Reflection
Fortitude is the gift of courage, strength and endurance. Fortitude touches the virtue of hope in us and gives us tenacity to get through difficult, dangerous or heart-breaking times. Fortitude is always reasoned and reasonable, it allows us to overcome fear and to remain steady in the face of obstacles. Fortitude gives us the strength to do what needs to be done. It shows itself the moral courage to act as justice demands of us no matter what the personal cost.
Prayer
Holy Spirit, strengthen me in times of struggle, adversity, failure, loss, or illness. Help me to take one day at a time, putting my trust in your sure guidance.
Action
In spite of how you feel, during times of trouble, loss or disaster, try to trust in God’s love and presence and act with courage.
Suggested Reading
Do not fear, for I am with you; Do not anxiously look about you, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, surely I will help you, Surely I will uphold you with My righteous right hand.
Isaiah 41:10
Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or tremble at them, for the LORD your God is the one who goes with you. He will not fail you or forsake you.
Deuteronomy 31:6
Even though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I fear no evil; for Thou art with me; Thy rod and Thy staff, they comfort me.
Psalm 23:4
For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
2 Timothy 1:7
Through the gift of fortitude, the Holy Spirit liberates the soil of our heart, he frees it from sluggishness, from uncertainty and from all the fears that can hinder it, so that Lord’s Word may be put into practice authentically and with joy. The gift of fortitude is a true help, it gives us strength, and it also frees us from so many obstacles.
Pope Francis
We would like to stay spiritual children; God wills us to grow up. We would will to have life be a perpetual sandbox. God wills life to be a mountain climbing moment of rhapsody and accomplishment. We would will life tbe a walk on velvet waters. God wills life to be a journey through seasons, every climate, all the topographies of the soul so that when we have finished it, we can say that we have truly lived it.
Joan Chittister, OSB
Courage is a special kind of knowledge: the knowledge of how to fear what
ought to be feared and how not to fear what ought not to be feared.
David Ben-Gurion
Last, but by no means least, courage–moral courage, the courage of one’s convictions, the courage to see things through. The world is in a constant conspiracy against the brave. It’s the age-old struggle–the roar of the crowd on one side and the voice of your conscience on the other.
Douglas MacArthur
One has to abandon altogether the search for security, and reach out to the risk of living with both arms. One has to embrace the world like a lover. One has to accept pain as a condition of existence. One has to court doubt and darkness as the cost of knowing. One needs a will stubborn in conflict, but apt always to total acceptance of every consequence of living and dying.
Morris L. West
The courage of life is often a less dramatic spectacle than the courage
of a final moment; but it is no less than a magnificent mixture of triumph
and tragedy. A person does what he or she must–in spite of personal consequences, in spite of obstacles and dangers and pressures–and that is the basis of all human morality.
John F. Kennedy
Courage is resistance to fear, not absence of it.
Mark Twain