Peace

In your heart and soul, in your intelligence and in your will, implant a spirit of trust and abandonment to the loving Will of your heavenly Father… —From this will arise the interior peace you desire.

How can you be at peace if you allow passions you do not even attempt to control to drag you away from the “pull” of grace?

Heaven pulls you upwards; you — only you, and don’t seek excuses! — downwards… —If you go on like that you will tear yourself apart.

We have both peace and war within us.

Victory and peace cannot be attained if loyalty and resolve to win the combat are lacking.

There is a remedy for those anxieties of yours. Be patient, have rectitude of intention and look at things from a supernatural perspective.

God is with you! So cast far away from you that fear and spiritual agitation… They are reactions to avoid in the first place, for they only serve to multiply temptations and increase the danger.

Everything may collapse and fail. Events may turn out contrary to what was expected and great adversity may come. But nothing is to be gained by being perturbed. Furthermore, remember the confident prayer of the prophet: “The Lord is our judge, the Lord gives us our laws, the Lord is our king; it is he who will save us.”

—Say it devoutly every day, so that your behaviour may agree with the designs of Providence, which governs us for our own good.

If you fix your sight on God and thus know how to keep calm in the face of worries; if you can forget petty things, grudges and envies, you will save a lot of energy, which you need if you are to work effectively in the service of men.

Someone we know well told us sincerely, in confidence, that he had never been bored, for he had never been on his own, without our Friend.

—It was late in the evening, and there was a great silence… You felt very intently the presence of God… And, in the knowledge of that reality, what peace!

One day when you were travelling, a hearty greeting from a brother reminded you that the honest ways of the world are open to Christ. It is just a matter of launching out on them with the spirit of conquerors.

If God has created the world for his children, for them to live in and sanctify, what are you waiting for?

You are extraordinarily happy. Sometimes you may find out that God has been abandoned by a son of his. Then, in the midst of the peace and joy deep within you, you feel a pang of grief and a sorrow which arises from affection, but you do not allow it really to disturb or upset you.

—All right, but… make sure you use all human and supernatural resources available to help him change his mind And you must trust fully in Jesus Christ! If you do, the waters will return to their course.

As soon as you truly abandon yourself in the Lord, you will know how to be content with whatever happens. You will not lose your peace if your undertakings do not turn out the way you hoped, even if you have put everything into them, and used all the means necessary. For they will have “turned out” the way God wants them to.

Your forgetfulness and your faults are still there, and they hurt you. At the same time, you go on your way bursting with happiness.

Precisely because they cause you the pain of love, your failings no longer rob you of your peace.

When darkness surrounds us and our soul is blind and restless, we have to go to the Light, like Bartimaeus. Repeat, shout, cry out ever more strongly, Domine, ut videam! — Lord, that I may see… And daylight will dawn upon you, and you will be able to enjoy the brightness He grants you.

Fight against your harshness of character, against your selfishness, your spirit of comfort and your dislikes… We have to be co-redeemers; and, besides, consider carefully that the prize you receive will bear a very direct relation to the sowing you may have done.

The task for a Christian is to drown evil in an abundance of good. It is not a question of negative campaigns, or of being anti anything. On the contrary, we should live positively, full of optimism, with youthfulness, joy and peace. We should be understanding with everybody, with the followers of Christ and with those who abandon him, or do not know him at all.

—But understanding does not mean holding back, or remaining indifferent, but being active.

Through Christian charity and human good manners, you should make an effort not to create an unbridgeable distance between you and anybody else… You should leave a way out for others, so that they need go no further from the Truth.

Violence is not a good method for convincing anyone… Even less is it so in the apostolate.

A violent person always stands to lose, even though he may win the first battle… for he ends up isolated and hedged around by his lack of understanding.

The tactics of a tyrant towards those who could overthrow him if they were united are to make them quarrel among themselves. —It is an old ploy of the enemy, the devil and his followers, to destroy many apostolic plans.

Those… who see adversaries where there are only brothers, deny with their works the Christianity they profess.

Matters can rarely be resolved by aggressive polemics which humiliate people. And things are certainly never cleared up when among those arguing the case there is a fanatic.

I can’t understand why you are annoyed and disappointed. They paid you back in your own currency, delighting in insults by word and deeds.

Learn from the lesson and never forget from now on that the people who live with you have a heart too.

To help you keep your peace during those times of hard and unjust contradictions I used to say to you: “If they break our skulls, we shall not take it too seriously. We shall just have to put up with having them broken.”

A paradox: I have had fewer worries on my mind every day since I decided to follow the advice of the psalm: “Cast your cares upon the Lord, and he will sustain you.” And at the same time, once we have done whatever needs doing, everything can be solved more easily!

Holy Mary is the Queen of peace, and thus the Church invokes her. So when your soul or your family are troubled, or things go wrong at work, in society or between nations, cry out to her without ceasing. Call to her by this title: Regina pacis, ora pro nobis — Queen of peace, pray for us. Have you at least tried it when you have lost your calm?… —You will be surprised at its immediate effect.

References to Holy Scripture
References to Holy Scripture
References to Holy Scripture
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