Mother Gavrilia: Loving difficult people

 Once, seeing her with [a very] "difficult" person, I was wondering how she could stand him! A few days later, I saw them again. He was unrecognizable! Sitting next to her, with a transformed face that looked beautiful, almost angelic, he was like an innocent child with its beloved mother... "How did you do it?" I asked when we were left alone. "What did I do, my child? I did nothing... The Lord does everything - provided we love the other person". "Even the... ill-natured?" I asked. "Even those you consider as such - for in their heart they are not so! You know, the moment you love them something changes. I have told you before that love is like a bomb - it shatters all evil"...

+Nun Gavrilia, spoken of Mother Gavrilia in The Ascetic of Love 

Fr. Stephen Freeman: The Importance of Love for Enemies

 I remember being startled the first time I read the saying of St. Silouan the Athonite (twentieth century): “The criterion for the presence of the Holy Spirit, the criterion of the truth, is the love for one’s enemies.” I have elsewhere seen the thought (or simplified it in my own mind) in this form: “You only know God to the extent that you love your enemies.” I believe it is true, and also that it is perhaps the most significant thing we can understand in the journey of our Christian life. There are many things to occupy our thoughts and our energies—the Christian life offers endless space for exploration. But if, in the end, it has not resulted in knowing God, then it has been a useless exercise and a life that missed its purpose.

+ Fr. Stephen Freeman from Everywhere Present: Christianity in a One-Storey Universe.

St. Maximos the Confessor: On love for others

 Let us love one another, and we shall be loved by God. Let us show longsuffering to each other, an God will show longsuffering towards our sins. Let us not return evil for the evil done to us (cf  Rom 12:17), and we shall not be punished according to our sins. For the forgiveness of our transgressions is to be found in our forgiveness of our brethren. And the mercy of God is to be found hidden in our compassion towards our neighbor... So you see, the Lord has given us a way in which we can be saved, and has endowed us eternally with the capacity to become children of God (cf John 1:12); thus it is on what we ourselves desire that our salvation depends.

+St. Maximos the Confessor, from Ascetic Discourse, #42.

Peter Bouteneff: The criterion of love

 What we learn from the Gospels’ descriptions of Christ and then from St Paul, and the Church Fathers and Mothers - is not only that “Thou shalt not” becomes “You ought to.” The commandments become something that people have to discern for themselves and live into, on the basis of something bigger. The root principle is, “Love God and love one another, including your enemies.” With those, the rest Will fall into place. You could say that there is barely even a need to explicitly prohibit specific misdeeds such as murder (or even anger), fornication (or lust), lying (or stretching the truth), because none of them satisfies the criterion of love.

+Peter Bouteneff, from How to be a Sinner, chapter 2, What is Sin?

St. Gabriel of the Seven Lakes Monastery: We should all be one in Christ.

We must serve our neighbors with the love of Christ, as He loved and loves His neighbors; and we must live in accordance with the Spirit of Christ - we should all be one in Christ. Ah, how holy that is! But love is not given to anyone cheaply - it is attained through patience and great sufferings. Let us not offend our neighbors, even those who purposely offend and vex us. And what a labor it will be for us during all this endurance! Let us then recall our Savior and God, the Mediator for man! Let us then recall His suffering for us and His love for us. Let us recall those who aggravated Him and the time when He was revealing His love for us - when they slapped His face, beat Him, spat on Him and crucified Him - the Innocent One - on the Cross. Let us cry out with the wise thief: "This man hath done nothing amiss... but we receive the due reward of our deeds... Lord, remember me when Thou comest into Thy kingdom" (Luke 23:41-42).
+St. Gabriel of the Seven Lakes Monastery, from The Love of God: The Life and teachings of St. Gabriel of the Seven Lakes Monastery, letters #3.

Why is it necessary to pray for enemies? It is necessary not only for them, but for us as well. We should find in ourselves the strength to be reconciled with people. Archimandrite Sophrony (Sakharov), in his book about St. Silouan the Athonite, says, "Those that hate and reject their brother are flawed in their being; they cannot find the way to God, who loves all." This holds true. When hatred for man settles in our heart, we are not able to approach God. As long as we hold on to this feeling, the path to God is barred to us. This is why it is necessary to pray for our enemies.
+Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev), from Prayer: Encounter with the Living God, #13 Prayer for Our Enemies