I think those who have a terminal illness and are in great pain should have the right to choose to end their own life, and those that help them should be free from prosecution.

I look after people.

To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.

Constant kindness can accomplish much. As the sun makes ice melt, kindness causes misunderstanding, mistrust, and hostility to evaporate.

When you are young, you cannot imagine being disabled. You imagine you would conquer it somehow. As I’ve got older, I can imagine it; I can see how life narrows in. I feel compassion for my mother now.

It is easy enough to be friendly to one’s friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.

One of the most pervasive political visions of our time is the vision of liberals as compassionate and conservatives as less caring.

But who prays for Satan? Who, in eighteen centuries, has had the common humanity to pray for the one sinner that needed it most?

A physician is not angry at the intemperance of a mad patient, nor does he take it ill to be railed at by a man in fever. Just so should a wise man treat all mankind, as a physician does his patient, and look upon them only as sick and extravagant.

Our task must be to free ourselves by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature and its beauty.

If you’re in trouble, or hurt or need – go to the poor people. They’re the only ones that’ll help – the only ones.

‚Suffering should not make us bitter people,‘ my mother once said, ‚it should make us better comforters.‘ Young people need to hear this from those who have walked before them, because someday they’ll be walking those same steps, but there may not be anyone following behind.

We need to, you know, restore people. We need to show mercy. I mean, because as much mercy as you show people, that’s the mercy you’re going to be receiving.

Wherever there is a human being, there is an opportunity for a kindness.

When you have kids, you see life through different eyes. You feel love more deeply and are maybe a little more compassionate. It’s inevitable that that would make its way into your songwriting.

The poorest people are the sweetest people.

A bone to the dog is not charity. Charity is the bone shared with the dog, when you are just as hungry as the dog.

Instead of judging people, we need to pray.

There is such a thing as old emotional pain living inside you. It is an accumulation of painful life experience that was not fully faced and accepted in the moment it arose. It leaves behind an energy form of emotional pain.

The greatest gift that you can give to others is the gift of unconditional love and acceptance.

Strength and compassion are not mutually exclusive.

What really raises one’s indignation against suffering is not suffering intrinsically, but the senselessness of suffering.

Peace begins with a smile.

Never deprive someone of hope; it might be all they have.

Every time I see documentaries or infomercials about little kids with cancer, I just freak out. It affects me on the highest emotional level… Anytime I think about it, it makes me sadder than anything I can think of.

Respect the burden.

Jesus never mistreated anyone just because they mistreated Him. He confronted them in a spirit of gentleness and then continued to love them.

What you do not want done to yourself, do not do to others.

Whether one believes in a religion or not, and whether one believes in rebirth or not, there isn’t anyone who doesn’t appreciate kindness and compassion.

While we ourselves are the living graves of murdered animals, how can we expect any ideal living conditions on this earth?

Real living is living for others.

When you truly accept that those children in some far off place in the global village have the same value as you in God’s eyes or even in just your eyes, then your life is forever changed; you see something that you can’t un-see.

All major religious traditions carry basically the same message, that is love, compassion and forgiveness the important thing is they should be part of our daily lives.

How shall I lose the sin, yet keep the sense, and love the offender, yet detest the offence?

I think we all have empathy. We may not have enough courage to display it.

A good thing to remember is somebody’s got it a lot worse than we do.

It’s good to remember that in crises, natural crises, human beings forget for awhile their ignorances, their biases, their prejudices. For a little while, neighbors help neighbors and strangers help strangers.

What do you regard as most humane? To spare someone shame.

Rose Adams is a wonderful Christian woman who cared for my mother, Morrow Coffey Graham, in her last years of life.

Blessed are the merciful, for they will be shown mercy.

I think if you follow anyone home, whether they live in Houston or London, and you sit at their dinner table and talk to them about their mother who has cancer or their child who is struggling in school, and their fears about watching their lives go by, I think we’re all the same.

I can do no other than be reverent before everything that is called life. I can do no other than to have compassion for all that is called life. That is the beginning and the foundation of all ethics.

We just cannot worry about ourselves.

Stay humble and be concerned for the less fortunate.

Men are only as great as they are kind.

It is one of the beautiful compensations in this life that no one can sincerely try to help another without helping himself.

The good man is the friend of all living things.

Still and all, why bother? Here’s my answer. Many people need desperately to receive this message: I feel and think much as you do, care about many of the things you care about, although most people do not care about them. You are not alone.

If you find it in your heart to care for somebody else, you will have succeeded.

Men feel that cruelty to the poor is a kind of cruelty to animals. They never feel that it is an injustice to equals; nay it is treachery to comrades.

Tears shed for self are tears of weakness, but tears shed for others are a sign of strength.

The just is close to the people’s heart, but the merciful is close to the heart of God.

It is a very rare man who does not victimize the helpless.

If you love those who love you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners love those who love them. And if you do good to those who do good to you, what credit is that to you? For even sinners do the same.

Ethiopia didn’t just blow my mind; it opened my mind. Anyway, on our last day at this orphanage a man handed me his baby and said, ‚Would you take my son with you?‘ He knew, in Ireland, that his son would live, and that in Ethiopia, his son would die.

Encouragement to others is something everyone can give. Somebody needs what you have to give. It may not be your money; it may be your time. It may be your listening ear. It may be your arms to encourage. It may be your smile to uplift. Who knows?

The Bible tells us to love our neighbors, and also to love our enemies; probably because generally they are the same people.

The true measure of a man is how he treats someone who can do him absolutely no good.

A doctor gave a man six months to live. The man couldn’t pay his bill, so he gave him another six months.

I try to give to the poor people for love what the rich could get for money. No, I wouldn’t touch a leper for a thousand pounds; yet I willingly cure him for the love of God.

I’m a pretty tough guy, you know. I’m a pretty hard man. I’ve got a lot of compassion, but I don’t waste time with people.