Brother Curtis Almquist: Religion
We cannot possess anything in this life, nothing truly belongs to us. I would say that it all belongs to God, and we belong to God. We are not possessors of anything, but rather stewards of everything. And because we are stewards we cherish things all the more.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Curtis Almquist: Religion
Freedom is known in the context of limitation, which is quite counter-cultural. We live in a culture where we are identified as “consumers,” in a market economy that is constantly alluring us with dissatisfaction, where what is next or what is new is presumed better than what is now. More is more and never enough. The notion that what is, is enough is quite radical, and yet there is a buried treasure to be found in the grace of contentment.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Curtis Almquist: Religion
Mortality. Amidst the diminishments that aging brings can come an enormous and eternal freedom, a freedom of availability that we could not have known in our younger years.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Curtis Almquist: Religion
Wisdom has its source in God, and we have access to wisdom when we acknowledge that we are not our own god, when we are awe-filled with the recognition that we have something to learn from God about how to make meaning of this life.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Curtis Almquist: Religion
To look at the Bible as some kind of fixed and final Word of God is a canon firing in the wrong direction. The Bible is part of the movement of God’s revelation, which is continuous.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Mark Brown: Religion
We are so tempted to measure human worth by what we have or what we can do or any number of other ways. But if the Spirit of God dwells within us, if this Spirit flows between us and among us and through us like “a river of living water”, we are bound to recognize our essential equality.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Mark Brown: Religion
When it comes right down to it, the Christian religion is grounded in what we embody, what we actually do in this world, what we incarnate. Theology—great. Scholarship—great. Bible study—great. Personal devotion—great. All these good things can be strategies of evasion, however, if we are not grounded in actual practice in an actual community.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Brother Mark Brown: Religion
I heard Elie Wiesel speak once in a synagogue near Chicago. I remember him saying that gratitude is the most human sentiment. I think what he meant was that when we are in a state of gratitude, we are most fully alive in our humanity. That such fullness of life and humanity is possible for us is yet more cause for thanksgiving.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
G.K. Chesterson: Religion
The great majority of people will go on observing forms that cannot be explained; they will keep Christmas Day with Christmas gifts and Christmas benedictions; they will continue to do it; and someday suddenly wake up and discover why.
(Generally Speaking)
detail
Benjamin Franklin: Religion
All of us who were engaged in the struggle must have observed frequent instances of superintending providence in our favor. To that kind providence we owe this happy opportunity of consulting in peace on the means of establishing our future national felicity. And have we now forgotten that powerful friend? Or do we imagine that we no longer need his assistance? I have lived, Sir, a long time, and the longer I live, the more convincing proofs I see of this truth-that God governs in the affairs of men. And if a sparrow cannot fall to the Ground without his Notice, is it probable that an Empire can rise without his Aid?
(To Colleagues at the Constitutional Convention)
detail
Brother Kevin Hackett: Religion
Gardens evoke a distant memory, one encoded in our spiritual DNA, a recollection of Eden—and that awakens our desire to return to the place where we once walked with the Lord God in the cool of the evening.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
Christopher Hoctor: Religion
There are many laws in religions that are based upon the needs of the time they were revealed in, and so when another time comes and other needs are important the laws change. But there are also eternal laws that do not change, these are the laws governing spiritual development and are important for the growth of the soul and the Church. Here is one such law given by the Buddha, "Occasions of hatred are certainly never settled by hatred. They are settled by freedom from hatred. This is the eternal law." We could quote many teachers, people of other religions, I see a lot of it on FB. But the truth of the matter is that our 'one, holy catholic' church has such laws as well, and they say it all, if not enough (see Matthew 22: 36-40). Can we live by that law? It's a pressure to be perfect, to be like Christ, which is a noble venture but impossible. We have a hard enough time sticking to church policy! And that is Satan at work dividing the tree into tooth picks.
Christ's Church gave us many other timeless laws; guidance, canons, doctrine, carefully written and interpreted for 20 centuries. These are not as well known as they used to be, but they haven't changed. Sadly, they have fallen under decay and people say they do not fit 'in these times'. I say they fit more than ever, in these times. Reading Compline at the end of every day is more than a way to remember how 'nice' it ended the day when we all read it together. It is a connection to your Church past, and present, a timeless liturgy with true purpose.
I would encourage everyone to find new ways (new to us); ask your priest, from time to time, to resurrect a less used practice that has just as much meaning today as it did 1500 years ago. Connect to the rich heritage of the church, know more about the liturgies you are using, the canons and laws, make life an ongoing church school. Although there are lots of interesting things to know and learn about other religions, it would serve us well to understand our own religion before allowing ourselves to be absorbed by the quips and quotes of others.
detail
Bishop Nick Knisely: Religion
There are in principle Universal Truths, but scientifically speaking at least, we don't seem to be able to exactly express them. And so universal truth has become essentially a matter of faith scientifically and experimentally speaking. We want it to exist so that all the wonderful work done by the classical Greek schools of philosophy will still be relevant. But it doesn't and they aren't - at least not in the way they were to people in the time of Newton and the other giants of scientific determinism.
That shift landed us in the world of the post-modern. But post-modernism has its own sets of problems. It becomes impossible to speak of universal meaning anymore. Things become rapidly reductionist and personal. And that is making it harder and harder to find values that a large group of people can agree to. Which is in turn making it harder and harder to create the sort of broad participation in the kinds of structures that make society and common good possible. People will choose the morals they like, persecute the people they don't, and will be moving inexorably into the dead-end of a intellectual echo-chamber that threatens to undermine any attempt to back out of it.
detail
Brother James Koester: Religion
We only know the relief of dawn when the terrors of the night have kept us awake. We only know the joy of resurrection when the fear of darkness has clutched our hearts, but even there, even then, even now God is at work in your life. Take courage. Now is God’s time in your life.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail
C. S. Lewis: Religion
A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word 'darkness' on the walls of his cell.
(The Problem of Pain)
detail
C. S. Lewis: Religion
I believe in Christianity as I believe that the sun has risen: not only because I see it, but because by it I see everything else.
detail
C. S. Lewis: Religion
To be a Christian means to forgive the inexcusable, because God has forgiven the inexcusable in you.
(The Weight of Glory)
detail
Archibald Macleish: Religion
Religion is at its best when it makes us ask hard questions of ourselves. It is at its worst when it deludes us into thinking we have all the answers for everybody else.
detail
Gabriel Marcel: Religion
The striking thing about the Precious Blood is the bond it establishes between love and suffering in our experience, a bond that has become so close that we have come to think of suffering accepted with joy as the most authentic sign of love with any depth at all.
detail
Saint John Maximovitch: Religion
Never, never, never let anyone tell you that in order to be Orthodox, you must also be eastern. The West was Orthodox for a thousand years, and her venerable liturgy is far older than any of her heresies.
detail
President Ronald Reagan: Religion
Freedom is never more than one generation away from extinction. We didn't pass it to our children in the bloodstream. It must be fought for, protected, and handed on for them to do the same, or one day we will spend our sunset years telling our children and our children's children what it was once like in the United States where men were free.
Freedom prospers when religion is vibrant and the rule of law under God is acknowledged.
detail
Brother David Vryhof: Religion
We can exercise tolerance towards others while still insisting that we are right and they are wrong. What is needed is something more than tolerance; what is needed is a clear way of seeing that acknowledges the mystery of the other and the mystery of truth.
(Society of Saint John the Evangelist)
detail