With Thanksgiving right around the corner, it is the perfect time to reflect on all the wonderful gifts we have been blessed with. Gratitude is important to practice all year long, but the holiday season especially can easily lose its richness if we give into the materialism of the world and forget to give thanks for all God has given us.
A man who truly lived in a spirit of gratitude each and every day was St. Josemaria Escrivá. His life’s work was built upon the idea that small moments and daily tasks are all opportunities to glorify God. Even the most ordinary people, in his eyes, could be extraordinary in their love, service, and care for their fellow man. We hope that his words can inspire you this Thanksgiving to embrace gratitude, hope, and love in this holiday season!
Seven quotes from St. Josemaria to lead you toward gratitude:
- “Make it a habit to raise your heart to God, in acts of thanksgiving, many times a day. Because He gives you this and that… Because someone has despised you… Because you don’t have what you need, or because you do have it. And because He made His Mother, who is also your Mother, so beautiful. Because He created the sun and the moon and this animal or that plant. Because He made that man eloquent and you He left slow of speech… Thank Him for everything, because everything is good.”
- “Brief indeed is our time for loving, for giving, for making atonement. It would be very wrong, therefore, for us to waste it, or to cast this treasure irresponsibly overboard. We mustn't squander this period of the world's history which God has entrusted to each one of us.
- “Do everything for Love. Thus there will be no little things: everything will be big. Perseverance in little things for Love is heroism.”
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When you and I put the same zeal into the affairs of our souls, then we’ll have a living and working faith. And there will be no obstacle that we cannot overcome in our apostolic works.”
- “Be filled with hope: Jesus Christ is always victorious.”
- If you have done something wrong, be it big or small, go running back to God! —Savour those words of the psalm, cor contritum et humiliatum, Deus, non despicies — the Lord will never spurn or disregard a contrite and humbled heart.
- “Be grateful to your parents for bringing you into this world, thus enabling you to become a child of God. And be all the more grateful if it was they who placed in your soul the first seeds of faith and piety, of your Christian way, or of your vocation.”
We hope you can grow in gratitude with the help of St. Josemaria’s powerful words. For more from St. Josemaria, check out our St. Josemaria Escriva Collection!
