Words to Live By – From Catholic Tradition

Mortifying Our Passions and Desires Helps Us Much More Than Choosing to Perform Unusual Voluntary Penances

Here is how St. John of the Cross, Mystical Doctor of the Church, counsels us:

One must greatly lament the ignorance of certain men, who burden themselves with extraordinary penances and with many other voluntary practices, and think that this practice or that one will suffice to bring them to the union with Divine Wisdom. But such will not be the case if they endeavor not diligently to mortify their desires. If they were careful to bestow half of that labor on this, they would profit more in a month than they profit by all the other practices in many years.

For, just as it is necessary to till the earth if it is to bear fruit, and unless it be tilled it bears nothing but weeds, so likewise is mortification of the desires necessary if the soul is to profit. Without this mortification, I make bold to say, the soul no more achieves progress on the road to perfection and to the knowledge of God of itself, however many efforts it might make, than the seed grows when it is cast upon untilled ground. Wherefore the darkness and rudeness of the soul will not be taken from it until the desires be quenched. For these desires are like cataracts, or like motes in the eye, which obstruct the sight until they be taken away.

Ascent Of Mount Carmel, St. John of the Cross, Bk.1, ch.8, §4.