The Way Escriva Quotes & Sayings

You're bored? That's because you keep your senses awake and your soul asleep. — Josemaria Escriva

290 To reform. Every day a little. This has to be your constant task if you really want to become a saint. — Josemaria Escriva

You always leave the Rosary for later, and you end up not saying it at all because you are sleepy. If there is no other time, say it in the street without letting anybody notice it. It will, moreover, help you to have presence of God. — Josemaria Escriva

A man who fails to love the Mass fails to love Christ. We must make an effort to 'live' the Mass with calm and serenity, with devotion and affection. — Josemaria Escriva

There is need for a crusade of manliness and purity to counteract and nullify the savage work of those who think man is a beast. And that crusade is your work. — Josemaria Escriva

The heroic minute.- It is the time fixed for getting up.- Without hesitation: a supernatural reflection and.-.-.- up! The heroic minute: here you have a mortification that strengthens your will and does no harm to your body. — Josemaria Escriva

Christian optimism is not a sugary optimism, nor is it a mere human confidence that everything will turn out all right. It is an optimism that sinks its roots into an awareness of our freedom, and the sure knowledge of the power of grace. It is an optimism that leads us to make demands on ourselves, to struggle to respond at every moment to God's call. — Josemaria Escriva

If you say the Holy Rosary every day, with a spirit of faith and love, our Lady will make sure she leads you very far along her Son's path. — Josemaria Escriva

He has much who needs least. Do not create necessities for yourself. — Josemaria Escriva

To begin is easy; to persevere is sanctity.- Let your perseverance not be a blind consequence of the first impulse, the work of inertia: let it be a reflective perseverance. — Josemaria Escriva

If I love, there will be no hell for me. — Josemaria Escriva

You must realise now, more clearly than ever, that God is calling you to serve Him in and from the ordinary, secular and civil activities of human life. He waits for us everyday, in the laboratory, in the operating theatre, in the army barracks, in the university chair, in the factory, in the workshop, in the fileds, in the home and in all the immense panorama of work. — Josemaria Escriva

Faith, joy, optimism. But not the folly of closing your eyes to reality. — Josemaria Escriva

Turn to Mary, tota pulchra, all pure and wonderful, and tell her: Our Lady and Mother, the Lord wanted you yourself to look after God and tend him with your own hands. Teach me, teach us all, how to treat your Son! — Josemaria Escriva

I find my pleasure in doing thy will, my God, and thy law dwells deep within my heart. — Josemaria Escriva

Our Lady listens attentively to what God wants, ponders what she doesn't fully understand and asks about what she doesn't know. Then she gives herself completely to doing the divine will. — Josemaria Escriva

For those who use their intelligence and their study as a weapon, the Rosary is most effective. Because that apparently monotonous way of beseeching Our Lady as children do their Mother, can destroy every seed of vainglory and pride. — Josemaria Escriva

You strayed from the way and did not return because you were ashamed. It would be more logical if you were ashamed not to return. — Josemaria Escriva

You need a heart which is in love, not an easy life, to achieve happiness. — Josemaria Escriva

It's true he was a sinner. But don't pass so final a judgement. Have pity in your heart and don't forget that he may yet be an Augustine, while you remain just another mediocrity. — Josemaria Escriva

When you decide firmly to lead a clean life, chastity will not be a burden on you: it will be a crown of triumph. — Josemaria Escriva

Is it not true that your gloominess and bad temper are due to your lack of determination in breaking the subtle snares laid by your own disordered desires? The daily examination of conscience is an indispensible help if we are to follow our Lord with sincerity of heart and integrity of life. — Josemaria Escriva

An hour of study, for the modern apostle, is an hour of prayer. — Josemaria Escriva

To defend his purity, Saint Francis of Assisi rolled in the snow, Saint Benedict threw himself into a thorn bush, and Saint Bernard plunged into an icy pond ... You - what have you done? — Josemaria Escriva

You go to pray; to become a bonfire, a living flame, giving light and heat. — Josemaria Escriva

I assure you, my children, that when a Christian carries out with love the most insignificant everyday action, that action overflows with the transcendence of God. That is why I have told you so often, and hammered away at it, that the Christian vocation consists in making heroic verse out of the prose of each day. Heaven and earth seem to merge, my children, on the horizon. But where they really meet is in your hearts, when you sanctify your everyday lives ... — Josemaria Escriva

Don't judge without having heard both sides. Even persons who think themselves virtuous very easily forget this elementary rule of prudence. — Josemaria Escriva

Many Christians take their time and have leisure enough in their social life (no hurry here). They are leisurely, too, in their professionally activities, at table and recreation (no hurry here either). But isn't it strange how those same Christians find themselves in such a rush and want to hurry the priest, in their anxiety to shorten the time devoted to the most holy sacrifice of the altar? — Josemaria Escriva

What conversations! What vulgarity and what dirt! And you have to associate with them, in the office, in the university, in the operating-theatre ... , in the world.
Ask them if they wouldn't mind stopping, and they laugh at you. Look annoyed, and they get worse. Leave them, and they continue.
This is the solution: first pray for them, and offer up some sacrifice; then face them like a man and make use of the 'strong language apostolate'. - The next time we meet I'll tell you - in a whisper - a few useful words. — Josemaria Escriva

If you don't have a plan of life, you'll never have order. — Josemaria Escriva

Compromise is a word found only in the vocabulary of those who have no will to fight. — Josemaria Escriva

The enemy: Will you obey ... even in this 'ridiculous' little detail? You, with God's grace: I will obey ... even in this 'heroic' little detail. — Josemaria Escriva

When you see the storm coming, if you seek safety in that firm refuge which is Mary, there will be no danger of your wavering or going down. — Josemaria Escriva

Don't say, "That person bothers me." Think: "That person sanctifies me". — Josemaria Escriva