List of points

Humility and obedience are the indispensable conditions for acquiring good doctrine.

Whenever you speak of the theological virtues, of faith, of hope, of love, remember that, rather than to theorise on, they are virtues to be practised. .

There was a young priest who used to address Jesus with the words of the Apostles: Edissere nobis parabolam, explain the parable to us. He would add: Master, put into our souls the clarity of your teaching, so that it may never be absent from our lives and our works. And so that we can give it to others.

—You too should say this to Our Lord.

Always have the courage — the humility, the desire to serve God — to put forward the truths of faith as they are, not allowing any concessions, nor ambiguities.

Coepit facere et docere — Jesus began to do and then to teach. You and I have to bear witness with our example, because we cannot live a double life. We cannot preach what we do not practise. In other words, we have to teach what we are at least struggling to put into practice.

You must always have, in everything, the same “sentiments” as the Church. For this, you must acquire the spiritual and doctrinal training that you need, which will make you a person of sound judgement in temporal matters, humble and quick to correct yourself when you realise you have made a mistake.

—Correcting your own mistakes, nobly, is a very human and very supernatural way of using your freedom.

There is an urgent need for spreading the doctrine of Christ.

Store up your training, fill yourself with clear ideas, with the fullness of the Christian message, so that afterwards you can pass it on to others.

—Don’t expect God to illuminate you, for he has no reason to when you have definite human means available to you: study and work.

We cannot separate the seed of doctrine from the seed of piety.

The only way to inoculate your work of sowing doctrine against the germs of ineffectiveness is by being sincerely devout.

Let us go to Jesus in the Tabernacle where we can get to know him and assimilate his teaching, and then be able to hand out this food to souls.

Preaching — the preaching of Christ crucified — is the word of God.

Priests need to prepare themselves as best they can before carrying out such a divine ministry, the aim of which is the salvation of souls.

Lay people should listen with very special respect.