#l

Heaven is comfort, but it's still not living. ↗

— Alice Sebold

#haunting #imaginative #inspirational #murder #personal-growth

The cure for our modern maladies is dirt under the fingernails and the feel of thick grass between the toes. The cure for our listlessness is to be out within the invigorating wind. The cure for our uselessness is to take back up our stewardship; for it is not that there has been no work to be done, we simply have not been attending to it. ↗

— L.M. Browning

#cure #faith #god #l-m-browning #meaning

He said I was unequipped to meet life because I had no sense of humor. ↗

— J.D. Salinger

#humor

There's no such thing as a bad dog, just a bad owner. ↗

— John Grogan

#marley-and-me #humor

Hespe's mouth went firm. She didn't scowl exactly, but it looked like she was getting all the pieces of a scowl together in one place, just in case she needed them in a hurry. ↗

— Patrick Rothfuss

#literacy #relationships #humor

So long as we do not permit faith to override our rational powers we should use those talents to explore the frontiers which lie at the outer limits of scientific observation. ↗

— Robert Christian

#religion-and-science #faith

It took a couple of months before we were both convinced there were no rules about sexual activities in Hell and our spouses were not going to show up out of the blue. It was hard to start a sexual relationship in circumstances of such bizarre uncertainty, especially for an active Mormon and a good Christian, both lost in a Zoroastrian Hell. We were like virgin newlyweds. All my life I’d been raised to believe this kind of thing was wrong. All my life I had lived with a strong sense of morality. How do you give it up? How do you do things you thought you’d never do? Where do all the things you believed go, when all the supporting structure is found to be a myth? How do you know how or on what to take a moral stand, how do you behave when it turns out there are no cosmic rules, no categorical imperatives? It was difficult. So tricky to untangle. ↗

— Steven L. Peck

#christianity #christians #ethics #existentialism #faith

What obliged her to put her faith in a foreign religion. Catholic, universal, what you will, the problem remains: Catholicism springs from the Western world. Even to understand it is European. It is supported by Europe's institutions, and one can love it only by enrolling oneself in the history of a civilization. ↗

— V Y Mudimbe

#catholicism #foreign #religion #faith

Over the years I've found it much more helpful to follow the advice of Sister Liebert and seek to treat each young person as a teacher from God, someone God has placed in my life in order to help me grow in faith. When I encounter a young person, I find it much more helpful to think that she (or he) may be the only Jesus I'll ever know. Perhaps by seeking to encounter the presence of Christ in young people, we'll find ourselves better able to see them, hear them, feel compassion for them, and respond in kindness. ↗

— Mark Yaconelli

#faith

Until you get the measure of your own soul, Jim, don't be quick to condemn a priest, or anyone else for that matter. I'm not scolding you, sweetheart," she said hurriedly. "It's just that, until you've been there, you can't know what it's like to hold yourself to promises you made in good faith a long time ago. Do you hang in there, or cut your losses? Soldier on, or admit defeat and try to make the best of things?" She'd looked a little sheepish then and admitted, "You know, I used to be a real hardass about stuff like this. No retreat, no surrender! But now? Jimmy, I honestly don't know if the world would be better or worse if we all held ourselves to the vows of our youth. ↗

— Mary Doria Russell

#promises #faith