As a culture, we turn away from people just when they are in times of change. That's when most communities used to embrace people, so the individual and the culture both benefited.

Trouble is another word for fate; what troubles us the most is what we are fated to one day face. What troubles us in youth will return at each crossroad in life because it secretly seeks to provoke a deep awakening to the unique way that we are intended to live.

In many tribal cultures, it was said that if the boys were not initiated into manhood, if they were not shaped by the skills and love of elders, then they would destroy the culture. If the fires that innately burn inside youths are not intentionally and lovingly added to the hearth of community, they will burn down the structures of culture, just to feel the warmth.

The desire to be part of something greater and to occupy life more fully, is also a desire to touch and be touched by the living imagination that sustains each soul and all of life.

A false sense of security is the only kind there is.

As a culture, we turn away from people just when they are in times of change. That's when most communities used to embrace people, so the individual and the culture both benefited.

When a culture simply shrugs about what happens to people in war, it breaks the fragile sequence, the bond between all people.