"If Christ Jesus dwells in a person as his friend and noble leader, that person can endure all things, for Christ helps and strengthens us and never abandons us. He is a true friend. And I clearly see that if we expect to please him and receive an abundance of his graces, God desires that these graces must come to us from the hands of Christ, through his most sacred humanity, in which God takes delight.
"Many, many times I have perceived this through experience. The Lord has told it to me. I have definitely seen that we must enter by this gate if we wish his Sovereign Majesty to reveal to us great and hidden mysteries. A person should desire no other path, even if he or she is at the summit of contemplation; on this road one walks safely. All blessings come to us through our Lord. He will teach us, for in beholding his life we find that he is the best example."
Yet more clear proof that the hiearchical Catholic Church stifles charismatic personalism. Oh, wait.
Teresa of Jesus of Avila (AD 1515-1582), Life 22, 6-7.14
Born in Avila, Spain, Teresa became a Carmelite nun, advanced in prayer, and left her Order and the Church a legacy of her spiritual growth in numerous writings. Luis de León, O.S.A., was the editor of her writings and thus saved them for posterity.
Building the Foundation - October 16
"God's disciples need to have firmly anchored in their souls the remembrance of their Master, Jesus Christ, and to think of him day and night. They must learn where to begin, and how and where to construct the rooms in their buildings, and how to bring those buildings to completion. Otherwise all the passers-by will mock them, as our Lord said about the man who set out to build a tower and could not finish it.
"The foundation is already laid, as Saint Paul said: it is Jesus Christ our God. If anyone builds on this foundation with gold or silver or precious stones, or with wood or straw or stubble, his work will be brought to light, because fire will reveal it and test the quality of each one's work [1 Cor 3:12-13 -- EBB].
"Good habits and righteousness in all its beauty are what Paul compared to gold, silver, and precious stones. Faith is like gold; temperance, fasting, abstinence, and the other good works are like silver; while the precious stones are peace, hope, pure and holy thoughts, and spiritual understanding that contemplates God and the grandeur of his being, and keeps silence, trembling before the inexplicable, uncommunicable mysteries of the Godhead."
Philoxenus of Mabbug (AD 440-552), Hom. 1: SC 44, 27-31
Philoxenus was the bishop of Mabbug. He was an outstanding theologian and master of the spiritual life, who achieved a remarkable synthesis between the Syriac and Greek traditions.
"[Keep] silence, trembling before the inexplicable, uncommunicable mysteries of the Godhead." Oh, yeah, no doubt, that just made the quote bar!
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