The greatest enemy to human souls is the self-righteous spirit which makes men look to themselves for salvation.

‚Kiss Land‘ wasn’t about what people wanted to hear on the radio. It was the state of mind I was in – introverted, like David Cronenberg’s ‚Naked Lunch.‘ You didn’t know if you were hearing a chorus or a verse. It was just my thoughts.

If the grace of God miraculously operates, it probably operates through the subliminal door.

In great contests each party claims to act in accordance with the will of God. Both may be, and one must be wrong.

There is only one religion, though there are a hundred versions of it.

The happiness and peace attained by those satisfied by the nectar of spiritual tranquillity is not attained by greedy persons restlessly moving here and there.

We are never deceived; we deceive ourselves.

I’m an expert typist. I learned in high school. I would close my eyes and just type without worrying about mistakes. I tried to penetrate my heart, and as I let my thoughts drift, things bubbled up to the surface.

The enemy is within the gates; it is with our own luxury, our own folly, our own criminality that we have to contend.

The only answer to fear is faith in God, knowing He loves you unconditionally and individually.

From my point of view, God is the light that illuminates the darkness, even if it does not dissolve it, and a spark of divine light is within each of us.

My thought is me: that is why I cannot stop thinking. I exist because I think I cannot keep from thinking.

I know my flaws before other people point them out to me.

Perhaps I can say that I am a bit astute, that I can adapt to circumstances, but it is also true that I am a bit naive. Yes, but the best summary, the one that comes more from the inside and I feel most true is this: I am a sinner whom the Lord has looked upon.

I always say that people should not rush to change religions. There is real value in finding the spiritual resources you need in your home religion.

The reason why the world lacks unity, and lies broken and in heaps, is, because man is disunited with himself.

We’re all put on this earth to walk in His image, the Master.

The most effective prayers are usually the simple prayers.

My home is in Heaven. I’m just traveling through this world.

I think Buddhism should open the door of psychology and healing to penetrate more easily into the Western world.

For a young person, it is almost a sin, or at least a danger, to be too preoccupied with himself; but for the ageing person, it is a duty and a necessity to devote serious attention to himself.

People are looking for something a little more stable; people are feeling like they need to get closer to God.

My mother always used to say, ‚Well, if you had been born a little girl growing up in Egypt, you would go to church or go to worship Allah, but surely if those people are worshipping a God, it must be the same God‘ – that’s what she always said. The same God with different names.

In my case Pilgrim’s Progress consisted in my having to climb down a thousand ladders until I could reach out my hand to the little clod of earth that I am.

I don’t pretend we have all the answers. But the questions are certainly worth thinking about.

Some Christians feel guilty when they are doing something that isn’t ‚spiritual.‘ Somehow or another, they feel the need to hurry through the grocery store, dash through the house cleaning, and rush through all the daily aspects of life that seem irrelevant to their faith.

We should never let material things get ahead of God or become so important in our lives that we can’t walk away from them if He tells us to. Anything you own that has a hold on you is a problem.

The spirit becomes free only when it ceases to be a support.

Sometimes, I feel like one who is on the sidelines, who has missed life itself.

Great thoughts and a pure heart, that is what we should ask from God.

It is the heart which perceives God and not the reason. That is what faith is: God perceived by the heart, not by the reason.

The experience of life consists of the experience which the spirit has of itself in matter and as matter, in mind and as mind, in emotion, as emotion, etc.

Death surrenders us totally to God: it makes us enter into him; we must, in return, surrender ourselves to death with absolute love and self-abandonment since, when death comes, all we can do is to surrender ourselves completely to the domination and guidance of God.

Fear of death makes us devoid both of valour and religion. For want of valour is want of religious faith.

The heart has its reasons of which reason knows nothing.

Our heart glows, and secret unrest gnaws at the root of our being. Dealing with the unconscious has become a question of life for us.

In the Church, and in the journey of faith, women have had and still have a special role in opening doors to the Lord.

I’m not the judge. You know, God didn’t tell me to go around judging everybody.

Solitude is independence.

The essence of all religions is one. Only their approaches are different.

I believe in believing. My coach John Kavanagh is a big atheist, and he is always trying to persuade people to his way of thinking, and I think, ‚What a waste of energy.‘ If people want to believe in this god or that god, that’s fine by me; believe away. But I think we can be our own gods. I believe in myself.

You hear a lot about God these days: God, the beneficent; God, the all-great; God, the Almighty; God, the most powerful; God, the giver of life; God, the creator of death. I mean, we’re hearing about God all the time, so we better learn how to deal with it. But if we know anything about God, God is arbitrary.

I’ve always believed in God. I also think that’s the sort of thing that either comes as part of the equipment, the capacity to believe, or at some point in your life, when you’re in a position where you actually need help from a power greater than yourself, you simply make an agreement.

The true identity theft is not financial. It’s not in cyberspace. It’s spiritual. It’s been taken.

Somebody’s boring me. I think it’s me.

I am in my own head most of the time.

You can have religion with spirituality. You can also have religion without spirituality.

Look within. Within is the fountain of good, and it will ever bubble up, if thou wilt ever dig.

For me, it’s about the way I carry myself and the way I treat other people. My relationship and how I feel about God and what He does for me, is something deeply personal. It’s where I came from, my family, I was brought up in a religious household and that’s very important to me.

The Church is like a great tree whose roots must be energetically anchored in the earth while its leaves are serenely exposed to the bright sunlight. In this way, she sums up a whole gamut of beats in a single living and all-embracing act, each one of which corresponds to a particular degree or a possible form of spiritualisation.

Religion is not a department of life; it is something that enters into the whole of it.

It is in our lives and not our words that our religion must be read.

I do not believe there is a problem in this country or the world today which could not be settled if approached through the teaching of the Sermon on the Mount.

Men occasionally stumble over the truth, but most of them pick themselves up and hurry off as if nothing had happened.

I find the whole business of religion profoundly interesting. But it does mystify me that otherwise intelligent people take it seriously.

One may have a blazing hearth in one’s soul and yet no one ever came to sit by it. Passers-by see only a wisp of smoke from the chimney and continue on their way.

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

To be a monk is to have time to practice for your transformation and healing. And after that to help with the transformation and healing of other people.

When you turn your heart and your life over to Christ, when you accept Christ as the savior, it changes your heart.

My belief as a Christian is when we receive Christ as salvation, that that gives us a guarantee for Heaven.

To us also, through every star, through every blade of grass, is not God made visible if we will open our minds and our eyes.