter
"Who hated sin more than the Saints? But they did not hate the sinners at the same time, nor condemn them, nor turn away from them. But they suffered with them, admonished them, comforted them. gave them remedies as sickly members, and did all they could to heal them.
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- St. Dorotheos of Gaza
"At all times indeed, but especially then when I reflect upon the achievements of the Saints, it comes over me to feel despondency concerning my own condition, because we have not even in dreams experienced the things among which those men spent their whole lives, not paying the penalty of sins, but always doing rightly and yet always afflicted...
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- St. John Chrysostom
"Prayer, fasting, vigil and all other Christian practices, however good they may be in themselves, do not constitute the aim of our Christian life, although they serve as the indispensable means of reaching this end. The true aim of our Christian life consists in the acquisition of the Holy Spirit of God.
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- St. Seraphim of Sarov
"It is indispensable for every Christian to acquire the habit of turning quickly to God in prayer about everything.
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