As Scripture says, 'Faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen' (Hebrews 11:1).
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Christian
St. John of the Cross
Christian1542 – 1591Fontiveros, Castile (modern-day Spain)827 quotes
St. John of the Cross was a 16th-century Spanish Carmelite friar, mystic, and poet whose accounts of the Dark Night of the Soul — the painful purification the soul undergoes on the path to union with God — have become the definitive map of contemplative suffering and transformation in the Christian tradition.
Born Juan de Yepes y Álvarez in 1542 in a poor family in Castile, he joined the Carmelite order and became a close collaborator of St. Teresa of Ávila in reforming the order toward stricter contemplative practice. His reforming zeal earned him powerful enemies within the Carmelite establishment, and in 1577 he was abducted and imprisoned in a tiny cell in Toledo for nine months — an experience of darkness and suffering that became the crucible for his greatest poetry. His poems, including 'The Dark Night' and 'The Spiritual Canticle,' are considered among the finest lyric poems in the Spanish language, and his prose commentaries on them constitute a rigorous and tender psychology of the mystical path. The 'Dark Night of the Soul' — his term for the stripping away of all spiritual consolation and self-concept as a prelude to union with God — has become a universal phrase for profound spiritual crisis. He was canonized in 1726 and declared a Doctor of the Church in 1926.
Wisdom
Seek the Kingdom of God and His righteousness first, and all other things will be added to you.
The Lord is near those who call upon Him in truth, and who ask Him for the things that are truly important, such as salvation.
He will fulfill the desires of those who fear Him, and will hear their cries, and will save them.
Because you desired wisdom above all else, and did not ask for victory over your enemies, or riches, or long life, I will give you not only the wisdom you asked for to rule my people righteously, but also the things you did not ask for: riches, wealth, and glory, so that there will be no king like you before or after you.
When the soul completely frees itself from everything that goes against God's will and conforms to it, it is transformed in God through love.
In this way, gradually and quickly, divine calm and peace will be infused into your soul, along with a wonderful and sublime knowledge of God, wrapped in divine love.
Regardless of their inherent nature, these things cannot help him love God as much as the smallest act of living faith and hope, which is done with selflessness and detachment from all things.
यह सब गुप्त आत्म-सम्मान और अहंकार से उत्पन्न होता है, और वे कभी भी यह महसूस नहीं कर सकते कि वे अपनी आंखों तक गर्व में डूबे हुए हैं।
You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, soul, and strength.
'If you want to follow me,' He says, 'deny yourself.'
The spiritual person, however, can judge all things.
So they accepted their food, but did not ask the Lord's counsel.
I gave you milk to drink, not solid food, like infants in Christ.
And don't interfere with forms, meditations, and imaginings, or any kind of reasoning, lest your soul becomes disturbed and loses its contentment and peace, leading to feelings of dislike and aversion.
The path to eternal life is narrow, and those who walk on it must be completely detached and free from burdens.
The soul receives benefits by getting rid of the apprehensions of the imagination.
God sought to try me, but His mercy never left me.
To achieve perfection, we should not desire earthly or heavenly goods, but instead, we should seek and strive for the glory and honor of God in all things
The saint was so pleased with her response that for several days, he uttered profound and sublime thoughts about the beauty of God, leaving everyone in awe.