Changed for the Better

From Gregory of Nyssa:

"The Divine Word doesn't want us to be slaves of anything; our nature has been changed for the better. He has taken everyuthing that was ours with the agreement that He will give what is His to us in return. Justr as He took diseasse, death, condemnation, and sin, He also took our bondage.

There won't be disease, condemnation, sin, or death in the life that we hope for. Anbd bondage will also vanish. The Truth Himself testifies to this. Let all now, as never before, look up at the truth and see that He who owns allt he Father's things is Lord of all and isn't a servant."

Jesus' sepulchre

From Pascal's Pensees #560:

"Jesus was dead but seen on the cross. He was dead and hidden in the sepulchre.
Jesus was buried only by saints.
Jesus peformed nio miracles in the sepulchre.
Only saints went into it.
It was there that Jesus took on a new life, not on the cross.
This is the supreme mystery of the Passion and Redemption.
Jesus teaches alive, dead, buried, risen again.
Jesus had nowhere on earth to rest except in the sepulchre.
His enemies only ceased tormenting him in the sepulchre.

Sufficient

From Thomas a Kempis:

"Give, therefore, place to Christ and refuse entrance to all others. When thou hast Christ, thou art rich, and hast sufficient. He shall be thy provider and faithful watchman in all things, so that thou hast no need to trust in men, for men soon change and swiftly pass away, but Christ remaineth for ever standeth by us firmly even to the end."

Earthly & Divine Wisdom

from Clement of Alexandria:

"The Savior teaches nothing in a merely human way, but teaches His own with Divine wisdom. Therefore, we must not listen to His words with worldly ears. We must search out and lern the meaning hidden in them. For what the Lord seems to have simplified for the disciples requires even more attention than puzzling statements because of its overabundance of wisdom. In addition, the things He explained to His children require even more consideration than the things which seem to have been simply stated."

Sin & Forgiveness

From St. Augustine:

"For if He who neither has, nor had, nor will have any sin, prays for our sins, how much more ought we to pray for one another's in return! And if He forgives us, whom we have nothing to forgive, how much more ought we, who are unable to live here without sin, to forgive one another!"

From the (late) Internet Monk

"Gospel honesty. That's what Jesus gives us. The Good News that we aren't good enough to be Christians. The truth is that we are so messed up that we have no other choice but to be Christians." -- Michael Spencer, Mere Churchianity

Pascal on Adam & Jesus

Pensees # 590:

"Six days to create one, six ages to create the other. The six days which Moses represents for the creation of Adam are only an image of the six ages for creating Christ and the Church. If Adam had not sinned and Christ had not come, there would have been only one covenant and one age of man, and creation would have been represented as accomplished at a single moment."

From the (late) Internet Monk

"Religion is our negotiation with God to try to get his help in exchange for our good behavior. We promise to do what we're told, and we expect God to reward us. This is a straightforward business arrangement, and we fully expect it to work. Meanwhile, we talk about being God's child as if we're family. But in our performance-for-reward arrangement, things don't operate on grace. Under the rules of religion, God is kept at arms length and expected to be involved only to the degree that he gives us what we think we deserve." -- Michael Spencer, Mere Churchianity

Invitation to Contemplation

"Let us take Jesus at his word and we will be contemplatives at the heart of the world, because if we have faith then we are his permanent presence. In contemplation the soul draws directly from God's heart the graces that the active life has been entrusted to distribute. Our very existence is to be intimately bound to the living Christ within us. If we do not live in God's presence, we cannot keep going ... Our lives and our contemplation are one. It's not a question of doing but of being. In fact it is about the complete happiness of our spirit through the Holy Spirit who breathes God's fullness into us and send us into all creation as his own, personal message of love." -- Mother Teresa

disguise, falsehood & hypocrisy

The conclusion of Pascal's Pensees #978:

"Man is therefore nothing by disguise, falsehood, & hypocrisy, both in himself and with regard to others. He does not want to be told the truth. He avoids telling it to others, and all those tendencies, so remote from justice and reason, are naturally rooted in his heart."