“It is always possible to make a new start by means of repentance. “You fell,” it is written, “now arise”(cf. Prov. 24:16). And if you fall again, then rise again, without despairing at all of your salvation, no matter what happens. So long as you do not surrender yourself willingly to the enemy, your patient endurance, combined with self-reproach, will suffice for your salvation. “For at one time we ourselves went astray in our folly and disobedience,” says St. Paul. “… Yet He saved us, not because of any good things we had done, but in His mercy” (Tit. 3:3,5).”
“And so, my friends, accept whatever the Lord sends with a willing spirit and do not groan at what is imposed on you, for why should you feel joy at being part of a crowd or pain at being excluded from it? Rather we should do everything to ensure that we are not excluded from the city of God.”
“The beginning of wisdom is the fear of the Lord. For where there is fear, there the commandments are kept; where the commandments are kept, there is the flesh purified—that cloud which envelops the soul and prevents it from seeing clearly the Divine ray; where the flesh is purified, there light springs forth, and the shining of the light fulfils desire above all desires.”