Self-Conquest

#selfconquest
The conquest of self is the grandest triumph that man can achieve.

Once a day, at least, recall very earnestly that

“You are the temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwelleth in you.”

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Ꚛ Seventh Day of August

St. Teresa

Many lives of this Saint have been published: but the best is her Autobiography written with charming candor, and, from the literary point of view, a Spanish classic. Teresa, daughter of Alphonsus Sanchez de Cepeda, was born at Avail, in 1515, and passed away at Alba de Tormes, in 1582. Her life-work was the Reform of the Carmelite Order, which she had entered in her youth. Without help and often misunderstood or set aside as a visionary, she herself founded thirty-two convents. Her Reform spread all over the world, and flourishes to the present day. Though all her long life and indefatigably active toiler, St. Teresa was in the main a contemplative, favored with the grace of high prayer and enriched with extraordinary supernatural gifts. The works on Mystical Prayer she has left us continue to be text-books on the subject.

“It is said," wrote St. Teresa of St. Peter of Alcantara, “that man’s health has grown feebler, and that we are not now as in the former times. But his holy man lived in our day: he had a spirit strong as those of another age, and so he trampled on the world. If men do not go about barefoot, nor undergo sharp penances, as he did, there are many ways of trampling on the world: and Our Lord teaches them when He finds the necessary courage.”

O blessed penance, which has merited so great a reward. –St. Peter in glory to St. Teresa.

The constant though of purgatory will help us, not only to escape its dreadful pains, but also to avoid the least imperfection which hinders our approach to God.

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Ask yourself: how does this matter affect me personally, what lesson does it convey to me, what suggestion for a better life, how can I improve my conduct; resolve to become a saint at any cost; think upon the eternal years; pray to the Holy Ghost that He may lead you in the way of perfection; finally recite attentively and devotedly the following Act of Consecration to the Holy Spirit:

Oh Holy Spirit, divine Spirit of light and love, I consecrate to Thee my understanding, heart, and will, my whole being for time and for eternity. May my understanding be always submissive to Thy heavenly inspirations, and to the teaching of the Church, of which Thou art the infallible guide; may my heart be ever inflamed with love of God and of my neighbor; may my will be ever conformed to the divine will, and may my whole life be a faithful imitation of the life and virtue of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, to Whom with the Father and Thee be honor and glory forever. Amen.

Self-Conquest. Rev. F. X. Lasance. 1936. @selfconquest