Quotes by Clerics - Page 6

You will never know just how thrilled my heart is to behold such a throng of people; especially as they have gathered to pay tribute and love's greatest honor to loved ones who, today, are basking in the sunshine of God's heaven.
Reverend Ada Slaton Bonds
When I leave this earthly home and go up to God to dwell, someone will look on the heaped up grave and whisper, "She tried to do well.
Reverend Ada Slaton Bonds
I had a love affair with life, and as is the custom, I will lose, but will regain a greater love with my heavenly Father.
Reverend Ada Slaton Bonds
God hath thus ordered it, that we may learn to bear one another’s burdens; for no man is without fault, no man without his burden, no man sufficient of himself, no man wise enough of himself; but we ought to bear with one another, comfort one another, help, instruct, and admonish one another.
Thomas à Kempis
By salvation I mean not barely according to the vulgar notion deliverance from hell or going to heaven but a present deliverance from sin a restoration of the soul to its primitive health its original purity a recovery of the divine nature the renewal of our souls after the image of God in righteousness and true holiness in justice mercy and truth.
John Wesley
Do you not know that God entrusted you with that money (all above what buys necessities for your families) to feed the hungry, to clothe the naked, to help the stranger, the widow, the fatherless; and, indeed, as far as it will go, to relieve the wants of all mankind? How can you, how dare you, defraud the Lord, by applying it to any other purpose?
John Wesley
If ever any beauty I did see,Which I desired, and got, 'twas but a dream of thee.
John Donne
Love, built on beauty, soon as beauty, dies.
John Donne
No spring nor summer beauty hath such grace as I have seen in one autumnal
John Donne
Go and catch a falling star,Get with child a mandrake root,Tell me where all past years are,Or who cleft the devil's foot,Teach me to hear mermaids singing,Or to keep off envy's stinging,And findWhat windServes to advance an honest mind.If thou be'st born to strange sights,Things invisible to see,Ride ten thousand days and nights,Till age snow white hairs on thee,Thou, when thou return'st, wilt tell me,All strange wonders that befell thee,And swear,No whereLives a woman true and fair.
John Donne
He likewise directed, “that every senator in the great council of a nation, after he had delivered his opinion, and argued in the defence of it, should be obliged to give his vote directly contrary; because if that were done, the result would infallibly terminate in the good of the public.
Jonathan Swift
My message to the international community is that our silence and complicity especially on the situation in Gaza shames us all. It is almost like the behaviour of the military junta in Burma
Desmond Tutu
And he gave it for his opinion, "that whoever could make two ears of corn, or two blades of grass, to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before, would deserve better of mankind, and do more essential service to his country, than the whole race of politicians put together.
Jonathan Swift
It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
Jonathan Swift
He asked me, "what were the usual causes or motives that made one country go to war with another?" I answered "they were innumerable; but I should only mention a few of the chief. Sometimes the ambition of princes, who never think they have land or people enough to govern; sometimes the corruption of ministers, who engage their master in a war, in order to stifle or divert the clamour of the subjects against their evil administration. Difference in opinions has cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether the juice of a certain berry be blood or wine; whether whistling be a vice or a virtue; whether it be better to kiss a post, or throw it into the fire: what is the best colour for a coat, whether black, white, red, or gray: and whether it should be long or short, narrow or wide, dirty or clean; with many more. Neither are any wars so furious and bloody, or of so long a continuance, especially if it be in things indifferent.
Jonathan Swift
Go where thou wilt, seek what thou wilt, and thou shalt not find a higher way above, nor a safer way below, than the way of the holy Cross."- Thomas A Kempis (The Following of Christ)
Thomas à Kempis
A book has but one voice, but it does not instruct everyone alike.
Thomas à Kempis
Books, the children of the brain.
Jonathan Swift
That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy.
Jonathan Swift
That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy.
Jonathan Swift
The tiny Lilliputians surmise that Gulliver's watch may be his god, because it is that which, he admits, he seldom does anything without consulting.
Jonathan Swift
Beware you be not swallowed up in books! An ounce of love is worth a pound of knowledge.
John Wesley
If you wish to stand and progress as you ought, hold yourself an exile and a pilgrim on the earth.
Thomas à Kempis
Holy solitaries' is a phrase no more consistent with the Gospel than holy adulterers. The Gospel of Christ knows no religion but social; no holiness, but social holiness.
John Wesley
Unless God has raised you up for this very thing, you will be worn out by the opposition of men and devils. But if God be for you, who can be against you? Are all of them together stronger than God? O be not weary of well doing!
John Wesley
The highest does not stand without the lowest.
Thomas à Kempis
As prayer without faith is but a beating of the air, so trust without prayer [is] but a presumptuous bravado. He that promises to give, and bids us trust His promises, commands us to pray, and expects obedience to his commands. He will give, but not without our asking.
Thomas Lye
It may be a procession of faithful failures that enriches the soil of godly success. Faithful actions are not religious acts. They are not even necessary actions undertaken by people of faith. Faithful actions, whether they are marked by success or they end in failure, are actions that are compelled by goodness.
Desmond Tutu
Out of the cacophony of random suffering and chaos that can mark human life, the life artist sees or creates a symphony of meaning and order. A life of wholeness does not depend on what we experience. Wholeness depends on how we experience our lives.
Desmond Tutu
Though wrong gratifies in the moment, good yields its gifts over a lifetime.
Desmond Tutu
At the round earth's imagined corners blowYour trumpets, angels, and arise, ariseFrom death, you numberless infinitiesOf souls, and to your scattered bodies go ;All whom the flood did, and fire shall o'erthrow,All whom war, dea[r]th, age, agues, tyrannies,Despair, law, chance hath slain, and you, whose eyesShall behold God, and never taste death's woe.But let them sleep, Lord, and me mourn a space ;For, if above all these my sins abound,'Tis late to ask abundance of Thy grace,When we are there. Here on this lowly ground,Teach me how to repent, for that's as goodAs if Thou hadst seal'd my pardon with Thy blood.
John Donne
Only our love hath no decay; This no tomorrow hath, nor yesterday, Running it never runs from us away, But truly keeps his first, last, everlasting day.
John Donne
How blest am I in this discovering thee!To enter in these bonds is to be free;Then where my hand is set, my seal shall be. Full nakedness! All joys are due to thee,As souls unbodied, bodies unclothed must be
John Donne
If our two loves be one, or, thou and I Love so alike, that none do slacken, none can die.
John Donne
True and false fears let us refrain, Let us love nobly, and live, and add again Years and years unto years, till we attain To write threescore: this is the second of our reign.
John Donne
Love's mysteries in souls do grow,But yet the body is his book.
John Donne
And to 'scape stormy days, I choose an everlasting night.
John Donne
Our two souls therefore, which are one, Though I must go, endure not yet A breach, but an expansion, Like gold to aery thinness beat. If they be two, they are two so As stiff twin compasses are two ; Thy soul, the fix'd foot, makes no show To move, but doth, if th' other do. And though it in the centre sit, Yet, when the other far doth roam, It leans, and hearkens after it, And grows erect, as that comes home. Such wilt thou be to me, who must, Like th' other foot, obliquely run ; Thy firmness makes my circle just, And makes me end where I begun.
John Donne
My face in thine eye, thine in mine appeares, And true plaine hearts doe in the faces rest, Where can we finde two better hemispheares Without sharpe North, without declining West? What ever dyes, was not mixt equally; If our two loves be one, or, thou and I Love so alike, that none doe slacken, none can die.
John Donne
Licence my roving hands, and let them go Before, behind, between, above, below.
John Donne
All mankind is of one author, and is one volume; when one man dies, one chapter is not torn out of the book, but translated into a better language; and every chapter must be so translated... As therefore the bell that rings to a sermon, calls not upon the preacher only, but upon the congregation to come: so this bell calls us all... No man is an island, entire of itself... any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind; and therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
John Donne
Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.
John Donne
No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent, a part of the main. If a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as well as if a manor of thy friend's or of thine own were: any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in mankind, and therefore never send to know for whom the bells tolls; it tolls for thee.
John Donne
In the Cross is salvation; in the Cross is life; in the Cross is protection against our enemies; in the Cross is infusion of heavenly sweetness; in the Cross is strength of mind; in the Cross is joy of spirit; in the Cross is excellence of virtue; in the Cross is perfection of holiness. There is no salvation of soul, nor hope of eternal life, save in the Cross.
Thomas à Kempis
Twice or thrice had I lov'd thee, Before I knew thy face or name
John Donne
Up then, fair phoenix bride, frustrate the sun;Thyself from thine affectionTakest warmth enough, and from thine eyeAll lesser birds will take their jollity.Up, up, fair bride, and callThy stars from out their several boxes, takeThy rubies, pearls, and diamonds forth, and makeThyself a constellation of them all;And by their blazing signifyThat a great princess falls, but doth not die.Be thou a new star, that to us portendsEnds of much wonder; and be thou those ends.
John Donne
First keep the peace within yourself, then you can also bring peace to others.
Thomas Kempis
A person is a person through other persons.None of us comes into the world fully formed. We would not know how to think, or walk, or speak, or behave as human beings unless we learned it from other human beings. We need other human beings in order to be human. I am because other people are. A person is entitled to a stable community life, and the first of these communities is the family.
Desmond Tutu
My father always used to say, "Don't raise your voice. Improve your argument." Good sense does not always lie with the loudest shouters, nor can we say that a large, unruly crowd is always the best arbiter of what is right.
Desmond Tutu
Learned arguments do not make a man holy and righteous, whereas a good life makes him dear to God.
Thomas à Kempis
The realm of God is dangerous. You must enter into it and not just seek information about it
Archbishop Anthony Bloom
It is good for us to have trials and troubles at times, for they often remind us that we are on probation and ought not to hope in any worldly thing. It is good for us sometimes to suffer contradiction, to be misjudged by men even though we do well and mean well. These things help us to be humble and shield us from vainglory. When to all outward appearances men give us no credit, when they do not think well of us, then we are more inclined to seek God Who sees our hearts. Therefore, a man ought to root himself so firmly in God that he will not need the consolations of men.
Thomas à Kempis
Those who attempt to search into the majesty of God will be overwhelmed with His Glory!
Thomas à Kempis
We must be ready to learn from one another, not claiming that we alone possess all truth and that somehow we have a corner on God.
Desmond Tutu
Love is a mighty power, a great and complete good; Love alone lightens every burden, and makes the rough places smooth. It bears every hardship as though it were nothing, and renders all bitterness sweet and acceptable. The love of Jesus is noble, and inspires us to great deeds; it moves us always to desire perfection. Love aspires to high things, and is held back by nothing base. Love longs to be free, a stranger to every worldly desire, lest its inner vision become dimmed, and lest worldly self-interest hinder it or ill-fortune cast it down. Nothing is sweeter than love, nothing stronger, nothing higher, nothing wider, nothing more pleasant, nothing fuller or better in heaven or earth; for love is born of God, and can rest only in God above all created things.Love flies, runs, leaps for joy; it is free and unrestrained. Love gives all for all, resting in One who is highest above all things, from whom every good flows and proceeds. Love does not regard the gifts, but turns to the Giver of all good gifts. Love knows no limits, but ardently transcends all bounds. Love feels no burden, takes no account of toil, attempts things beyond its strength; love sees nothing as impossible, for it feels able to achieve all things. Love therefore does great things; it is strange and effective; while he who lacks love faints and fails.
Thomas à Kempis
Like when you sit in front of a fire in winter — you are just there in front of the fire. You don't have to be smart or anything. The fire warms you.
Desmond Tutu
Give me one hundred preachers who fear nothing but sin, and desire nothing but God, and I care not a straw whether they be clergymen or laymen; such alone will shake the gates of hell and set up the kingdom of heaven on Earth.
John Wesley
The more humble and obedient to God a man is, the more wise and at peace he will be in all that he does.
Thomas à Kempis
We may be surprised at the people we find in heaven. God has a soft spot for sinners. His standards are quite low.
Desmond Tutu
If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor.
Desmond Tutu