Author Archives: admin

November 21 – PRESENTATION OF THE BLESSED VIRGIN
“The Word of God took up our grass in order to make us gold. The Word of God, you see, which abides forever, did not consider it beneath him to be for a time grass; not in order to change the Word itself, but to bestow on the grass a change for the better. Yes, The Word became flesh and dwelt among us; and as the Lord he suffered for us and was buried, and rose again and ascended into heaven, and is seated at the right hand of the Father, no longer grass but now gold, undestroyed and indestructible.”
Sermon 113B, 2

November 20 – SAINT BENIGNUS
“Perfect love or charity is the final, perfect gift of the Holy Spirit. First, however, comes the gift which consists in the forgiveness of sins, the benefaction by which we are delivered from the power of darkness, and the prince of this world is thrown outside by our faith; he is the one who is at work in the children of unbelief … It is by the Holy Spirit who gathers the people of God together into one, that the unclean spirit is cast out, who is divided against himself.”
Sermon 71, 19-20

November 19 – SAINT FAUSTUS
“Listen, dearest grains of Christ; listen, Christ’s precious ears of wheat; listen, Christ’s dearest corn. Take a look at yourselves, go back to your consciences, interrogate your faith, interrogate your love, stir up your consciences. And if you discover that you are good grain, let the thought occur to you. Whoever perseveres to the end will be saved. Any of you who are shaking up your consciences find yourselves among the weeds, must not be afraid to change. The command hasn’t yet been given to cut, it isn’t the harvest yet; don’t be today what you were yesterday, or at least don’t be tomorrow what you are today.”
Sermon 73A.2

November 18
“Pride is a great evil; it is even the foremost evil, the beginning, root and cause of all sin. It was pride that overthrew the angel and made the devil. And even when overthrown, he passed on the cup of pride to upright humanity. He aroused pride in the human being who had been created in the image of God, and that pride made humanity shameful. The devil entered humanity and persuaded Eve to defy God’s law and use her own power. … ‘If you eat, he said, you will be like gods’ (Gen 3:5). Consider, then, whether it was not pride that persuaded her. The two who had been created human wanted to be gods. They assumed what they were not and lost what they were; they did not lose their human nature, but they lost blessedness, both present and future. They lost the place to which they were to be raised, deceived by the one who had been thrown down from there”
Sermon 340A

November 17 – SAINT ELIZABETH OF HUNGARY
“Whoever has injured another by open insult, or by abusive or even incriminating language, must remember to repair the injury as quickly as possible by an apology, and the one who suffered the injury must also forgive without further wrangling. But if they have offended one another, they must forgive one another’s trespasses for the sake of your prayers which should be recited with greater sincerity each time you repeat them. Although one is often tempted to anger, yet prompt to ask pardon from one he admits to having offended, such a one is better than another who, though less given to anger, finds it too hard to ask forgiveness.”
The Rule, VI.42

November 16 – SAINT MARGARET OF SCOTLAND
“No one shall perform any task for his or her own benefit, but all your work shall be done for the common good, with greater zeal and more dispatch that if each one were to work for himself or herself alone. For charity, as it is written, is not self-seeking meaning that it places the common good before its own, not its own before the common good. So, whenever you show greater concern for the common good than for your own, you may know that you are growing in charity. Thus, let the abiding virtue of charity prevail in all things that minister to the fleeting necessities of life.”
The Rule, V.31

November 15 – SAINT ALBERT THE GREAT
“How wonderful will be our happiness in heaven! Our undying body will be freed from the need to perform the ordinary tasks of this life. Who can describe the beauty of our bodies in that new life? Just imagine how they will act in that place where there is nothing ugly! Whatever our spirits decide will be accepted happily by our bodies. And our spirits will not be tempted to choose anything unbecoming either for themselves or for their friends, their bodies. We shall have perfect peace because there will be nothing inside or outside of us to cause upset. All of our parts will be drawn to praise the Lord. Our whole being will become one magnificent organ striking melodies in praise of the wonderful artist who made us inside and out and placed us at the center of the overpowering structure of this universe, a universe that will ravish us with its beauty.”
City of God 22.30

November 14 – SAINT GIOCONDO
“People didn’t make themselves, but they make bad deeds. What God made in them is good, because God made man to his image and likeness. But the evil that man worked by free choice, turning away from his author and creator and turning to wickedness, this God condemns in order to set man free; that is, God condemns what man has done, and God sets free what God himself has done.”
Sermon 23A

November 13 – ALL AUGUSTINIAN SAINTS
“Who would be ashamed to say, ‘I am unequal to God’? Assuredly you are. Or to say, ‘I am unequal to Christ’? Yes, you are unequal even to the mortal Christ. But Peter was what you are, the apostles and prophets were what you are. If you have no stomach for imitating your Lord, imitate your fellow servant. A whole marching column of servants has gone ahead, so there is no excuse for the lazy. Yet human weakness still complains: ‘I am not Peter’s equal, nor Paul’s.’ What, are you unequal to confessing the truth? Men of humble origin are crowned; the haughty are left with excuse. Finally, I must ask you: Are you unequal to boys? Even to girls?”
Sermon 325

November 12 – SAINT JOSAPHAT
“The bread which you can see on the altar, sanctified by the word of God, is the body of Christ. That cup, or rather what the cup contains, sanctified by the word of God, is the blood of Christ. It was by means of these things that the Lord Christ wished to present us with his body and blood, which he shed for our sake for the forgiveness of sins. If you receive them well, you are yourselves what you receive. You see, the apostle says, We, being many, are one loaf, one body. That’s how he explained the sacrament of the Lord’s table; one loaf, one body, is what we all are, many though we be.”
Sermon 227