Quotations

Trutyh without compassion is not really truth

Compassion is an aspect of Divine love that melts all defenses and resistance when anyone's suffering is really seen. There is nothing the personality can do to create compassion, but when we are willing to be completely open and truthful about whatever we are truly feeling, it arises naturally and soothes our hurt. (We could say that truth without compassion is not really truth, and that compassion without truth is not really compassion.) The Divine love that seeks to express itself in the world through us is a powerful force that can break through all of the old barriers and untruths that have accumulated in us.

~ from THE WISDOM OF THE ENNEAGRAM by D.R. Riso and R. Hudson

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The three steps of truth

These are the three steps of truth. We climb to the first by the toil of humility, to the second by the deep feelings of compassion, and to the third by the ecstasy of contemplation. On the first step we experience the severity of truth, on the second its tenderness, on the third its purity. Reason brings us to the first as we judge ourselves; compassion brings us to the second when we have mercy on others; on the third the purity of truth sweeps us up to the sight of things invisible.

~ from BERNARD OF CLAIRVAUX ed. by M. Basil Pennington

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The truth that I hold deeply on the inside

I will no longer act on the outside in a way that contradicts the truth that I hold deeply on the inside. I will no longer act as if I were less than the whole person I know myself to be.

~ by Rosa Parks

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The only safe ground

Truth is the only safe ground to stand upon.

~ by Elizabeth Cady Stanton

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My life is rooted in the truth of my spiritual identity

Prayer is listening to the voice of the One who calls you the beloved. It is to constantly go back to the Truth of who we are and claim it for ourselves. I'm not what I do. I'm not what people say about me. I'm not what I have. My life is not rooted in the world, the things the world gives me. My life is rooted in the truth of my spiritual identity. Whatever we do — we have to go back regularly to that place of core identity.

~ by Henri Nouwen

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Let truth be done in silence

Let truth be done in silence "till it is forced to speak," and then should it only whisper; all those whom it may concern will hear.

~ by Caroline Fox

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A walk in nature

A walk in nature can help bring about one of the most essential acts a human being can perform: the stilling of the mind. For when the cacophony of disturbances, reactions, and self-talk subsides, like a windswept sea suddenly finding calm, the lens of our lives becomes a still, pure crystalline window for the cosmos to experience itself through... A walk in the natural world, with conscious mindfulness, can help bathe the senses in the implicate ordering of existence. Such a direct and immediate reminder does much to help steer us back to the center of ourselves.

~ by David LaChapelle

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The defining cry of creation

Silence ... And in the west, the ever-setting sun consumed itself, surrounded by its circling sisters, rushing with the speed of light toward the point systems and cosmic galaxies had been fleeing from the beginning, toward darkness and the primordial Fiat. And across the cold ocean of space, audible as the music of the spheres, the defining cry of creation comes. Maranatha!

~ Unknown

Unknown nature

Grow in silence like the trees

Grow in silence like the trees find strength in solitude listen to the wind, and living things hear what God speaks in silence.

~ by Jan Sutch Pickard

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Let nature be your teacher

Come forth into the light of things,
let Nature be your teacher.

~ by William Wordsworth

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Nature's invitation

NATURE is eternally inviting us to simply BE who we were born to be.

~ Anonymous

Anonymous nature

She rubs oil into wounds

The Spirit of God
is a life that bestows life,
root of world-tree
and the wind in its boughs.
Scrubbing out sin,
she rubs oil into wounds.
She is glistening life
alluring all praise,
all-awakening,
all-resurrecting.

~ Hildegard of Bingen

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I walked through the birches by the river today

I walked through the birches by the river today. Overwhelming! The earth is stripped down to simple designs. The land has become a visual haiku. Sun on the fretwork of twigs. Blood droplets of rose hips clinging to the bushes. The chatter of the creek against trimmings of ice. The skiff of snow. My breath a white cloud like a departing soul... I have always been beguiled by birds. As if there was much they would tell me if they could, but they are only permitted to bear witness with their lives, their song.

~ from STRANGERS AND SOJOURNERS by Michael D. O'Brien

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We have the potential to become like a tree planted by the stream

We have the potential to become like a tree planted by the stream. Like the tree, we need nurturance — both of water and of sun if we are to blossom. We need nurturance from all the elements; without the soil, the sun, and the air, our food will not grow. We need nurturance from the plants. We all need human nurturance in the form of friendship and love, and we need God's own divine nurturance which empowers us to trust in the Author of creation.

~ by Alice L. Laffey

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Spirituality in the ecological epoch

Spirituality in the ecological epoch will be based on a sense of deep communion with all beings through empathy, through the power of the heart, through our deepest intuition of the sacred pulse of life and the sacred nature of the cosmos.

~ from A SACRED PLACE TO DWELL by Henryk Skolimowski

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To discover the universe is a big step toward knowing ourselves

To discover the universe is a big step toward knowing ourselves. As humans we are born of the Earth, nourished by the Earth, healed by the Earth. The natural world tells us: I will feed you, I will clothe you, I will shelter you, I will heal you. Only do not so devour me or use me that you destroy my capacity to mediate the divine and the human. For I offer you a communication with the divine. In the vastness of the sea, in the snow-covered mountains, in the rivers flowing through the valleys, in the serenity of the landscape, and in the foreboding of the great storms that sweep over the land — I offer you inspiration for your music, your art, your dance. All these benefits the Earth gives to us: individually, communally, and throughout the entire Earth.

~ Thomas Berry in MAKING PEACE ed. by McConnell and van Gelder

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The healing grace of wildness

Walking home, I ponder about a love of art and I think about my love of the land back home, about the healing grace of wildness, and how difficult it is to articulate why conservation matters, why wilderness matters to the health of our souls and how a language of the heart becomes suspect. I wonder how it is we have come to this place where art and nature are spoken in terms of what is optional?

~ from LEAP by Terry Tempest Williams

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This water is talking

My daughter, three years old and fearless, loves nothing more than wading along the shallow shoreline outside our house. Holding hands, we walk barefoot upstream quietly in the water, stepping delicately over stones. Besides the water sounds, there is just immense silence. We stop and listen to the water. She asked me for a story; I did not have one. Listening, she turned in delight and announced, "Daddy, this water is talking." In listening to the river a kind of silence prevails, broken only by the rush of water over rocks. Such a silence is more like faint echoes, each a series of dim reverberations. They continue in you, distant yet familiar.

~ by Robert Reese

Robert Reese nature

Silently a flower blooms

Silently a flower blooms,
In silence it falls away;
Yet here now, at this moment, at this place,
The world of the flow, the whole of
the world is blooming.
This is the talk of the flower,
the truth of the blossom;
The glory of eternal life is fully shining
here.

~ by Zenkei Shibayama

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Prayer fulfills the need humans have for God

Prayer fulfills the need humans have for God, for inspiration, for affirmation of our own spirits. In prayer, we communicate with the essence of everything that exists, including our own essence. We have a message to share with life, with God, and we want to share it with authority. The message is coming directly from our hearts, we are talking with our divinity, with Divinity Itself. The power of prayer can lead us into love, truth, and personal freedom.

~ from PRAYERS by Don Miguel Ruiz

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As your prayer becomes deeper

As your prayer and meditation become deeper, they will defend you from the perpetual assaults of the outer world. You will hear the busy hum of that world as a distant exterior melody, and know yourself to be in some way withdrawn from it. You have set a ring of silence between you and it; and behold! within the silence you are free.

~ from PRACTICAL MYSTICISM by Evelyn Underhill

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Sending out love everywhere

PRAYER is a way of sending out love everywhere at once.

~ by Robert Lax

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Be with us this day

Sacred Friend, be with us this day.
Within us to purify us;
Above us to draw us up;
Beneath us to sustain us;
Before us to lead us;
Behind us to restrain us;
Around us to protect us.

~ by St. Patrick

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Two dimensions to prayer

There are two dimensions to prayer: speech and silence. Of the two, speech is necessary, but silence takes precedence. Silence is the authentic medium of prayer, the rich matrix in which true communion becomes possible. And being a medium, silence has a positive existence. For the one who truly understands prayer, silence also conveys a message; it too speaks... Silence prepares the soul for prayer, to hear the pain of others, the pain of the world.

~ by Geoffrey W. Dennis

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Prayer permeates a sick body

I know in my cells that prayer permeates a sick body, makes it shimmer as the new life comes in, making the cells remember how to respond to the harmonic whole. Music is like prayer a mystical bridge between heaven and earth.

~ from BONE by Harion Woodman

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Routine work can be transformed into prayer

If you cannot meditate, you can repeat one simple word; this is good for the soul. Do not say anything else, just repeat the word over and over, innumerable times. Finally, it will lose all meaning, yet take on an entirely new significance. God will open the doors and you will find yourself using that simple word to say everything you wanted to say. Thus, routine work can be transformed into prayer.

~ by R. Nachman of Breslov

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Every moment in life is a prayer

Every moment in life is a prayer, or could be. I think you can pray yourself into the mystery of the moment, or allow for the blessings of the moment to sustain you. Every moment is an invitation, and whatever you do in that moment, if it's dedicated to God, then it is a prayer.

~ from THE WAY OF THE DREAMCATCHER by S. T. Georgiou

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In the dark of the night I wait and watch

In the quiet of this place
in the dark of the night
I wait and watch.
In the stillness of my soul
and from its fathomless depths
the senses of my heart are awake to You.
For fresh soundings of life
for new showings of light
I search in the silence of my spirit,
O Blessing God.

~ from CELTIC BENEDICTION by J. Philip Newell

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A prayer utters itself

Some days, although we cannot pray, a prayer utters itself. So, a woman will lift her head from the sieve of her hands and stare at the minims sung by a tree, a sudden gift. Some nights, although we are faithless, the truth enters our hearts, that small familiar pain; then a man will stand stack- still, hearing his youth in the distant Latin chanting of a train. Pray for us now.

~ "Prayer" by Carol Ann Duffy

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Darkness in prayer

A small seed sowed in the field. I am back to the part of darkness in my prayer. As the seed opens in the ground, so the soul opens in the ground, in the dark. Over the last decade, with each faltering step I took into this darkness, my prayer — a prayer of no words — found deeper roots. This way of prayer is the dark way of silence. This way takes leave of discourse, of the mind, and turns to the heart, the dwelling place of God.

~ from CIRCLING TO THE CENTER by Susan M. Tiberghien

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Prayer is looking at the world as if with God's eyes

Praying is not necessarily best described always as looking towards God; sometimes and especially in intercession, it is equally a learning to look at the world as if with God's eyes.

~ from PONDER THESE THINGS by Rowan Williams

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The duty of prayer

In the life of the Indian there was only one inevitable duty — the duty of prayer — the daily recognition of the Unseen and Eternal. Daily devotions were more important than daily food. Each soul must meet the morning sun, the new sweet Earth, and the Great Silence alone.

~ Ohiyesa -- Santee Tribe

Ohiyesa, Santee Tribe prayer

Praying our experiences is a way into the depth of self-knowledge and acceptance

Praying our experiences is a way into the depth of self-knowledge and acceptance. As we unfold our experiences and become aware of our blessedness and our brokenness, we begin to become more aware of the God who alone can fill all our life with graciousness.

~ from PRAYING OUR EXPERIENCES by Joseph F. Schmidt

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The inner bath of love

Prayer is the inner bath of love into which the soul plunges.

~ by John Vianney

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Fear that has said its prayer

Courage is fear that has said its prayer...

~ by Dorothy Bernard

Dorothy Bernard prayer

Love losing itself and finding itself

Love giving itself, losing itself and finding itself in love, and Love returning to itself, giving itself back in love — this is the eternal pattern of the universe. The nucleus throws out its protons and electrons and they circle round it, held by the attraction of Love. Beyond the molecules and atoms, beyond the protons and electrons, there is an energy, a force of life, continually welling up from the abyss of being in god, continually springing up into the light of the Word, continually flowing back to it source in the bliss of love.

~ from RETURN TO THE CENTER by Bede Griffiths

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Love begets love

Love begets love. Like a wave, the love of an individual can evoke compassion in another. The active display of concern warms the many hearts who witness it. The love spreads for many to see. Compassion hen generates community. Others are brought into the swirling dynamic of God's revelation of care. The witness to love can inspire others to carry the tide of concern further.

~ from MEDITATIONS WITH MERTON by Nicki V. Vandergrift

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Seek refuge in inner silence

Seek refuge in inner silence,
free your thoughts from
the external world and you will feel
the rays of God's goodness and love
pouring over you and the universe.

~ Persian Wisdom

Anonymous Persian Wisdom love

If you would but practice loving

If you would but practice loving, you would make yourself into a fountain of healing energy where others could drink the balm that heals the pain of the soul. For it is love, only love, that can heal all levels of the human being. Remember also that the earth being needs your love. Not only is the earth a living, thinking, feeling entity like yourself, but she needs the love and the thoughts of the human race in these dark years as she has never before needed anything. You can be among the growing number who realize the mother planet is suffering. In your prayers, and in your meditation, send her your love and your thoughts. The darkness of her days can be lifted by the love of the race she has nurtured since its inception.

~ from THRESHOLD -- a letter to a 13 year old child by Hilarion

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Love matters

Love matters. It matters more than anything else in the world. Yet is is very easy. All you have to do is be who you really are; for you are made of love and made to love because of what you are: an interconnected part of a whole whose life and fiber is love.

~ by Robert S. Ellwood

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Love is our shared truth

Love is our shared truth.
Peace is our eternal hope.

~ The Museum of World Religions -- Taiwan

Anonymous The Museum Of World Religions In Taiwan love

How many people can you love?

How many people can you love
before it's too much, she said.

and I said I didn't think
there was any real limit

as long as you didn't care
if they loved you back.

~ from TRAVELING LIGHT by Brian Andreas

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Love is that fire that does not destroy

Love is the opposite of fear. Love is that fire that does not destroy, whereas fear is the fire that burns everything it touches.

~ by Don Miguel Ruiz

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To feel something as real in the measure of its full reality is to love

To feel something as real in the measure of its full reality is to love. It is love which awakens us to the reality of ourselves, to the reality of others, to the reality of the world, and o the reality of God.

~ Unknown

Unknown love

Yes we are here to love

In the presence of the Ancient Ones, we deliver new vows in whispers by the authority of our own remembered hearts. Standing before these Elders of Time, we entrust ourselves to each other. Our vows are simple, spontaneous. "Yes, we are here to love. Yes, we are here to experience both shadow and light, forgiveness and joy. We return to each other, rejoined. Together we will love this beautiful, broken world of which we are a part."

~ from LEAP by Terry Tempest Williams

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Encircle me

Encircle me
Enfold me
Entrance me
With Thy peace
That I may pray
and love Thee well.

Encircle me
Embolden me
Enhance me
With Thy power
That I may ever
do Thy will.

~ Celtic Prayer

Anonymous Celtic Prayer love

The important thing

The important thing is not to think much but to love much. So do that which bestirs you to love.

~ by St. Theresa of Avila

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The abundant well of spiritual longing

Spiritual longing is a sort of loneliness for an unknown yet deeply perceived presence. Some call the presence God; some call it peace; some call it consciousness; some call it Love. It's source rests in the well of our own hearts. When we slow down, quiet the mind, and allow ourselves to feel hungry for something that we do not understand, we are dipping into the abundant well of spiritual longing. If we want to open to doors to life's love and God's peace, we have to learn how to fearlessly explore the full terrain of our human longing.

~ from THE SEEKERS GUIDE by Elizabeth Lesser

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This is an intentional life enhancing universe with LOVE as its vital force

Take heart! Humanity is wise and, in its rich diversity, possessed of vast reservoirs of creativity, inspiration, and spiritual energy. Be of good cheer. For this is an intentional, life enhancing universe with LOVE as its vital force.

~ from OTHER WAYS OF KNOWING by John Broomfield

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Love has given humans very real gifts

Love has given humans very real gifts. The chief one is the divine indwelling, God's own presence within us, sustaining us by this creative action and embracing us, or trying to heal or transform us through the redeeming love that is distinctively motherly. As the spiritual journey progresses, one comes face to face with the divine presence.

~ Thomas Keating

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