 |
Interfaith
Quotes
Whenever
a human being ceases to live for themselves and
begins to care about that which is greater than
themselves, the personality begins to experience
ecstasy, joy and spontaneous liberation. And that's
found through doing, through action, through giving,
through deeply embracing the human experience.
-- Andrew
Cohen |
|
|
|
It
seems to rise again when the crisis times come,
and this is a time of most severe crisis, as
we all know, not just for the history of the
United States and the survival indeed of our
democracy, but for the future peace of the world.
And never before probably has the need for interfaith
commitment been nearly as great as it is at
this very moment.
-- Walter
Cronkite
|
The
fact that you are here tonight gathered together with
us testifies to the fact you understand the need for
this organization and the need for redoubling our
efforts in this organization to try to assure that
democracy as represented by the United States must
depend upon a total freedom of religion, which is
written into our Constitution, of course, and the
mere suggestion that anyone could maintain that one’s
patriotism, one’s devotion to one’s country can be
judged by one’s religion is so vile, so vile that
we have to take to the streets indeed and to put it
aside.
-- Walter
Cronkite
|
"My
religion is very simple. My religion is kindness."
- The
Dalai Lama
I
appreciate any organization or individual people
who sincerely make an effort to promote harmony
between humanity, and particularly harmony between
the various religions. I consider it very sacred
work and very important work
- The
Dalai Lama
|
|
The
problems we face today, violent conflicts, destruction
of nature, poverty, hunger and so on, are human-created
problems which can be resolved through human effort,
understanding and the development of a sense of brotherhood
and sisterhood. We need to cultivate a universal responsibility
for one another and the planet we share.
- The
Dalai Lama
"What
we would like to do is change the world-make it
a little simpler for people to feed, clothe, and
shelter themselves as God intended for them to
do. And, by fighting for better conditions, by
crying out unceasingly for the rights of the workers,
of the poor, of the destitute…we can, to a certain
extent, change the world; we can work for the
oasis, the little cell of joy and peace in a harried
world. We can throw our pebble in the pond and
be confident that its ever widening circle will
reach around the world. We repeat, there is nothing
that we can do but love, and, dear God, please
enlarge our hearts to love each other, to love
our neighbor, to love our enemy as well as our
friend."
-- Dorothy
Day |
|
"Whenever
I groan within myself and think how hard it is to
keep writing about love in these times of tension
and strife which may, at any moment, become for us
all a time of terror, I think to myself: What else
is the world interested in? What else do we all want,
each one of us, except to love and be loved, in our
families, in our work, in all our relationships? God
is Love. Love casts out fear. Even the most ardent
revolutionist, seeking to change the world, to overturn
the tables of the money changers, is trying to make
a world where it is easier for people to love, to
stand in that relationship to each other…There can
never be enough of it."
-- Dorothy
Day
|
|
"Our
principle is, and our practices have always
been, to seek peace, and ensue it, and to follow
after righteousness and the knowledge of God,
seeking the good and welfare, and doing that
which tends to the peace of all...All bloody
principles and practices we do utterly deny,
with all outward wars, and strife, and fightings
with outward weapons, for any end, or under
any pretence whatsoever..."
-- George
Fox
|
“My
generation was bold enough to question many things
and to seek spirituality over religion. We haven’t
succeeded in overthrowing the old order yet, and
maybe there are some meanings to be found in my
story about coming of age spiritually in the latter
half of the twentieth century.”
-- Matthew
Fox |
|
Compassion
is the essence of Jesus’ teaching, and indeed of the
teaching of all great spiritual figures from Mohammed
to Isaiah, from Lao Tzu to Chief Seattle. Yet compassion
has been sentimentalized and severed from its relationship
to justice-making and celebration. Creation Spirituality
links the struggle for justice with the yearning for
mysticism.
-- Matthew
Fox
We
were made for something cosmic and will not fit peacefully
into anything much smaller. And when we try to build
our lives around anything much smaller than cosmos
we become grotesque, and our institutions, be they
religious or familial or educational or governmental
are asked to do too much. They become misshapen and
malformed and turn into instruments of cosmic and
personal destruction.
-- Matthew
Fox
 |
Lord,
make me an instrument of your peace: where there
is hatred, let me sow love: where there is injury,
pardon; where there is doubt, faith; where there
is despair, hope; where there is darkness, light;
and where there is sadness, joy.
-- Saint
Francis of Assisi |
Every
time that religion has identified itself or entangled
itself with a particular political movement or
a particular government, religion has been harmed
by that. I see religion as a powerful positive
healing force for this nation and the world. But
that force is blunted, weakened, compromised inestimably,
if we turn religion into a tool for advancing
political strategy; if we make it a matter of
how to win political office; if we treat it as
anything other than a sacred part of life from
which we ought to draw sustenance and values and
strength for living courageously as good citizens.
-- C.
Welton Gaddy |
|
 |
Every
breath we take, every step we make, can be filled
with peace, joy, and serenity. We need only
to be awake, alive in the present moment.
-- Thich
Nhat Hanh
"Do
not be idolatrous about or bound to any doctrine,
theory, or ideology, even Buddhist ones. All
systems of thought are guiding means; they are
not absolute truth."
-- Thich
Nhat Hanh
|
|
"To
me, love, spirituality and life are all the
same thing. To me they're all about honoring
the circle, and they're just different ways
of defining the same understanding. Our society
as a whole, because we have placed our love
for money above our love for life, has devalued
the sacred and devalued love."
-- Julia
Butterfly Hill
|
 |
It
all began on a day in 1960, sitting in the kitchen
of my Greenwich home with a friend, snacking on peanut
butter sandwiches, talking about what a mess the world
was in, with the spectre of nuclear Armageddon not
a remote possibility, when as if out of nowhere, a
light turned on in my mind and I excitedly saw an
antidote -- an ongoing forum where dialogue and understanding
could be promoted by bringing all the world's religions
together under one roof.'
-- Juliet Hollister, founder of the Temple of Understanding
There
is so much work yet to be done. It is so clear to
me that all we have to do is awaken to the fact that
we are all ONE, or as my friend Father Thomas Merton
has so rightly said, 'We are already ONE . . . what
we have to become is what we already are.' It seems
so simple, doesn't it? Yet so much more work to do.
So much more work.'
-- Juliet Hollister, founder of the Temple of Understanding
 |
In
the next 30 years we can destroy our world. With
the very same powers — spiritual, social, scientific
— we can evolve our world. Our mission is to serve
as catalysts for a planetary awakening in our
lifetime, to take a non-violent path to the next
stage of our evolution.
-- Barbara
Marx Hubbard |
…in
place of the Old Bottom Line of money and power,
a New Bottom Line of Love and Generosity is possible.
People of all faiths need to shape a political
and social movement that reaffirms the most generous,
peace-oriented, social justice-committed, and
loving truths of the spiritual heritage of the
human race.
-- Rabbi
Michael Lerner |
|
|
A
life is either all spiritual or not spiritual
at all. No man can serve two masters. Your life
is shaped by the end you live for. You are made
in the image of what you desire.
-- Thomas
Merton
The
whole idea of compassion is based on a keen
awareness of the interdependence of all these
living beings, which are all part of one another,
and all involved in one another.
--
Thomas
Merton
|
|
 |
The
Interfaith Alliance has to become an ongoing sustaining
and powerful movement whose interest is to prove
that religion has a healing side as well as a
killing side, and that democracy is the consequence
of conscience
-- Bill
Moyers |
|
The
world’s major religions in the end all want
the same thing, even though they were born in
different places and circumstances on this planet.
What the world needs today is a convergence
of the different religions in the search for
and definition of the cosmic or divine laws
which ought to regulate our behavior on this
planet.
--
Robert
Muller
|
 |
|
|
"As
believers we all have an opportunity and moral
obligation to recognize our spiritual common
ground; to rise above our differences; to combat
prejudice and intolerance."
-- Queen
Noor of Jordan
|
|
"Be
a sweet melody in the great orchestration, instead
of a discordant note. The medicine this sick
world needs is love. Hatred must be replaced
by love, and fear by faith that love will prevail."
-- Peace
Pilgrim
|
|
What
interfaith seeks to do is to not allow religion to
fall back into confrontational modes, into contemporary
crusades and jihads, rather to move onwards to a new
level of interfaith harmony and understanding."
-- Dr. Karen Singh
"I
would like the church to be a place where the
questions of people are honored rather than
a place where we have all the answers. The church
has to get out of propaganda. The future will
involve us in more interfaith dialogue. ...
We cannot say we have the only truth."
-- Bishop
John Shelby Spong
|
|
''We're
talking about calling the entire world of religion
into a global dialogue,''
-- Bishop William E. Swing
|
|
Love
is a fruit in season at all times and within
the reach of every hand. Anyone may gather it
and no limit is set. Everyone can reach this
love through meditation, prayer, sacrifice,
and an intense inner life.
~ Mother
Teresa
|
|
We
are not human beings having a spiritual experience;
we are spiritual beings having a human experience.
-- Pierre
Teilhard De Chardin
|
|
|
|
Certainly
the vision of the spiritual nature of man and
the universe brings the conviction that the
human potential is unlimited and that we stand
at the threshold over which a quantum leap in
consciousness is possible.
~ George
Trevelyan
|
|
"My
humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only
be human together."
-- Desmond
Tutu
|
 |
In
the context of interfaith encounter, we need to bring
to the surface how our actual beliefs shape what we
do - not simply to agree that kindness is better than
cruelty.
-- Rowan D. Williams
 |
The
spiritual path -- is simply the journey of living
our lives. Everyone is on a spiritual path;
most people just don't know it.
-- Marianne
Williamson
|
Love
is what we are born with. Fear is what we learn. The
spiritual journey is the unlearning of fear and prejudices
and the acceptance of love back in our hearts. Love
is the essential reality and our purpose on earth.
To be consciously aware of it, to experience love
in ourselves and others, is the meaning of life. Meaning
does not lie in things. Meaning lies in us.
-- Marianne
Williamson
|
We
can find common ground only by moving to higher
ground.
-- Jim
Wallis
|
 |
www.InterfaithDay.com
- June 22
www.SpiritualityDay.com
- December 31
Quotes
for a Culture of Peace
A
CALENDAR OF DAYS
To Celebrate
Hope for
A CULTURE OF PEACE
|
 |
and to unite and mobilize
the Culture of Peace Movement...
|
 |
January
| February
| March
| April
|
May
| June
| July
| August
|
September
| October
| November
| December
|
You are
a pathway To Peace!
|
 |
|
 |
