To be a monk is to have time to practice for your transformation and healing. And after that to help with the transformation and healing of other people.
The "new" in us is bound to notice the "old" that remains.
Never give up what you want most for what you want today.
If another person only had in his storehouse of deserved self-esteem what you had put there, what would he have to draw upon and to sustain him?
We should not assume; however, that just because something is unexplainable by us, it is unexplainable.
These really are our days, and we can prevail and overcome, even in the midst of trends that are very disturbing. If we are faithful the day will come when those deserving pioneers and ancestors, whom we rightly praise for having overcome the adversities in the wilderness trek, will praise today’s faithful for having made their way successfully through a desert of despair and for having passed through a cultural wilderness, while still keeping the faith.
God, as a loving Father, will stretch our souls at times. The soul is like a violin string: it makes music only when it is stretched. . . . God will tutor us by trying us because He loves us, not because of indifference!
Recognize that everyone suffers in their own life, even if you don't see it; even if you think they've got it easy.
I'm not against sentimentality. I think you need it. I mean, I don't think you get a true picture of people without it in writing. . . It's a kind of poetry, it's an emotional poetry, and, to bring it back to the literary scene, I don't think anything is true that doesn't have it, that doesn't have poetry in it.
Childhood is frequently a solemn business for those inside it.
Powerlessness and silence go together.