The living Spirit

Make an effort to rise from the ground. Remember the good Shepherd will search for you and rescue you … Remember the mercies of God and how he cures wounds with oil and wine. Don’t despair of salvation. The one who admits his sin won’t be rejected. The Lord doesn’t will the death of sinners, but rather that they repent and live. There’s a time for healing and correction. Have you stumbled and fallen? Then get up again. Have you sinned? Then stop. Don’t remain in the habits of sin, but leap away from them. When you’re converted and lament your sins, you’ll be saved … Be of good cheer; don’t despair. The law of God doesn’t condemn to death without pity. Instead, his mercy cancels your punishment and awaits your improvement.

St Basil
A Year with the Saints, Paul Thigpen (ed.) (St Benedict Press, 2013)


Asking in Jesus’ name means entering into him, living by him, being one with him in love and faith. If he is in us by faith, in love, in grace, in his spirit, then our petition arises from the centre of our being which is himself, and if all our petition and desire is gathered up and fused in him and his spirit, then the Father hears us. Then our petition becomes simple and straightforward, harmonious, sober and unpretentious. Then what St Paul says in the letter to the Romans applies to us: we do not know how to pray as we ought but the Spirit himself intercedes for us praying the one prayer, “Abba! Father!”

Karl Rahner SJ
in The Pink Ribbon Path: prayers, reflections and meditations for women with breast cancer by Mary Ussher (Columba Press, 2013)


Our soul can never be at peace in these worldly things, because they are all less than we are. They have been made for us, not we for them. And we have been made for God, so that we may experience his supreme eternal good. Only God, then, can satisfy us.
St Catherine of Siena (1347-80)