We don’t love our parents because they belong to us; we love them because we belong to them. It is thus that we love and desire God: not that He may become our good, but because He is our good; not that He may become ours but because we are His. It is not as though He exists for us: we exist for Him.
–Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622)
For it does not require much time to make us saints; it requires only much love.
–Fulton Sheen (1895-1979)
Some torment themselves in seeking means to discover the art of loving God, and do not know – poor creatures – that there is no art or means of loving Him but to love those who love Him – that is, to begin to practice those thing which are pleasing to Him.
–Saint Francis de Sales (1567-1622)
When men have harnessed the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, they will harness for God the energies of love, and then for the second time in the history of this world, man will have discovered fire.
–Pierre Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955)
I was answered in spiritual understanding, and it was said: What, do you wish to know your Lord’s meaning in this thing? Know it well, love was his meaning. Who reveals it to you? Love. What did he reveal you? Love. Why does he reveal it to you? For Love…. So I was taught that love is our Lord’s meaning.
–Saint Julian of Norwich (1342-1416)
One outcome of deep love of our Lord is a perfect charity toward our neighbor, which grows as our love for God increases, making its possessor as much at one with his brothers and sisters, as if they were members of the same body.
–Saint John of Avila (1500-1569)
