I sometimes pray not for self-knowledge in general but for just so much self knowledge at the moment as I can bear and use at the moment the little daily dose.

The praying which makes a prayerful ministry is not a little praying put in as we put flavor to give it a pleasant smack but the praying must be in the body and form the blood and bones. Prayer is no petty duty put into a corner no piecemeal performance made out of the fragments of time which have been snatched from business and other engagements of life but it means that the best of our time the heart of our time and strength must be given.

Let his sword break and his shield shatter Sansa thought coldly as she shoved out through the doors let his courage fail him and every man desert him.

As the books of Job Jeremiah and Habakkuk clearly show God has a high threshold of tolerance for what appropriate to say in a prayer. God can handle my unsuppressed rage. I may well find that my vindictive feelings need Gods correction - but only by taking those feelings to God will I have the opportunity for correction and healing.

If God be near a church it must pray. And if he be not there one of the first tokens of his absence will be a slothfulness in prayer.

Lord behold our family here assembled. We thank You for this place in which we dwell for the love accorded us this day for the hope with which we expect the morrow for the health the work the food and the bright skies that make our lives delightful for our friends in all parts of the earth. Give us courage and gaiety and the quiet mind. Spare us to our friends soften us to our enemies. Bless us if it may be in all our innocent endeavors if it may not give us strength to endure that which is to come that we may be brave in peril constant in tribulation temperate in wrath and in all changes of fortune and down to the gates of death loyal and loving to one another. We beseech of you this help and mercy for Christs sake.

Preaching never edifies a prayerless soul.

The angel said I like black-and-white films more than color because theyre more artificial. You have to work harder to overcome your disbelief. Its sort of like prayer.

Whether you teach or live in the cloister or nurse the sick whether you are in religion or out of it married or single no matter who you are or what you are you are called to the summit of perfection you are called to a deep interior life perhaps even to mystical prayer and to pass the fruits of your contemplation on to others. And if you cannot do so by word then by example.Yet if this sublime fire of infused love burns in your soul it will inevitably send forth throughout the Church and the world an influence more tremendous than could be estimated by the radius reached by words or by example.

Perfect prayer does not consist in many words silent remembering and pure intention raises the heart to that supreme Power.