Quote/s of the Day – 15 July
“Christ is both the way and the door.
Christ is the staircase and the vehicle,
like the “throne of mercy over the Ark of the Covenant,”
and “the mystery hidden from the ages.”
A man should turn his full attention to this throne of mercy
and should gaze at Him hanging on the cross,
full of faith, hope and charity, devoted,
full of wonder and joy, marked by gratitude
and open to praise and jubilation.
Then such a man will make with Christ a “pasch,”
that is, a passing-over.
Through the branches of the cross.
he will pass over the Red Sea,
leaving Egypt and entering the desert.
There he will taste the hidden manna
and rest with Christ in the sepulcher,
as if he were dead to things outside.
He will experience, as much as is possible for one who is still living,
what was promised to the thief who hung beside Christ:
‘Today you will be with me in paradise.'”
– from Journey of the Mind to God by Saint Bonaventure
“The life of God — precisely because God is triune —
does not belong to God alone.
God who dwells in inaccessible light and eternal glory
comes to us in the face of Christ and the activity of the Holy Spirit.
Because of God’s outreach to the creature,
God is said to be essentially relational, ecstatic, fecund,
alive as passionate love. Divine life is therefore also our life.
The heart of the Christian life is to be united
with the God of Jesus Christ by means of communion with one another.
The doctrine of the Trinity is, ultimately, therefore,
a teaching not about the abstract nature of God,
nor about God in isolation from everything other than God
but a teaching about God’s life with us and our life with each other.”
“God might have created a more beautiful world;
He might have made heaven more glorious;
but it was impossible for Him to exalt a creature
higher than Mary in making her His Mother.”
“If there is anyone who is not enlightened
by this sublime magnificence of created things,
he is blind.
If there is anyone who, seeing all these works of God,
does not praise Him,
he is dumb;
if there is anyone who, from so many signs,
cannot perceive God,
that man is foolish.”
AnaStpaul 