Words from the Saints – June 2, 2022

"Yet if from the start we had wanted to keep the commandments and to remain as we were when baptized, we would not have fallen into so many sins or have needed the trials and tribulations of repentance." --St. Peter of Damascus

"The mouth which is continuously giving thanks, receives blessing from God. In the heart that always shows gratitude, grace abides." --St. Isaac the Syrian

"If the serpent, the devil, bites someone secretly, he infects that person with the venom of sin. And if the one who has been bitten keeps silence and does not do penance, and does not want to confess his wound... then his brother and his master, who have the word [of absolution] that will cure him, cannot very well assist him." --St. Jerome

"At first a simple thought about evil makes it into the mind, and if it is kept in the mind, then a passionate motion arises from it, and if you do not extirpate the passion, then it inclines the mind to agreement, and when this happens, it leads the mind to the commission of a sinful deed. Guard your thoughts, for if you do not sin in thought, you will never sin in deed." --St. Maximos the Confessor

"Every day you provide your bodies with good to keep them from failing. In the same way your good works should be the daily nourishment of your hearts. Your bodies are fed with food and your spirits with good works. You aren't to deny your soul, which is going to live forever, what you grant to your body, which is going to die." --St. Gregory the Great

"A saint-like soul helps its neighbor and when ill-treated by him is patient, enduring what it suffers at his hands." --St. Thalassios the Libyan