#o

If you really care for freedom, liberty, There cannot be any democracy or liberal institution without politics. The only true antidote to the perversions of politics is more politics and better politics. Not negation of politics - Dr Jayaprakash Narayan at Mumbai University ↗

— Dr Jayaprakash Narayan Loksatta at Mumbai University

#politics #freedom

These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives everything its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated. ↗

— Thomas Paine

#inspirational #patriotic #value #freedom

We receive His peace when we ask Him for it. We keep His peace by extending it to others. Those are the keys and there are no others. ↗

— Marianne Williamson

#extending #him #his #keep #keys

I want to be a cheerleader for women who have never even considered running for office or being involved in a campaign, but who in the quietness of their hearts might think, 'Why not me?' ↗

— Marianne Williamson

#campaign #cheerleader #considered #even #hearts

Our key to transforming anything lies in our ability to reframe it. ↗

— Marianne Williamson

#anything #key #lies #our #transforming

Physical circumstances have very little to do with either our capacity to love or to attract love. ↗

— Marianne Williamson

#capacity #circumstances #either #little #love

The first step in forgiveness is the willingness to forgive. ↗

— Marianne Williamson

#first step #forgive #forgiveness #step #willingness

The only way to speak is diplomatically, and British is the imperial English tongue. I have expelled all claims to American independence from my pronunciation, and I have never felt more liberated. ↗

— Bauvard

#british #diplomacy #english #freedom #funny

Sweetest of all is liberty. This we have chosen and this we pay for. We have embraced the laws of Lykurgus, and they are stern laws. They have schooled us to scorn the life of leisure, which this rich land of ours would bestow upon us if we wished, and instead to enroll ourselves in the academy of discipline and sacrifice. Guided by these laws, our fathers for twenty generations have breathed the blessed air of freedom and have paid the bill in full when it was presented. We, their sons, can do no less. ↗

— Steven Pressfield

#liberty #sacrifice #warrior #warrior-ethos #freedom

But should we accept this negative view of power? Is power all bad? Specifically, can Christians share in this devaluation of power and discipline as inherently evil? Can we who claim to be disciples - who are called and predestined to be conformed to the likeness of the Son (Rom. 8:29) - be opposed to discipline and formation as such? Can we who are called to be subject to the Lord of life really agree with the liberal Enlightenment notion of the autonomous self? Are we not above all called to subject ourselves to our Domine and conform to his image? Of course, we are called not to conform to the patterns of 'this world' (Rom. 12:2) or to our previous evil desires (1 Peter 1:14), but that is a call not to nonconformity as such but rather to an alternative conformity through a counterformation in Christ, a transformation and renewal directed toward conformity to his image. By appropriating the liberal Enlightenment notion of negative freedom and participating in its nonconformist resistance to discipline (and hence a resistance to the classical spiritual disciplines), Christians are in fact being conformed to the patterns of this world (contra Rom. 12:2). ↗

— James K.A. Smith

#church #discipline #god #jesus #power