IF

Are You Crazy?

Be Saints!

Make Up Your Mind

Painting by Abraham van Strij 

A Sainthood From Trifles

'The holiness of saints does not

depend on anything sensational, 

but on little things

which seem but trifles 

in the eyes of the world.'

Pope St. John XXIII

Painting: Zhuravlev

Sainthood 101

'Jesus, help me to simplify my life by learning what You want me to be and becoming that person.' 

St. Therese of Lisieux



















Painting: Gari Melchers; in US public domain due to age

God Will Make Saints of Us, If....

'Perseverance is what God wants. 
If we get up and start again after each fall, 
God will make saints of us in the end.'

Father William Doyle












Painting: William Bouguereau, 1873

Another Help Toward Sainthood

'Don't neglect your spiritual reading. Reading has made many saints.'

St. Josemaria Escriva

Painting: Albert Anker

Daily Sainthood

'Jacob did not cease to be a saint because he had to attend to his flocks.'

St. Teresa of Avila

Painting: Joseph Farquharson, in US public domain due to age

Sanctify the Moment

'Do you really want to be a saint? 

Carry out the little duty 
of each moment. 

Do what you ought 
and concentrate 
on what you are doing.'

St. Josemaria Escriva

Painting: Edgar Degas

Don't Wait...

'Don't wait until tomorrow to begin becoming a saint.'  

St. Therese of Lisieux

Painting:  Schmaltz, Portrait of young girl with red umbrella

Thank You...

It's still awards season in the blog world.  I suppose it always is, as long as someone has been kind enough to pass along such treasures as the Semper Fidelis Award.  Thank you, Anabelle at Written by the Finger of God, for nominating The Breadbox Letters for this!

But alas.  It seems this blog does not technically qualify.  Intrigued by the words 'may you never howl alone,' I checked on the award, and from what I can tell it's for Word Press blogs.  Which The Breadbox Letters is not.  However, I hope no one minds if I slip a teeny picture of the award on this teeny post, along with a teeny bit of information about ... well, about never going it alone.

Semper Fidelis is Latin for always faithful.  Wolves are used to exemplify this (here) because they have strong links with their pack.  Put simply: they need one another.

A quick look at blogs listed under 'we have mail' on my sidebar will reveal a number of bloggers whose companionship I 'need.'   There is quite a variety.  Homeschoolers, crafters, prayer-sharers, apologists, priests, cooks, poets, nuns, grandparents, painters, photographers, and a few who cause their readers to laugh out loud.  Different ages, personalities, writing styles; yes, it's a remarkable mix.  But all have the same core goal.

Sainthood.  

'The most wonderful thing about the saints, after their dissimilarity, is their similarity, which is a golden chain binding them all together.  In the Calendar of saints we find all sorts and conditions of men: all trades and professions, from the tramp to the king, from the former wanton to the virgin, from the child to the centenarian.  Some particular vice, or tendency to vice, had to be overcome by nearly all of them.  But when all is said and done, the bedrock principle underlying each life is an intense, personal love of God, showing itself outwardly in sanctity of life, and in zeal to bring souls to Him.  To get to Heaven each of us must be a saint...

'The saint is one who makes Christ his Friend, Confidant and Companion; who walks arm-in-arm with Christ through life; who makes God's opinion his opinion, God's laws his laws, God's judgments his judgments, God's will his will...

'Is this easy?  By no means.  Try it for awhile, and see what daily, hourly repression of self it implies; what stabs of self-love and self-esteem, what patience and sweetness with others.'  (from Fervorinos From the Lips of the Master, compiled by a Religious, Pelligrini, Australia, 1940, pp. 339-341)

I thank God for the faithful bloggers who help me on the path to heaven.

And I thank God for the saints who have already made it Home.  They are the ones who inspire and pray for us as we continue to stumble along. 

If I were able to accept this award, I'd pass it on to some of my friends the saints.  I would link to their stories and their writings.  So thank you, Francis de Sales, Jane de Chantal, Margaret Mary, Faustina, Teresa of Avila, Paul of the Cross, Therese of Lisieux, John of the Cross, Bernard of Clairvaux, Francis of Assisi, the writers of the Gospels (and dear Sts. Peter and Paul), and all saints of Heaven.  Thank you for your prayer, your witness, and for the writings you have left us (and we all know you're the primary writers of this blog, so this one's definitely for you).   

I've only mentioned a handful of your number, but you are our Heavenly family.  You are our 'pack.' 

Thank you that we need not walk alone.

Painting:  James Sant, A Thorn amidst the Roses 1887

Give Us A Smile

'God deliver me from sullen saints!'

St. Teresa of Avila

Painting: Dos Niñas, Pere Borrell Del Caso

Saints Anonymous

This is the day for celebrating saints most of us don't know, but ones in whose presence we will hopefully spend eternity.

Imagine the stories they could tell about their spans of time on earth!

I love that the Church sets aside today to honor these holy ones, these men and women who overcame all sorts of obstacles to give their hearts to Christ and to be forever with God.

May they pray for us today, and always. 

 
'Teach us, O Lord, and enable us to live the lives of saints...!'  (John Henry Cardinal Newman) 

Portrait of a... Saint?

I've posted several quotes here about the call we have to sainthood.  Thinking of this recently, I came across something I'd written in 1990.  I could scribble these words as easily today......

Am I called to be a saint?  Of course I am.  I am called to be with God forever in heaven - that is sainthood. Am I called to be a saint on earth?  Of course I am.  I am called to give my life to Him in heroic abandon as He enables me, and I am called to love my neighbor in perfect charity, and I am called to be holy and good and dead to self on earth.  But how easy it is to say 'I want to be a saint' when I sit in perfect comfort.

What a different story when the tiniest little thing crosses the rosy self-made path I've envisioned and the flames of sacrifice nip at my will.

What a saint I then become - grumbling on the guillotine and cursing the very instruments of sainthood.
                                                           (from The Cloistered Heart, 2008 edition, p. 13)

IF.......

"If all would only make use of 

 the ordinary duties and trials of their state 

in the way God intended,

they would all become saints."

                                   

                                                                    Sister Miriam Teresa Demjanovich

(painting Alfred Reuter Waschetrockenplatz, US public domain)

Want to be a Saint?

 "Do you really want to be a saint?  Carry out the little duty of each moment,

 do what you ought and put yourself into what you are doing"  (St. Josemaria Escriva)

(painting by Ernestine von Kirchsberg; in US public domain)