“Our spiritual journey requires a deepening awareness of our own shadow and light. It requires a rigorous commitment to ‘catching ourselves in the act’ of automatic, programmed responses. It requires choosing instead to respond from the place of light in us and to call forth that light in every life we touch. It requires a descent into our deepest, truest self, into the wellspring of Divine Love in us. That descent involves a thousand deaths to the ego, a constant pattern of letting go and surrendering at deeper and deeper levels. The descent often involves suffering which we do not choose—it chooses us” ( By K. Killian Noe from Descent Into Love: How Recovery Cafe Came to Be).

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“If only it were all so simple! If only there were evil people somewhere insidiously committing evil deeds, and it were necessary only to separate them from the rest of us and destroy them. But the line dividing good and evil cuts through the heart of every human being. And who is willing to destroy a piece of his own heart?” (By Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn)

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“If we look at the great myths of religious and secular history, we see that events, historical trials, and concrete circumstances are themselves the primary teachers. For the Jewish and Christian tradition, God is specifically encountered in history and relationships, not in analysis. Community and experiencing life together in the context of human history–which is longer and wider than our individual lives–help us trust reality and grow into fullness” (By Richard Rohr, Daily Meditation, April 21, 2016).

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“In our generation we have rediscovered guilt; we have plenty of shame and violence; we have alienation at all levels. And we don’t know what to do with it, either at a personal or at a corporate level. Cleansing of the conscience is what is required; and the only way to do that is by the total offering of the human life to God. But that total offering isn’t something we can do for ourselves. If we try, we are merely trying to pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps” (By N.T. Wright in Following Jesus).