Finding Joy in the day, Day 207 (Year 2)

A new connection

'Take advantage of little sufferings even more than of great ones. God considers not so much what we suffer as how we suffer. . . Turn everything to profit as the grocer does in his shop.'

St. Louis Marie de Montfort

Finding Joy in the day, Day 206 (Year 2) Feast of the Archangels

Great Game last night Go Pack Go

'To encourage ourselves to endure patiently the labors and afflictions of this life, it is well to reflect that they are much less than the pains of Purgatory.'

St. Teresa of Jesus

Finding Joy in the day, Day 205 (Year 2)

Warmth outside
Pretty red tree

'O Virtue! How rarely we see you, yet how real you are!'

St. Bernadette Soubirous

Finding Joy in the day, Day 204 (Year 2)

Live stream of Papal Mass at World Meeting of Families

'Origen and St. Jerome, the former in his preface on the Canticles, the latter in his on Ezechiel say that it was not permitted to the Jews before the age of thirty to read the three first chapters of Genesis, the commencement and the end of Ezechiel, or the Canticle of Canticles, on account of the depth of the difficulties therein, in which few persons can swim without being submerged. And now, everybody talks of them, everybody criticises them, everybody knows all about them.

And how great the profanation of the Scriptures is in this way nobody could sufficiently believe who had not seen it.'

St. Francis de Sales

Finding Joy in the day, Day 203 (Year 2)

Good time with momma
Beautiful sky

'When you can do good, defer it not, because "alms delivers from death."' [ Tobit 4:10, Tobit 12:9]

St. Polycarp of Smyrna

Finding Joy in the day, Day 202 (Year 2)

Listening to the radio coverage of the Papal visit to the US
Time out with dad at Oktoberfest

'If love is long-suffering and kind (cf. 1 Cor. 13:4), a man who is contentious and malicious clearly alienates himself from love. And he who is alienated from love is alienated from God, for God is love.'

St. Maximos the Confessor

Finding Joy in the day, Day 201 (Year 2) Day 2 of the Papal Visit for World Meeting of Families in Philly

Keeping busy
Making some connections

'In storms and squalls we need a pilot, and in this present life we need prayer; for we are susceptible to the provocations of our thoughts, both good and bad. If our thought is full of devotion and love of God, it rules over the passions. As keepers of stillness, we should discriminate between virtue and vice with discretion and watchfulness; and we should know which virtues to practice when in the presence of our brethren and elders and which to pursue when alone. We should know which virtue comes first, and which second or third; which passions attack the soul and which the body, and also which virtues concern the soul and which the body. We should know which virtue pride uses in order to assault the intellect, and which virtue leads to vainglory, wrath or gluttony. For we ought to purify our thoughts from "all the self-esteem that exalts itself against the knowledge of God." (2 Cor. 10:5)'

St. Isaiah the Solitary

Finding Joy in the day, Day 200 (Year 2) Saint Junipero Serra Canonized today and St. Pio's Feast Day

Blessing chatting with a new friend
Making Jewelry, fun
200 days of Year 2

“Prayer is the best weapon we have; it is the key to God's heart. You must speak to Jesus not only with your lips, but with your heart. In fact on certain occasions you should only speak to Him with your heart.” 
Saint Padre Pio

Finding Joy in the day, Day 199 (Year 2)

Great Fall warmth still in the air

'Think good thoughts about what is good by nature, and think well of every man.'

St. Thalassios the Libyan

Finding Joy in the day, Day 198 (Year 2)

Listening to the Packer game on the Radio is always better

'If a man has attained to that which the Apostles speaks of "to the pure, everything is pure," (Titus 1:15) he sees himself less than all creatures.'

St. Poemen

Finding Joy in the day, Day 197 (Year 2)

Low key day
Reconnecting with a  friend

'Interior locutions in these days have been a delusion of many, and exterior locutions are the least safe. It is easy enough to see when they proceed from ourselves, but to distinguish between those of a good and those of an evil spirit is more difficult. There are many rules given for finding out whether they come from our Lord or not, and one of them is, that they should be sent us in a time of need, or for some good end, as for the comforting a man under temptation or in doubt, or as a warning of coming danger. As a good man will not speak unadvisedly, neither will God;'

St. John of Avila

Finding Joy in the day, Day 196 (Year 2)

Good visit with sistas

A little cleaner in my car

'When our Lord inspires us with some good deed, He also gives the strength to do it.'

St. Margaret Mary Alacoque

Finding Joy in the day, Day 195 (Year 2)

Shopping with sister
Awesome lightning show

'Take this to heart: Owe no man anything. So shalt thou secure a peaceful sleep, an easy conscience, a life without inquietude, and a death without alarm.'

Ven. Louis de Granada

Finding Joy in the day, Day 194 (Year 2)

There are good people in this world

'When a man's intellect is constantly with God, his desire grows beyond all measure into an intense longing for God and his incensiveness is completely transformed into divine love. For by continual participation in the divine radiance his intellect becomes totally filled with light; and when it has reintegrated its passible aspect, it redirects this aspect towards God, as we have said, filling it with an incomprehensible and intense longing for Him and with unceasing love, thus drawing it entirely away from worldly things to the divine.'

St. Maximos the Confessor

Finding Joy in the day, Day 193 (Year 2)

Sunny warm weather in September

'From what Abba Serapion said, we can learn that we shall be granted the gift of true discrimination when we trust, no longer in the judgments of our own mind, but in the teaching and rule of our fathers. The devil brings the monk to the brink of destruction more effectively through persuading him to disregard the admonitions of the fathers and follow his own judgment and desire, than he does through any other fault. We should learn from examples provided by human arts and sciences. If we cannot accomplish anything in them by ourselves - in spite of the fact that they deal with things we can touch with our hands, see with our eyes and hear with our ears - but still need someone who will instruct us well and guide us, how can it be anything but foolish to think that the spiritual art, the most difficult of all the arts, has no need of a teacher? It is an invisible, hidden art which is understood only through purity of heart, and failure in it brings, not temporary loss, but the soul's destruction and eternal death.'

St. John Cassian

Finding Joy in the day, Day 192 (Year 2) Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows

Love of a compassionate mother, humble, and pure

'Christ is the Savior of the whole world, and has conferred on men the gift of repentance so that they may be saved.'

St. Thalassios the Libyan

Finding Joy in the day, Day 191 (Year 2) The Exaltation of the Holy Cross

Family support
Salvation by Christ's Sacrifice of the Holy Cross

'Modern times are dominated by Satan and will be more so in the future. The conflict with hell cannot be engaged by men, even the most clever. The Immaculata alone has from God the promise of victory over Satan. However, assumed into Heaven, the Mother of God now requires our cooperation. She seeks souls who will consecrate themselves entirely to her, who will become in her hands effective instruments for the defeat of Satan and the spreading of God's kingdom upon earth.'

St. Maximilian Kolbe

Finding Joy in the day, Day 190 (Year 2)

Safe and beautiful drive
Seeing far away family

'How is it you do not fear to touch the work of God; do you not fear the chastisement His justice prepares for you?'

St. Lydwine of Schiedam

Finding Joy in the day, Day 189 (Year 2)

Greeting an old friend

'If you have too much to do, with God's help you will find time to do it all.'

St. Peter Canisius

Finding Joy in the day, Day 188 (Year 2)

Niece time and mom time
Eve of destruction

'Be comforted with this divine thought that your spiritual and physical pains are the test of the Divine Will.'

St. Padre Pio

Finding Joy in the day, Day 187 (Year 2)

Mass with Dad
Coffee too

'Let us note how another poor man prepared himself to receive gifts from above; he cried, he shouted, he implored, he groaned with the voice of the spirit: "My heart is ready, O God, my heart is ready." [Ps. 57:7] It is as if he had said openly: I have prepared my heart, Lord, to receive the gifts of Your bounty, for I have cleansed it from all the filth of wicked thoughts, and there is nothing left in it which would refuse the gift of Your grace coming from above. I have striven to cast out what was evil in it; do You hasten in Your mercy to fill it with the gift of Your loving kindness. I have emptied my heart and am holding it ready for You; I have dug out all the stones of vice, and long with all my soul to embrace the grace of Your Holy Spirit. So you, God's poor, hold your hearts in readiness, who keep them clean of wicked thoughts.'

St. Peter Damian

Finding Joy in the day, Day 186 (Year 2)

Coffee date with bro

'The heart of the wicked swarms with sins like an anthill with ants. It is like a piece of bad meat full of worms. When we abandon ourselves to our passions, we interweave thorns around our heart. We are like moles a week old; no sooner do we see the light, than we bury ourselves in the ground. The devil amuses us till the last moment, as a poor man is kept amused while the soldiers are coming to take him. When they come, he cries and struggles in vain, for they will not release him.'

St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars

Finding Joy in the day, Day 185 (Year 2)

Good time with friend
Baby love

'Our Lady, deign to intercede for us sinners with thy Divine Lord and Son, and obtain of Him a blessing for us in our trials and tribulations.'

St. Ignatius of Loyola

Finding Joy in the day, Day 184 (Year 2)

Good friends

'They who fulfill the orders of their superiors reluctantly and unwillingly should be classed among the vilest slaves.'

St. Ignatius of Loyola

Finding Joy in the day, Day 183 (Year 2)

Friend and niece time
Clearance deal

'Every one that revolts, and persists not in the doctrine of Christ: has not God. He that persists in the doctrine: the same has both the Father, and the Son. If any man come to you, and bring not this doctrine: receive him not into the house, nor say, God save you, unto him. For he that says unto him, God save you, communicates with his wicked works.'

2 John 9-11

Finding Joy in the day, Day 182 (Year 2)

Some errands out of the way
A kind word

'If man or angel always rendered to God his due, he would never sin. . . Therefore to sin is nothing else than not to render to God his due.'

St. Anselm of Canterbury, 'Cur Deus Homo'

Finding Joy in the day, Day 181 (Year 2)

Coffee with a friend
Spending time with my niece

'Virginity is the flower of the seed of the Church, beauty and adornment of spiritual grace, a glad joy of laud and honour, work entire and incorrupt, image of God, and yet more noble as to the holiness of God and portion of the flock of Jesus Christ.'

St. Cyprian of Carthage

Finding Joy in the day, Day 180 (Year 2)

Hugs from my niece
Seeing the traveling sheepshead wagon

'Two criminals were crucified with Christ. One was saved - do not despair. One was not - do not presume.'

St. Augustine

Finding Joy in the day, Day 179 (Year 2)

Feeling clean after a shower
Not getting too hot in bed

'Truly, the more the soul is enlightened by faith and prayer, the more intimately is she united to God, and by means of this union with the Supreme Being she is enriched with all goods, and she accomplishes great things with humility and a sense of her own insufficiency. Thus she disposes herself to be all absorbed in God in contemplation, for the divine Lover draws her to Himself by means of this union.'

St. Paul of the Cross

Finding Joy in the day, Day 178 (Year 2)

Meeting dad for mass
Free cheese

'I had become by this time fond of good books, and that gave me life.

I read the Epistles of St. Jerome, which filled me with so much courage. . .'

St. Teresa of Jesus

Finding Joy in the day, Day 177 (Year 2)

Getting referrals help
Seeing my long lost family

'The intellect does many good and bad things without the body, whereas the body can do neither good nor evil without the intellect. This is because the law of freedom applies to what happens before we act.'

St. Mark the Ascetic