Imagine how happy, how holy, life would be if we ever really learn to see beauty.

Assuming that tomorrow will be the same as today is poor preparation for living. It equips us only for disappointment or, more likely, for shock. To live well, to be mentally healthy, we must learn to realize that life is a work in process.

Don't worry about wearing the sign; be the sign. You don't have to wear a sandwich board saying, "I am religious and spiritual and know what you should do." You do have to be the best of the mystical presence that your tradition brings. Certainly in Christianity, that means that you begin to go through life putting on the mind of Jesus, trying to see the world as Jesus saw the world.

Compassion makes no distinction between friends and enemies, neighbors and outsiders, compatriots and foreigners. Compassion is the gate to human community.

The kind of "blind obedience" once theologized as the ultimate step to holiness, is itself blind. It blinds a person to the insights and foresight and moral perspective of anyone other than an authority figure.

Our role in life is to bring the light of our own souls to the dim places around us.

Fear is not the opposite of courage. Fear is the catalyst of courage.