The fruitfulness of our lives depends in large measure in our ability to doubt our own words and to question the value of our own work. The man who completely trusts his own estimate of himself is doomed to sterility.

There is no greater disaster in the spiritual life than to be immersed in unreality, for life is maintained and nourished in us by our vital relation with realities outside and above us.

How can I be sincere if I am constantly changing my mind to conform with the shadow of what I think others expect of me?

What can we gain by sailing to the moon if we cannot cross the abyss that separates us from ourselves?

God must be allowed the right to speak unpredictably.... We must find him in our enemy, or we may lose him even in our friend. We must find him in the pagan or we will lose him in our own selves, substituting for his living presence an empty abstraction.

When you expect the world to end at any moment, you know there is no need to hurry. You take your time, you do your work well.

It is in the ordinary duties and labors of life that the Christian can and should develop his spiritual union with God.