[Happiness] comes when we choose to be who we are, to be ourselves, at this present moment in our lives.
Look at your own povertywelcome itcherish itdon’t be afraidshare your deathbecause thus you will share your love and your life
I am struck by how sharing our weakness and difficulties is more nourishing to others than sharing our qualities and successes.
The friend of time doesn’t spend all day saying: ‘I haven’t got time.’ He doesn’t fight with time. He accepts it and cherishes it.
People cannot accept their own evil if they do not at the same time feel loved, respected and trusted.
We discover that we are at the same time very insignificant and very important, because each of our actions is preparing the humanity of tomorrow; it is a tiny contribution to the construction of the huge and glorious final humanity
Peace is the fruit of love, a love that is also justice. But to grow in love requires work — hard work. And it can bring pain because it implies loss — loss of the certitudes, comforts, and hurts that shelter and define us.
We work for peace every time we exercise authority with wisdom and authentic love.
The word love has been so abused by publicity and advertisements that we no longer know really what it means.
A growing community must integrate three elements: a life of silent prayer, a life of service and above all of listening to the poor, and a community life through which all its members can grow in their own gift.
To forgive is a gift of God that permits us to let go of our past hurts.
Jesus is the starving, the parched, the prisoner, the stranger, the naked, the sick, the dying. Jesus is the oppressed, the poor. To live with Jesus is to live with the poor. To live with the poor is to live with Jesus.
A Christian community should do as Jesus did: propose and not impose. Its attraction must lie in the radiance cast by the love of brothers.
Many people are good at talking about what they are doing, but in fact do little. Others do a lot but don’t talk about it; they are the ones who make a community live.
Every human activity can be put at the service of the divine and of love. We should all exercise our gift to build community.
When we love and respect people, revealing to them their value, they can begin to come out from behind the walls that protect them.
If we are to grow in love, the prisons of our egoism must be unlocked. This implies suffering, constant effort and repeated choices.
Envy comes from people’s ignorance of, or lack of belief, in their own gifts.
An ethics of desire is good news for those of us who have become allergic to an ethics of law.
We are not called by God to do extraordinary things, but to do ordinary things with extraordinary love.
Community is a sign that love is possible in a materialistic world where people so often either ignore or fight each other. It is a sign that we don’t need a lot of money to be happy–in fact, the opposite.
Community is not an ideal; it is people. It is you and I. In community we are called to love people just as they are with their wounds and their gifts, not as we want them to be.
In community we are called to care for each member of the community. We can. Choose our friends but we do not choose our brothers and sisters’ they are given to us, whether in family or in community.” Jean
Envy comes from people’s ignorance of or lack of belief in their own gifts.
Growth begins when we start to accept our own weakness.
Growth begins when we start to accept our own weakness.