Turning a corner

Jesus exploded into the life of ancient Israel -- the life of the whole world, in fact -- not as a teacher of timeless truths, nor as a great moral example, but as one through whose life, death and resurrection God's rescue operation was put into effect, and the cosmos turned its great corner at last.

N.T. Wright
Simply Christian

Incarnation

For me, the Incarnation is the place, if you will, where hope contends with fear. Not an antique doctrine at all, but reality - as ordinary as my everyday struggles with fears great and small, as exalted as the hope that allows me some measure of peace when I soldier on in the daily round.

Kathleen Norris
Amazing Grace

Prison and Advent

Life in a prison cell may well be compared to Advent; one waits, hopes, and does this, that, or the other--things that are really of no consequence--the door is shut and can be opened only from the outside.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer from Tegel Prison: November 21, 1943 - To Eberhard Bethge

Letters and Papers from Prison by Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Solidarity

The very first statement Jesus ever voiced about his concern for the poor, oppressed, marginalized people was when he cried out as one of them--eyes shut tight, mouth open wide, wailing, kicking ...It was one of the most profound acts of solidarity with the poor he could make.

Scott Bessenecker
The New Friars

Weakness

If I am to seek for answers to my questions, or even for the questions to ask in the first place, I must hold on to this failure [Jesus], but it isn’t easy, so far have we strayed from the original vision. We don’t understand the method in his madness. His coming to us as a human child, in total weakness, was the greatest act of warfare against the powers of hate and chaos that I know. And if I, too, am to fight in this battle, it is from his weakness that I must draw my strength.

Madeleine L’Engle
The Irrational Season

Holiness is...

…Holiness is… more than a moral or imitative quality. It is the embracing of their own uniqueness, a work that in most cases involves a radical and dangerous experiment in their own relationship with the institution . No one breaks through into the energy of the spirit just by doing what is expected of them or by what ensures security and immediate approval…


From Fr Laurence Freeman's Foreword to the 2009 collection of essays entitled, John Main: The Expanding Vision.

Loneliness

The roots of loneliness are very deep and cannot be touched by optimistic advertisement, substitute love images or social togetherness. They find their food in the suspicion that there is no one who cares and offers love without conditions, and no place where we can be vulnerable without being used.

Henri Nouwen
Reaching Out

Images

When a religion aggressively proselytizes and seeks to transform the world, its most important resource is its images. It is image that transforms the imagination, and it is imagination that engenders a lifestyle. And what globalization does better than anything else is transform the imagination. That is why the entertainment and advertising industries are the first wave of the emerging global consciousness.

Brian Walsh & Sylvia Keesmaat
Colossians Remixed: Subverting the Empire

Place

A place, I repeat, is a somewhere that isn’t going anywhere. So an experience of a place can befall us only when we do the same.

David James Duncan

My Story as Told by Water