Cloister Quotes

“Not celibate are they who wear monastic garb and shut themselves away behind thick walls and massive iron gates, But
celibate are they whose hearts and minds are celibate, whether they be in cloisters or in the public marts.”
― Mikhail Naimy, The Book of Mirdad: The Strange Story of a Monastery Which Was Once Called The Ark

“(Mother Teresa) said one must have great love to take up her cross every day and follow in faith her Beloved Jesus. Only such love can make the life possible. Attraction for the religious life is not sufficient. Any girl who comes “to seek peace” is to be carefully and seriously tested, as is one who “loves solitude”. Aptitude also was rated far below the supreme test of love and determination to strive for perfection. Aptitude, or general fitness for the life, is absolutely necessary, but aptitude without a personal love of Our Lord is not sufficient. … And she always added that a person who chooses marriage is not by any means barred from the life of Christian perfection, for there are many saints in the kitchens, factories and offices of the world. Not all the contemplatives are found in the cloister; among the priests and nuns engaged in the active apostolate, there are contemplatives and there are contemplatives in the world.”
― Mother Catherine Thomas of Divine Providence, My Beloved: The Story of a Carmelite Nun

“Every year that I live here it is as though another of my personalities is left behind, like a variation in a Passacaglia, leaving me nearer the first and last plain theme. It is not only that as one grows older the passions and vanities fade, nor that the pressure of the present day obliges one to live an ever simpler life, to make and to do with one's own hands whatever is necessary, to be forever saying goodbye to civilization. It is rather that civilization has turned to shoddy, plastic and sham, has become a cage with bars of cliché, so that one must get out. Here on my island the years have opened like a rose in the sun, the fury of standardization has missed one little byway, and events have remained in their real dimension as reactions of the human heart, limitless, yet dependent on its fleeting pulse.”
― Lucy M. Boston, Yew Hall

“A silence of cloisters and roses was in our hearts.”
― Silvina Ocampo, Thus Were Their Faces