Ponder the fact that God has made you a gardener, to root out vice and plant virtue.
St. Catherine Of SienaRead
Eternal Trinity... mystery deep as the sea, You could give me no greater gift than the gift of Yourself. For You are a fire ever burning and never consumed, which itself consumes all the selfish love that fills my being.
Interpretation
The quote expresses the deep intimacy and selflessness in a relationship with the divine, emphasizing the gift of oneself as the greatest offering.
In this profound quote, St. Catherine of Siena portrays the relationship between the soul and God as a deep mystery akin to the vastness of the sea. The 'gift of Yourself' signifies the ultimate expression of love, where self-giving transcends selfish desires, allowing the divine fire to purify and transform the soul, revealing the true nature of love as both consuming and enlightening.
In practice
During a sermon, to illustrate the depth of divine love.
Ponder the fact that God has made you a gardener, to root out vice and plant virtue.
When it seems that God shows us the faults of others, keep on the safer side-it may be that your judgment is false. On your lips let silence abide. And any vice that you may ascribe to others, ascribe at once to them and yourself, in true humility. If that vice really exists in a person, he will correct himself better, seeing himself so gently understood, and will say of his own accord the thing that you would have said to him.
O unfathomable depth! O Deity eternal! O deep ocean! What more could You give me than to give me Yourself?
To a brave man, good and bad luck are like his left and right hand. He uses both.
There is no perfect virtue-none that bears fruit- unless it is exercised by means of our neighbor.
Everything comes from love, all is ordained for the salvation of man, God does nothing without this goal in mind.
Everything in the universe wants to be loved and accepted. Our personal work is to find the love and acceptance within ourselves.
Love always elevates the character of man. It never lowers him, provided love be love
Christmas is a season for kindling the fire for hospitality in the hall, the genial flame of charity in the heart.
What I wanted to do was to fasten my index finger and thumb at the bolts of your collar bone, push out, spread the web of my hand until it caught against your throat. You asked me if I wanted to strangle you. No, I wanted to fit you, not just in the obvious ways but in so many indentations.
If you love, you will suffer. The only way to protect yourself against suffering is to protect yourself against love - and that is the greatest suffering of all, loneliness.
I love to hear my Lord spoken of, and wherever I have seen the print of His shoe in the earth, there have I coveted to put mine also.
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