Daniel Quinn: "If you are still..."

"If you are still then you will be better able to hear."

–Daniel Quinn, Ishmael

Daniel Quinn: "To a mind ready..."

"To a mind ready for mythology, he was the beginning of what is meant by godlike. He had twice made a brief appearance in my life – and twice, with a single utterance, had transformed me."

–Daniel Quinn, Ishmael

Barbara Kingsolver: "I believe in vegetables..."

"I believe in vegetables in general, and this one in particular. Gardeners are widely known and mocked for this sort of fanaticism. But other people fast or walk long pilgrimages to honor the spirit of what they believe makes our world whole and lovely. If we gardeners can, in the same spirit, put our heels to the shovel, kneel before a trench holding tender roots, and then wait three years for an edible incarnation of the spring equinox, who's to make the call between ridiculous and reverent?"

—Barbara Kingsolver, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle (on asparagus)

Barbara Kingsolver: "Our family values..."

"Our family values... include both 'love your neighbor' and 'try not to wreck every blooming thing on the planet while you're here.'"

—Barbara Kingsolver, Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

Jan Karon: "My friend, if you keep..."

"My friend, if you keep your eyes on Christians, you will be diappointed every day of your life. Your hope is to keep your eyes on Christ."

-Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford

Jan Karon: "... what God does with..."

"... what God does with our faith must be something like workouts. He sees to it that our faith gets pushed and pulled, stretched, and pounded, taken to its limits so its limits can expand."

-Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford

Oswald Chambers: "Common sense is not..."

"Common sense is not faith, and faith is not common sense."

-Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford (original quote by Oswald Chambers)

Jan Karon: "Boldly! That was the..."

"Boldly! That was the great and powerful key. Preach boldly! Love boldly! Jog boldly! And most crucial of all, do not approach God whining or begging, but boldly - as a child of the King."

-Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford

Jan Karon: "... a man must hammer..."

"... a man must hammer out his theology alone."

-Jan Karon, At Home in Mitford

Martha Beck: "Angels come in many..."

"Angels come in many shapes and sizes, and most of them are not invisible."

—Martha Beck, Expecting Adam

Martha Beck: "The strangeness, the curiosity..."

"The strangeness, the curiosity, the wonder keeps pushing outward, begging to be communicated, needing air and company."

—Martha Beck, Expecting Adam

Dalai Lama: "People take different roads..."

Unknown: "Exult in the quotidian..."

"Exult in the quotidian beauty of life!"

-Unknown

W. Somerset Maugham: "If you will act..."

"If you will act as if you believed, belief will be granted to you.
If you pray with doubt, but pray with sincerity, your doubt will be dispelled.
If you will surrender yourself to the beauty of liturgy, the power which over the human spirit has been proved by the experience of ages, peace will descend upon you."

—W. Somerset Maugham, The Razor's Edge

Herman Hesse: "The world is perfect..."

"The world is perfect at every moment.  Every sin already contains grace within it, all little children already have an old person in them, every infant has death within it, and all dying people have within them eternal life. It is not possible to see in another person how far along the way he is. In the bandit & dice player, a Buddha is waiting; in the Brahmin, a bandit. In the depths of meditation lies the possibility of cutting though time, of seeing the simultaneity of all past, present, future life; and within that, everything is good, all is perfect, all is Brahman. Thus I see whatever is as good. I see that life & death, sin & holiness, intelligence & foolishness, must be as they are. It only requires my consent, my willingness, my loving acceptance & it will be good for me, can never harm me. Let it be. Love it. Be glad to be a part."


—Herman Hesse, Siddhartha

Katherine Rosman: "There is a spiritual..."

"There is a spiritual rhythm created by women in a kitchen on a holiday..."

—Katherine Rosman, If You Knew Suzy

Khalil Gibran: "You are far, far..."

"You are far, far greater than you know - and all is well."

—Khalil Gibran

Katherine Rosman: "She was our mom..."

"She was our mom. We were her girls. Inevitabilities like adulthood and marriage didn't change that."

—Katherine Rosman, If You Knew Suzy