The only joy on earth is to escape from the prison of our own false self, and enter by love into union with the life Who dwells and sings within the essence of every creature and in the core of our own souls.  -Thomas Merton

“Faith does not simply account for the unknown, tag it with a theological tag and file it away in a safe place where we do not have to worry about it. This is a falsification of the whole idea of faith. On the contrary, faith incorporates the unknown into our everyday life in a living dynamic and actual manner. The unknown remains unknown. It is still a mystery, for it cannot cease to be one. The function of faith is not to reduce mystery to rational clarity, but to integrate the unknown and the known together in a living whole, in which we are more and more able to transcend the limitations of our external self. -Merton

“In fighting deliberate and evident vices a planned strategy of resolutions and penances is the best way—if not the only way… When it ends, and when you have a good habit to work with, do not forget the moments of battle when you were wounded and disarmed and helpless. Do not forget that, for all your efforts, you only won because of God, Who did the fighting in you.” -Merton

“We all want to be healed, but the staggering truth of our faith is that God’s presence with us is ultimately more important than our healing.” -Me 🙂

“We were innocent before we started feeling guilty; we were in the light before we entered into darkness; we were at home before we started to search for a home. Deep in the recesses of our minds and hearts there lies hidden treasure we seek.” -Nouwen

“The eyes of love had seen you as precious, as of infinite, as of eternal value. When loves chooses, it chooses with a perfect sensitivity for the unique beautify of the chosen one, and it chooses without making anyone else feel excluded.” -Nouwen

“There is little or no neutral territory between the land of the blessed and the land of the cursed. You have to choose where it is that you want to  live, and that choice is one that you have to keep making from moment to moment.” -Nouwen

“The great spiritual call of the Beloved Children of God is to pull their brokenness away from the shadow of the curse and put it under the light of the blessing.” -Nouwen

“Eternal life is not some great surprise that comes unannounced at the end of our existence in time; it is rather, the full revelation of what we have been and have lived all along.” -Nouwen

“You hit bottom when you stop digging.”

“My goal in life is not to ‘succeed’; it’s to live my life with humility.”

“Leadership is getting more out of people than the science of management says you can.” -Colin Powell

“The value of and interest of life is not so much to do conspicuous things… as to do ordinary things with the perception of their enormous value.” -Teilhard de Chardin

“The world needs more than the secret holiness of individual inwardness. It needs more than sacred sentiments and good intentions. God asks for the heart because He needs the lives. It is by lives that the world will be redeemed, by lives that beat in concordance with God, by deeds that outbeat the finite charity of the human heart.” -Abraham Joshua Heschel