"Because this conception of history allows room for human freedom to choose evil — and, what is more, for the Evil One as a demonic power in history — divisiveness, failure, irreconcilable discord and even catastrophe cannot, on principle, be excluded from history, not even from its average course. Nevertheless, this is not the last word in the apocalyptic prophecy. Its last word, its decisive statement, is in spite of everything: a happy ending infinitely exceeding all expectations; triumph over evil; conquest of death; quenching of thirst from the wellspring of life; resurrection; drying of all tears; the presence of God among men; New Heaven and New Earth."
— Josef Pieper
Source: Hope and History (Eng. trans. 1969), ch. V "The Great Banquet", p. 85
Suffering, hope, darkness
Views: 505
"Live like those that have a God, and then be disconsolate if you can: if there be not more in an infinite God to comfort you, than in a prison, or poverty, or affliction to deject you, our preaching is vain, and your faith is vain."
— Joseph Alleine
Source: Christian Letters, Letter V, from the common gaol at Ilchester, 1663
Suffering, Holy Spirit
Views: 495
"If God causes you to suffer much, it is a sign that He has great designs for you, and that He certainly intends to make you a saint."
— Ignatius of Loyola
Source: Attributed to Ignatius of Loyola (not in the Spiritual Exercises; original source unconfirmed)
Suffering, Design, Saints
Views: 457
"The operations of the Holy Spirit, like all the acts of Deity, are regulated by infinite wisdom and sovereignty. They sometimes "wait not for men, nor tarry for the sons of men." And it often happens that, while the servants of God are cast down, and ready to faint, through the want of success, he is then secretly working in the hearts of some persons whom they least expected to feel, and in places where the greatest blindness and obstinacy may have been manifested."
— William Milne
Source: A Retrospect of the First Ten Years of the Protestant Mission to China (1820), Appendix
Suffering, disease, truth
Views: 404
"In short, the ruin is almost entire, the work of forty years is nearly annihilated; the courage of missionaries, nevertheless, is not on the wane; we shall begin over again, assured of success in the end, for “the blood of martyrs is the seed of Christians;” unless God design to punish unhappy China, that has abused His grace for centuries. Let us hope that He will grant pardon, so many persons, even among the mandarins, are innocent of the atrocities committed. We love, and will ever love, our poor people of China; pray for them and for us."
— Alphonse Favier
Source: Letter of Bishop Alphonse Favier accompanying his siege journal (1900), in The Heart of Pekin: Bishop A. Favier's Diary of the Siege, May–August, 1900, ed. Jos. Freri (Boston: Marlier & Co., 1901), pp. 16–17
Suffering, hatred, rebirth, Christ, forgiveness, reconciliation
Views: 285
"The Italian Jesuit Giulio Aleni (1582-1649) was sent to China in 1610 and, while waiting at Macau to enter the country, taught mathematics there. Adopting the dress and manners of the Chinese scholar class, he became the first Christian missionary in Jiangxi and built several churches in Fujian. His works in Chinese include the world atlas Zhifang Waiji and a life of Christ drawn from the four Gospels (Peking, 1635-1637, 8 volumes). His convert Li Jiubiao recorded the answers of Aleni and his fellow Jesuit Andrius Rudamina to the questions of their parishioners and compiled them into the journal Kouduo Richao. He died at Yanping, Fujian, in 1649."
— Wikipedia
Source: Wikipedia, "Giulio Aleni" (from the Catholic Encyclopedia, 1913)
Suffering, disease, God, healing, soul, pride, cross
Views: 284