It was the Lord who put into my mind (I could feel His hand upon me) the fact that it would be possible to sail from here to the Indies. All who heard of my project rejected it with laughter, ridiculing me. There is no question that the inspiration was from the Holy Spirit, because He comforted me with rays of marvelous inspiration from the Holy Scriptures…

I am a most unworthy sinner, but I have cried out to the Lord for grace and mercy, and they have covered me completely. I have found the sweetest consolation since I made it my whole purpose to enjoy His marvelous presence. For the execution of the journey to the Indies, I did not make use of intelligence, mathematics or maps. It is simply the fulfillment of what Isaiah had prophesied…

The Lord made me a messenger of the new heavens and the new earth of which Isaiah speaks and St. John in the book of the Revelation. And He showed me the place where to find it…

No one should fear to undertake any task in the name of our Saviour, if it is just and if the intention is purely for His holy service. The working out of all things has been assigned to each person by our Lord….

~ Christopher Columbus, whose discovery of America in 1492 we celebrate today, from his Book of Prophecies, written between his 3rd and 4th voyages to the New World, in 1501-02. This book was only published in Spanish in 1894 and translated into English, incredibly, in 1991.

[HT: proofreader Angela]