"Life is a gift to be received with gratitude and a task to be pursued with courage." (Confession of 1967, 9.17)
"Our love is rooted in spirituality: to love is to be born of God.... Our love blossoms in spirituality: to love is to know God." Chris Glaser, Come Home! p. 107)
"Without the call to high adventure, the faith has never flourished." Vida Scudder
"When I get a little money I buy books. If any is left, I buy food and clothes." Erasmus
"There's an old saying about those who forget history. I don't remember it, but it's good." Stephen Colbert
"Without some sort of architecture, spirituality cannot be sustained over time or taught to successive generations." (Diana Butler Bass, A People's History of Christianity, 90)
"Here, in a parish church in Geneva, a pastor [John Calvin] leaves his pulpit and sits with a boy or girl, a radical egalitarian act in itself, to recite faith together. To small children, memorization was a way of reading.... They used catechism to personalize faith through teaching community." (Diana Butler Bass, A People's History of Christianity, 176)
"Sanity remains defined by the ability to cope with insane conditions." Ana Castilla
"I was reminded today that being wanted may not always mean that one is being called." Bruce Reyes-Chow
“River, you don’t fix the Bible…. It’s not about making sense. It’s about believing in something and letting that belief be real enough to change your life. It’s about faith. You don’t fix faith, River. It fixes you.” The Shepherd, Firefly 1.7
"We must insist that violence also refers to that which is psychologically destructive, that which demeans, damages, or depersonalizes others." God and Violence In the Old Testament, Terence Fretheim
“I don't like to hear cut and dried sermons. No—when I hear a man preach, I like to see him act as if he were fighting bees!” Abraham Lincoln
"Study the past if you would define the future." Confucius
"To love someone deeply gives you strength. Being loved by someone deeply gives you courage." Lao Tzu
"History is the version of past events that people have decided to agree upon." Napoleon Bonaparte
"Every gun that is made, every warship that is launched, every rocket fired signifies, is in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and not clothed." Dwight D. Eisenhower
"A small body of determined spirits fired by an unquenchable faith in their mission can alter the course of history." Mohandas Gandhi
"When you pray to God for courage, he doesn't give you courage. He gives you the opportunity to be courageous." Evan Almighty
My soul cries out with a joyful shout
that the God of my heart is great,
And my spirit sings of the wondrous things
that you bring to the ones who wait.
You fixed your sight on your servant's plight,
and my weakness you did not spurn,
So from east to west shall my name be blest.
Could the world be about to turn?
My heart shall sing of the day you bring.
Let the fires of your justice burn.
Wipe away all tears, for the dawn draws near,
and the world is about to turn!
that the God of my heart is great,
And my spirit sings of the wondrous things
that you bring to the ones who wait.
You fixed your sight on your servant's plight,
and my weakness you did not spurn,
So from east to west shall my name be blest.
Could the world be about to turn?
My heart shall sing of the day you bring.
Let the fires of your justice burn.
Wipe away all tears, for the dawn draws near,
and the world is about to turn!
--Canticle of the Turning
