From the moment you feel you are not as you should be before God and say humbly, “O my God, I have sinned,” God forgives, helps and provides His Grace. And if death finds you in this state, you will be saved because you’re struggling and not merely saying that your life in not in order and you’re on the wrong path. You are not, God forbid, in a demonic state. Here at the Monastery, with the help of God, all of the Sisters are more or less in a state of repentance. After all, you should know that the spiritual person receives divine Grace when he is aware of his spiritual disorder, because this awareness of sinfulness already serves to cleanse him.

When someone tells me with pain, “I am so unworthy, so unworthy…”, I am pleased with him because, by acknowledging his faults, I know he will be delivered from them. I once found a man who was living in a hut with cats and dogs. He wouldn’t even light a fire for fear of burning his hut down. He was completely abandoned! I felt pain for him, but he said to me, “Don’t feel sorry for me, my good monk; I need to be tormented. If you only knew what I have done, you wouldn’t feel so sorry for me. For me, even living in this place is too good.” Tell me now, will God not provide for him, no matter what he has done?

– Spiritual Struggle