He loves you as though He had
no-one else to love but you alone.
You, too, should love Him alone
and all others for His Sake.
Of Him you may say and, indeed, you should say:
My Beloved to me and I to Him (Cant, 2:16).
My God has given Himself all to me
and I give myself all to Him;
He has chosen me for His beloved
and I choose Him, above all others,
for my only Love.” St Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

Jesus, my Saviour, help me!
I am resolved truly to love Thee
and to leave all, to please Thee.
Help me to free myself
from everything which hinders me
from belonging wholly to Thee,
Who has loved me so much.
By thy prayers, O Mother Mary,
which are so powerful with God,
obtain for me this grace,
to belong wholly to God.
Amen St Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

‘I scourge both flesh and spirit because I know that I have offended in both flesh and spirit.’ St. Peter Damian

‘There is more security in self-denial, mortification, and other like virtues, than in an abundance of tears.’ St Teresa of Jesus

‘I say we have been given a guide. I mean the only-begotten incarnate Word, God’s Son, who shows us how to walk along this road that is so well lighted. He says, you know “I am the way and truth and life. Whoever walks in me walks not in darkness but in light.” He is Truth, and there is no falsehood in him.

And what road has this gentlest of teachers built? He has built a road of hatred and of love.

He so hated and despised sin that he avenged it on his own body with great pain, derision, torture, and reproach, his passion and death — and not for himself (for the poison of sin was not in him) but only as a service to us, to satisfy for our sins. He gives us back the light of grace and relieves us of the darkness that had entered our soul because of sin.’ St. Catherine of Siena

‘He who wishes to find Jesus should seek Him, not in the delights and pleasures of the world, but in mortification of the senses.’ St Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

This is all that is necessary in order to become a follower of Jesus Christ; the denying of ourselves, and the mortifying of self-love. Do we desire to be saved? we must conquer all, to secure all. How wretched is the soul that allows itself to be guided by self-love!

Mortification is of two kinds; interior and exterior. By interior mortification the passions are conquered, and particularly that which prevails over us most. He who does not overcome his predominant passion is in great danger of being lost. On the contrary he who does overcome it, will easily conquer all the rest. Some nevertheless suffer themselves to be swayed by some particular vice, and yet think they are good persons, because they are not overcome by the same vices which they witness in others. “But what will this avail?” says St. Cyril, “a small chink is sufficient to sink the vessel.” It avails nought to say: “I cannot abstain from this vice” a resolute will overcomes every thing; when it relies on God’s assistance which is never wanting. St. Alphonsus Maria de Liguori

The more one mortifies his natural inclinations, the more he renders himself capable of receiving divine inspirations and of progressing in virtue.’ St. Francis de Sales

Some subordinate their progress in perfection, which consists in denying their desires and likings out of love for God, to their own tastes and whims. So strong is this inclination that even if they are commanded by obedience to do something which is to their liking, they immediately lose their desire for it, and all interest in it, because their one desire is to do their own will.

The saints did not act this way.’ St John of the Cross

‘Our body is a vessel of corruption; it is meant for death and for the worms, nothing more! And yet we devote ourselves to satisfying it, rather than to enriching our soul, which is so great that we can conceive nothing greater — no, nothing, nothing!’ St. Jean Marie Baptiste Vianney, the Cure of Ars

‘Without a doubt, one of the things which keeps us from attaining perfection is our tongue. When one has reached the point of no longer committing faults in speech, he has surely reached perfection, as was said by the Holy Spirit. The worst defect in talking is talking too much. Hence, in speech be brief and virtuous, brief and gentle, brief and simple, brief and charitable, brief and amiable.’ St Francis de Sales