living in the middle with a need for contrition

“There are in truth three states of the converted: the beginning, the middle, and the perfection.
In the beginning, they experience the charms of sweetness; in the middle the contests of temptation;
and in the end the fullness of perfection.”
Pope St. Gregory the Great

(butterflys eating at the butterfly house at Callaway Gardens / Julie Cook)

“For want of contrition, innumerable Confessions are either sacrilegious or invalid;
the penitent so often breaks his promises to God,
and falls again so easily into the same faults,
and many souls are eternally lost.

Contrition is that true and lively sorrow which the soul has for all the sins it has committed,
with a firm determination never to commit them any more…

Many Christians spend a long time in examining their consciences,
and in making long and often unnecessary narrations to the confessor,
and then bestow little or no time upon considering the malice of their sins,
and upon bewailing and detesting them.
Christians such as these, says St. Gregory, act like a wounded man who shows his wounds to the doctor
with the utmost anxiety and care, and then will not make use of the remedies prescribed.
It is not so much thinking, nor so much speaking of your sins that will procure their pardon,
but heartfelt sorrow and detestation of them.”
Fr. Ignatius of the Side of Jesus, p. 289
An Excerpt From
The School of Jesus Crucified

Christ Crucified

“For true hearts, there is no separating ocean; or, rather, God is their ocean,
in Whom they meet and are united; they love, and lose themselves in Him and in each other.”
St. Théodore Guérin

“Jesus Christ did not think the sovereign beatitude and glory of Heaven too
dearly purchased at the price of unspeakable tortures,
and by suffering His sacred flesh to be mangled by nails, thorns, and scourges.
Great indeed must be the value of that which cost the Son of God so dear!
And yet we esteem it so little, as to be even ready to renounce our claim to it,
as, in fact, so many of us do, for the sake of some wretched pleasure or despicable interest!
Ye blind and deluded children of men, contemplate the Wounds of your
Crucified God, and see in what manner the gates of the kingdom of glory have
been opened to you!
See what it has cost Him to place you in possession of it, and understand,
if possible, how infinite a benefit was bestowed upon you by the
Son of God when He purchased for you Heaven, which you had lost by sin!…
Enter in spirit into these sacred Wounds, and you will comprehend the
value and sublimity of that eternal felicity which they have acquired for you,
and you will learn to detach your heart from the earth and from creatures,
so as to place all your affections and desires upon Heaven.”
Fr. Ignatius of the Side of Christ, p. 226-7
An Excerpt From
The School of Christ Crucified

patience under humiliation

“Act as if everything depended on you;
trust as if everything depended on God.”
St. Ignatius of Loyola

(Christ the Redeemer, Michealangelo / Santa Maria sopra Minerva / Julie Cook / 2018)

“Our Blessed Lord, bound like a thief,
is conducted through the public streets of Jerusalem accompanied by a large body of soldiers
who indulge their rage and hatred by ill-treating Him in every possible way,
and surrounded by a multitude of people who overwhelm Him with insults and maledictions,
and rejoice over His misfortunes. Jesus advances,
His feet bare, and His strength utterly exhausted by all His mental and bodily sufferings,
offering up the ignominy and tortures He is now enduring, to His Eternal Father, for the salvation of my soul.
The soldiers render His position still more painful,
by inviting people to approach and see their renowned prisoner,
while Jesus proceeds on His way in the midst of them, with a humble demeanor and with downcast eyes,
to teach us what value we should set on the esteem and honor of the world, and the applause of men.
But a few days previously Jesus had passed through these same streets,
applauded and honored by the crowd as the Messiah, and now, abandoned even by His disciples,
He is followed only by perfidious enemies who seek His death,
and unite in deriding and insulting Him as a malefactor, and the last of men.
Such is the duration of the honors and praises of the world!
Learn hence to seek the good pleasure of God alone, to labor for the acquisition of a right
to the immortal honors of Paradise, and to practice patience under humiliation,
from the example of Jesus.”
Fr. Ignatius of the Side of Jesus, p. 79-80
An Excerpt From
The School of Christ Crucified

simplicity of faith

“Christ is my Spouse.
He chose me first and His I will be.
He made my soul beautiful with the jewels of grace and virtue.
I belong to Him whom the angels serve.”
St. Agnes

(a simple cross on an old pine for a simple deditcation / Julie Cook / 2018)

“Jesus Christ did not think the sovereign beatitude and glory of Heaven too dearly
purchased at the price of unspeakable tortures, and by suffering His sacred
flesh to be mangled by nails, thorns, and scourges.
Great indeed must be the value of that which cost the Son of God so dear!
And yet we esteem it so little, as to be even ready to renounce our claim to it,
as, in fact, so many of us do, for the sake of some wretched pleasure or despicable interest!
Ye blind and deluded children of men, contemplate the Wounds of your Crucified God,
and see in what manner the gates of the kingdom of glory have been opened to you!
See what it has cost Him to place you in possession of it,
and understand, if possible, how infinite a benefit was bestowed upon you by the
Son of God when He purchased for you, Heaven, which you had lost by sin! …
Enter in spirit into these sacred Wounds,
and you will comprehend the value and sublimity of that eternal felicity which
they have acquired for you, and you will learn to detach your heart from the
earth and from creatures, so as to place all your affections and desires upon Heaven.”
Fr. Ignatius of the Side of Christ,
p. 226-7
An Excerpt From
The School of Christ Crucified