Today is the feast day of St. Paisus Velichkovsky, whose story you can read on the website of the monastery founded in his honor, St. Paisius Monastery, where I went on pilgrimage two years ago: “The Life and Mission of St. Paisius Velichkovsky.”

A quote from the saint for contemplation:

“One must clean the royal house from every impurity and adorn it with every beauty, then the king may enter into it. In a similar way one must first cleanse the earth of the heart and uproot the weeds of sin and the passionate deeds, and soften it with sorrows and the narrow way of life, sow in it the seed of virtue, water it with lamentation and tears, and only then does the fruit of dispassion and eternal life grow. For the Holy Spirit does not dwell in a man until he has been cleansed from passions of the soul and body.”

+ St. Paisius Velichkovsky, “Field Flowers”