Volume 5 Issue 2 ~~January 2000
Food for Thought
[L]ife will only be complete when it is lived and has God living in it. --Joel Goldsmith, Practising the Presence (p.9)
[W]e see nothing matters, and that everything matters, and and that this my task matters for me and for my fellow [people] and for Eternity. And if we be utterly humble we may be given strength to be obedient... --Thomas Kelly, A Testament of Devotion (p.72)
It is not only inconsstant, but hypocrytical to talk about Christ andour great love for God in one breath, and, in the next breath, speak dispargingly of a neighbour who is of a differnet race, creed, nationality, political affiliataion, or economic status. One cannot be the child of God so as long as [one] persecutes or hates anyone or anything, but only as [one] lives in a consciousness of no judgement or condemnation. --Joel Goldsmith, Practising the Presence (p.73)
[W]hen God[self] shows anyone where to live, in that place all sorrows are light. You will know yourself, your heart will tell you. You will feel that in the same moment. There you shall remain thanking the Lord. -- Feodor Kusmich
Everyone, rich and poor, nobleman and commoner, strong and weak, healthy and sick, just and sinner, has the opportunity to practice prayer. The power of prayer is great. It brings to us the Spirit of God. It is the easiest virture for everyone to practice. --St. Seraphim of Sarov
When you read the Gospel, do not look for pleasure, for ecstacy, for brilliant ideas;look for the unerring sacred truth.... When you open the Holy Gospel to read it, remember that it will decide your fate in eternity. We will be judged acording to that book. --Inagnatius Bryanchaninov
How different are the sufferings of the sinner and those of the saint! The former are an eclipse of the moon, by which the dark night becomes still blacker and wilder; the latter are a solar eclipse, which cools off the hot day and casts a romantic shade, and wherein the nightingales begin to warble. --Jean Paul Richter.
If the Master had not washed the feet of the disciples, the world never would have learned that the function of the Master was to be a servant. The function of the illumined is to serve those who do not yet know their true Identity. Our function, as seekers after God and as truth students, is not to be a master over nuktituddes, but to be a servant unto multitudesnot to take from the multitudes, but to give unto the nuktitudes, --Joel Goldsmith, Practising the Presence (p.129)
One thing I've learned regarding homosexuality is that those persons who are homosexual are more comfortable or confident in the comprehension of sex than those of us who are hetrosexual. --R. H. Calderhood, Some Will Say Heresy (p.51)
Created things are good but they all pass. Everthing says: do not become attached to me or I leave you. --Staretz Zosima
You may learn many useful things, which at the present you are unable to understand because you think you are already perfect. --Staretz Moses
Live simply and God will not leave you. -- Starez Leonid
If you were as simple in heart as the Apostles were, you would not hide your human faults, would not appear as very pious and would live without hypocriy. This way which appears so easy, is not given or understandable to all. Yet it is the shortest road to salvation and attracts divine grace. The absence of pretences and of cunning, frankness of soul, this is pleasant to the Lord who is humble of heart. Unless you become as little children, you cannot enter the kingdom of God. -- Starez Leonid
One must live without sadness, judge no one, trouble no one and revere everybody. --Staretz Isaac
The Fathers [of the Church] say that the fear of pain is the way of a slave and the desire of reward is the way of a mercenary, but God desires we come by the way of [children] who have lived well and honestly for love of [God] and desire to serve [God] and take pleasure in asavong union with [God] in soul and heart. --The Way of A Pilgrim
True Repentance covers all sins. --Michael of Uusio Valamo
In [the true mystic] grace acts in such a way that their body and heart are in deep peace. Their soul in its tremendous joy becomes like the innocent child. They judge no one, niether greek nor Jew niether sinner nor layman. This interior person looks at everyone equally. They rejoice with the entire world. Their only desire is to honnor and to love the Greek and the Jew. They are children of the king because they trust in the Son of God as their parent. The doors of the invisble world opens before them and the enter into many mansions. And once they enter these mansions, the doors of others open before them. If they entered a hundred ansions, the doors of another hundred would open. They are contiunually enriched. The more they are enriched, the more are thewonders revealed to them. To them as to the child and heir, God entrusts that which cannot be apprehended by human nature or expressed by word. -- St Macarius the Great
Back Issues:
(Note 3.1-5.1 are former Integrity/Calgary newsleters)
