The Wisdom of the Saints

A year ago I stole an idea from Fr. John Cameron and the Magnificat daily prayer companion to take the Litany of the Saints and collect favorite sayings of each individual. Since then, my collection has grown steadily and proved to be a repository of holy counsel worth returning to frequently.

For the Solemnity of All Saints and the month of November, I decided to share some selections that I will be reflecting on over the next few weeks. It can be prayed like the Litany in its entirety, but I usually prefer to select one or a few quotes to reflect on and appropriate more deeply.


Holy Mary, Mother of God: “Do whatever he tells you."

Saint Gabriel: “With God nothing is impossible."

Saint Michael: “Who is like God?”

Saint Raphael: "It is good to praise God and to exalt his name, worthily declaring the works of God."

Saint John the Baptist: “Bear fruit in keeping with repentance."

Saint Joseph: [pause in reverent silence]

Saint Peter: "Rejoice inasmuch as you participate in Christ's sufferings, so you may rejoice when his glory is revealed.”

Saint Paul: “I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory that is to be revealed to us.”

Saint James: “Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance."

(+ 99) Saint Clement of Rome: “You have searched the scriptures, which are true, which were given through the Holy Spirit; and you know that nothing unrighteous or counterfeit is written in them.”

(+107) Saint Ignatius of Antioch: "I prefer death in Christ Jesus to power over the farthest limits of the earth. He who died in place of us is the one object of my quest. He who rose for our sakes is my one desire." 

(+165) Saint Justin Martyr: “The greatest grace God can give someone is to send him a trial he cannot bear with his own powers – and then sustain him with his grace so he may endure to the end and be saved.”

(+ 180) Saint Cecilia: “To die for Christ is not to sacrifice one’s youth but to renew it. Jesus Christ returns a hundredfold all offered him, and adds to it eternal life.”

(+ 202) Saint Irenaeus of Lyons: “The Glory of God is man fully alive.”

(+ 216) Saint Clement of Alexandria: “’Eat my flesh, and drink my blood.’ The Lord supplies us with these intimate nutrients, he delivers over his flesh and pours out his blood, and nothing is lacking for the growth of his children." 

(+ 298) Saint Athanasius: “Devils take great delight in fullness, and drunkeness, and bodily comfort. Fasting possesses great power and it works glorious things. To fast is to banquet with angels.”

(+ 304) Saint Agnes of Rome: “Christ made my soul beautiful with the jewels of grace and virtue. I belong to Him whom the angels serve.”

(+ 304) Saint Lucy of Syracuse: “No one's body is polluted so as to endanger the soul if it has not pleased the mind."

(+ 356) Saint Anthony the Great: "Do not trust in your own righteousness, do not worry about the past, but control your tongue and your stomach. Some have afflicted their bodies by asceticism, but they lack discernment, and so they are far from God."

(+ 368) St. Hilary of Poitiers: “There is no space where God is not; space does not exist apart from Him. He is in heaven, in hell, beyond the seas; dwelling in all things and enveloping all. Thus He embraces, and is embraced by, the universe, confined to no part of it but pervading all.”

(+ 373) Saint Ephrem the Syrian: “O Jesus, in that hour when darkness like a cloak shall be spread over all things, may your grace shine on us in place of the earthly sun.”

(+ 379) Saint Basil the Great: “Silence is the beginning of purifying the soul.”

(+ 386) Saint Cyril of Jerusalem: “This synthesis of faith was not made to accord with human opinions, but rather what was of the greatest importance was gathered from all the Scriptures, to present the one teaching of the faith in its entirety.”

(+ 390) Saint Gregory Nazianzen: "Give something, however small, to the one in need. For it is not small to one who has nothing. Neither is it small to God, if we have given what we could." 

(+ 395) Saint Gregory of Nyssa: "Whatever name we may adopt to signify the perfume of divinity, it is not the perfume itself which we signify by our expressions; rather, we reveal just the slightest trace of the divine odor by means of our theological terms."

(+ 397) Saint Ambrose: “Every soul who has believed both conceives and generates the Word of God and recognizes his works. Let the soul of Mary be in each one of you to magnify the Lord.”

(+ 407) Saint John Chrysostom: “Jesus Christ gave you all; he left nothing for himself.”

(+ 420) Saint Jerome: “May your actions never be unworthy of your words, may it not happen that, when you preach in church, someone might say to himself: ‘Why does he therefore not act like this?’ How could a teacher, on a full stomach, discuss fasting; even a thief can blame avarice; but in the priest of Christ the mind and words must harmonize.”

(+ 430) Saint Augustine: “We have been promised something we do not yet possess. It is good for us to persevere in longing until we receive what was promised, and yearning is over.”

(+ 444) Saint Cyril of Alexandria: “If you feel scorched by the fever of impurity, go to the banquet of the Angels; and the spotless Flesh of Christ will make you pure and chaste.”

(+ 445) Saint Arsenius the Great: “I have often been sorry for having spoken, but never for holding my tongue.”

(+ 450) Saint Peter Chrysologus: “Peace is the plenitude that fulfills our desires. As Christ left the world, he wished to leave the gift he wanted to find when he returned.”

(+ 461) Saint Leo the Great: “Let us be raised to the one who made the dust of our lowliness into the body of his glory.”

(+ c. 493) Saint Patrick: “I arise today through the strength of Christ with his baptism, through the strength of his crucifixion with his burial, through the strength of his Resurrection with his Ascension.”

(+ 523) Saint Brigid of Kildare: "I would like myself to be a rent payer to the Lord; that I should suffer distress, that he would bestow a good blessing upon me. I would like a great lake of beer for the King of Kings. I would like to be watching Heaven's family drinking it through all eternity."

(+ 547) Saint Benedict: “It is only we who brood over our sins. God does not brood over them, God dumps them at the bottom of the sea.”

(+ 604) Saint Gregory the Great: “We have been truly set free from subjection to sin because we are united to him who is truly free.”

(+ 615) Saint Columban: “The more the soul loves, the more it desires to love, and the greater its suffering, the greater its healing.”

(+ 636) Saint Isidore of Seville: “Confession heals, confession justifies, confession grants pardon of sin, all hope consists in confession; in confession there is a chance for mercy. “

(+649) Saint John Climacus: “Even though one is well advanced in virtue, should he stop mortifying himself, he soon would lose his modesty and virtue - just as fertile soul quickly becomes dry and arid and produces nothing but thorns and thistles if it is not cultivated.”

(+ 662) Saint Maximus the Confessor: “God made us so that we might become partakers of the divine nature and sharers in eternity, and so that we might come to be like him through deification by grace.”

(+ 700) Saint Isaac the Syrian: “This life has been given to you for repentance; do not waste it in vain pursuits.”

(+ 1101) Saint Bruno of Cologne: "No act is charitable if it is not just." 

(+ 1109) Saint Anselm: “God who made all things made himself of Mary, and thus he refashioned everything he had made.”

(+ 1153) Saint Bernard of Clairvaux: “We are to love God for Himself, because of a twofold reason; nothing is more reasonable, nothing more profitable." 

(+ 1179) Saint Hildegard of Bingen: “God has arranged all things in the world in consideration of everything else.”

(+ 1221) Saint Dominic: “I shall be more useful to you after my death and I shall help you more effectively than during my life.”

(+ 1226) Saint Francis of Assisi: “May I feel in my heart, as far as possible, that abundance of love with which you, Son of God, are inflamed.”

(+ 1231) Saint Anthony of Padua: “Consider every day that you are then for the first time beginning; and always act with the same fervor as on the first day you began.”

(+ 1250) Saint Albert the Great: “He who enters into the secret place of his own soul passes beyond himself, and does in very truth ascend to God.”

(+ 1253) Saint Clare: “Live and hope in the Lord, and let your service be according to reason.”

(+ 1274) Saint Thomas Aquinas: “The life of man consists in the love that principally sustains him and in which he finds his greatest satisfaction.”

(+ 1302) Saint Gertrude the Great: “Once again I give you thanks for your merciful love, kindest Lord, for having found another way of rousing me from my inertia.”

(+ 1274) Saint Bonaventure: “God created all things not to increase his glory, but to show it forth and communicate it.”

(+ 1380) Saint Catherine of Siena: “When we love something we don’t care what sort of abuse or injury or pain we might have to go through to get it; we are concerned only with satisfying our desire for the thing we love.”

(+ 1419) Saint Vincent Ferrer: “In time of temptation continue the good you have begun before temptation.”

(+ 1444) Saint Bernardine of Siena: “If we but recollect the name of Jesus, it is to fight with confidence—for this name subjects all the fury of our enemies to us.”

(+ 1510) Saint Catherine of Genoa: “God lets the soul share his goodness so that it becomes one with him. The nearer the soul comes to him, the more it partakes of what is his.”

(+ 1535) Saint Thomas More: "Tribulation is a gift from God - one that he especially gives His special friends." 

(+ 1540) Saint Angela Merici: “Strengthen, O Lord, my senses and my affections, that they may not stray into betrayal of trust.”

(+ 1552) Saint Francis Xavier: “God our Lord knows the intentions which he in his mercy has wished to place in us, and the great hope and confidence which he in his goodness has wished that we should have in him.”

(+ 1556) Saint Ignatius of Loyola: “As long as obedience is flourishing, all the other virtues will be seen to flourish and bear fruit.”

(+ 1562) Saint Peter of Alcantara: “Truly, matters in the world are in a bad state; but if you and I begin in earnest to reform ourselves, a really good beginning will have been made.”

(+ 1582) Saint Teresa of Jesus: "From silly devotions and sour-faced saints, good Lord, deliver us!" 

(+ 1584) Saint Charles Borromeo: “The candle that gives light to others must itself be consumed. Thus we also have to act. We ourselves are consumed to give a good example to others.”

(+ 1591) Saint John of the Cross: “In giving us His Son, His only Word, He spoke everything to us at once in this sole Word -- and He has no more to say...because what he spoke before to the prophets in parts, he has now spoken all at once by giving us the All Who is His Son.”

(+ 1591) Saint Aloysius Gonzaga: “As God is above all created things, honors, possessions, so should our internal esteem of his Divine Majesty surpass our esteem or idea of anything whatever.”

(+ 1595) Saint Philip Neri: "A joyful heart is more easily made perfect than a downcast one."

(+ 1595) Saint Robert Southwell: “Jesus, possess my mind with your presence and ravish it with your love, that my delight may be to be embraced in the arms of your protection.”

(+ 1607) Saint Mary Magdalene di Pazzi: “A little drop of simple obedience is worth a million times more than a whole vase of the choicest contemplation.”

(+1617) Saint Rose of Lima: "Apart from the cross, there is no other ladder by which we may get to heaven." 

(+ 1621) Saint Robert Bellarmine: "Charity is that with which no man is lost, and without which no man is saved." 

(+ 1622) Saint Francis de Sales: “The more one mortifies his natural inclinations, the more he renders himself capable of receiving divine inspirations and of progressing in virtue.”

(+ 1646) Saint Isaac Jogues: “My hope is in God, who needs not us to accomplish his designs. We must endeavor to be faithful to him.”

(+ 1654) Saint Peter Claver: “Man’s salvation and perfection consists in doing the will of God, which he must have in view in all things, and at every moment of his life.”

(+ 1660) Saint Vincent de Paul: “He who gives little import to exterior mortifications, claiming that interior mortifications are more perfect, clearly shows that he is not mortified at all, exteriorly nor interiorly.”

(+ 1682) Saint Claude de la Columbiere: “My Jesus, let me live in your heart and pour all my bitterness into it, where it will be utterly consumed.”

(+ 1690) Saint Margaret Mary Alacoque: “All my pleasure in this land of exile is that of having every kind of suffering found on the cross, deprived of every other consolation except that of the Sacred Heart.”

(+ 1716) Saint Louis de Montfort: “He who fights even the smallest distractions faithfully, when he says even the smallest prayer, will also be faithful in great things.”

(+ 1719) Saint Jean Baptiste de La Salle: “Never speak to anyone except with kindness.”

(+ 1775) Saint Paul of the Cross: “It is an excellent and holy practice to call to mind and meditate on our Lord's Passion, since it is by this path that we shall arrive at union with God. In this, the holiest of all schools, true wisdom is learned, for it was there that all the saints became wise.”

(+ 1787) Saint Alphonsus di Liguori: “We must love God in the way that pleases him, and not just in a way that suits ourselves. God wishes people to empty themselves of everything and to be filled with his divine love.”

(+ 1820) Saint Clement Hofbauer: “Something can be done everywhere for the glory of God.”

(+ 1821) Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton: “O Jesus, sure joy of my soul, give me but a true love of you. Let me seek you as my only good.”

(+ 1859) Saint Jean-Baptiste-Marie Vianney: "We will either accuse ourselves or excuse ourselves." 

(+ 1860) Saint John Neumann: “Though God hates sin more than any other thing, he loves us poor miserable sinners. He ardently desires the welfare of our souls as if his own happiness depended on it.”

(+ 1868) Saint Peter Julian Eymard: “Abide in the home of the divine and fatherly goodness of God like his child who knows nothing, does nothing, makes a mess of everything, but nevertheless lives in his goodness.”

(+ 1870) Saint Anthony Marie Claret: “Our Lord has created persons for all states in life, and in all of them we see people who achieved sanctity by fulfilling their obligations well.”

(+ 1876) Saint Catherine Labouré: “I knew nothing; I was nothing. For this reason God chose me.”

(+ 1889) Saint Damien de Veuster of Moloka’i: “In the face of the too real dangers that surround me I repeat: ‘Lord, I have placed all my hope in you. I will never be confounded.”

(+ 1897) Saint Therese of Lisieux: “Miss no single opportunity of making some small sacrifice, here by a smiling look, there by a kindly word; always doing the smallest right and doing it all for love.” 

(+ 1898) Saint Charbel Makhloof: “Just as one person's sins affect all, so a person's holiness becomes like a light for others.” 

(+ 1914) Saint Pius X: "Holy Communion is the shortest and safest way to heaven."

(+ 1917) Saint Francis Xavier Cabrini: “Stretch every fiber of my being, dear Lord, that I may more easily fly towards you. May your Spirit, which once breathed over the chaos of the earth, give life to all the powers of my soul.”

(+ 1920) Saint Teresa of the Andes: “True friendship consists in mutually perfecting one another and drawing closer to God.”

(+ 1928) Saint Toribio Romo: "Christ said, 'I am the Truth'; he did not say 'I am the custom.'" 

(+ 1938) Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska: “Jesus, I trust in you.”

(+ 1941) Saint Maximilian Kolbe: “Shall the urge for complete and total happiness, inherent to human nature, be the only need to remain unfulfilled and unsatisfied? No, even this longing can be fulfilled by the infinite and eternal God.”

(+ 1942) Saint Teresa Benedicta of the Cross: “Holy realism has a certain affinity with the realism of the child who receives and responds to the impressions with unimpaired vigor and vitality, and with uninhibited simplicity.”

(+ 1968) Saint Pius of Pietrelcina: "Our Lord loves you and loves you tenderly; and if He does not let you feel the sweetness of His love, it is to make you more humble and abject in your own eyes."  

(+ 2005) St. John Paul II: "Do not be afraid. Open wide the doors to Christ."