One cannot be strong without love. For love is not an irrelevant emotion; it is the blood of life.
Paul TillichEvery person, every place and every action is qualified by this association with the unconditional; it penetrates every moment of daily life and sanctifies it: "The Universe is God's sanctuary. Every work day is a day of the Lord, every supper is a Lord's supper, every work a fulfillment of the divine task, every joy a joy in God. In all preliminary concerns, ultimate concern is present, consecrating them."
Paul TillichMorality [or ethics] is not a subject; it is a life put to the test in dozens of moments.
Paul TillichThe separation of faith and love is always a consequence of a deterioration of religion.
Paul Tillich...history has shown that the most terrible crimes against love have been committed in the name of fanatically defended doctrines.
Paul TillichAll things and all people, so to speak, call on us with small or loud voices. They want us to listen. They want us to understand their intrinsic claims, their justice of being. But we can give it to them only through the love that listens.
Paul TillichFaith as ultimate concern is an act of the total personality. It happens in the center of the personal life and includes all its elements. Faith is the most centered act of the human mind. It is not a movement of a special section or a special function of man's total being. They all are united in the act of faith.
Paul Tillichman is free, in so far as he has the power of contradicting himself and his essential nature. Man is free even from his freedom; that is, he can surrender his humanity
Paul TillichBeing human means asking the questions of one's own being and living under the impact of the answers given to this question. And, conversely, being human means receiving answers to the questions of one's own being and asking questions under the impact of the answers.
Paul TillichThe awareness of the ambiguity of one's highest achievements, as well as one's deepest failures is a definite symptom of maturity.
Paul TillichI loved thee beautiful and kind, And plighted an eternal vow; So altered are thy face and mind, t'were perjury to love thee now!
Paul TillichThe most intimate motions within the depths of our souls are not completely our own. For they belong also to our friends, to humankind, to the universe, and the Ground of all being, the aim of our life.
Paul TillichBeing religious means asking passionately the question of the meaning of our existence and being willing to receive answers, even if the answers hurt.
Paul TillichThe fatal pedagogical error is to throw answers like stones at the heads of those who have not yet asked the questions.
Paul TillichExistential anxiety of doubt drives the person toward the creation of certitude of systems of meaning, which are supported by tradition and authority. Neurotic anxiety builds a narrow castle of certitude which can be defended with the utmost certainty.
Paul Tillich[A] process was going on in which people were transformed into things, into pieces of reality which pure science can calculate and technical science can control. … [T]he safety which is guaranteed by well-functioning mechanisms for the technical control of nature, by the refined psychological control of the person, by the rapidly increasing organizational control of society – this safety is bought at a high price: man, for whom all this was invented as a means, becomes a means himself in the service of means.
Paul TillichGrace strikes us when we are in great pain ....Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying, 'You are accepted.'
Paul TillichParents need to listen as much to their kids as they do to them: "The first duty of love is to listen."
Paul TillichWisdom loves the children of men, but she prefers those who come through foolishness to wisdom.
Paul TillichThe basic anxiety, the anxiety of a finite being about the threat of non-being, cannot be eliminated. It belongs to existence itself.
Paul TillichIn the courageous standing of uncertainty, faith shows most visibly its dynamic character.
Paul TillichFaith as the state of being ultimately concerned implies love, namely, the desire and urge toward the reunion of the seperated.
Paul TillichThe citizens of a city are not guilty of the crimes committed in their city; but they are guilty as participants in the destiny of [humanity] as a whole and in the destiny of their city in particular; for their acts in which freedom was united with destiny have contributed to the destiny in which they participate. They are guilty, not of committing the crimes of which their group is accused, but of contributing to the destiny in which these crimes happened.
Paul TillichI have given no definition of love. This is impossible, because there is no higher principle by which it could be defined. It is life itself in its actual unity. The forms and structures in which love embodies itself are the forms and structures in which love overcomes its self-destructive forces.
Paul TillichBut freedom is the possibility of a total and centered act of the personality, an act in which all the drives and influences which constitute the destiny of man are brought into the centered unity of a decision.
Paul TillichHe who risks and fails can be forgiven. He who never risks and never fails is a failure in his whole being.
Paul TillichYou are accepted. You are accepted, accepted by that which is greater than you, and the name of which you do not know. Do not ask for the name now; perhaps you will find it later. Do not try to do anything now; perhaps later you will do much. Do not seek for anything; do not perform anything; do not intend anything. Simply accept the fact that you are accepted!
Paul TillichNothing truly real is forgotten eternally, because everything real comes from eternity and goes to eternity.
Paul Tillich