THE EVIL OF NOT FORGIVING

'It may be infinitely less evil to murder a man than to refuse to forgive him. The former may be a moment of passion: the latter is the heart's choice. It is spiritual murder, the worst, to hate, to brood over the feeling that excludes, that, in our microcosm, kills the image, the idea of hatred.'

George Macdonald in Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.158.

THE IMPORTANCE OF STRUCTURE

'...the students talked loudly about wanting to be free to dance, to make love, to be themselves. So do I. So we left literature and talked about the body, and I kept asking questions: what is it in you which gives you freedom? Finally one of the young men, with great reluctance, pulled out the word: skeleton. It is our bones, our structure, which frees us to dance, to make love. Without our structure we would be an imprisoned, amorphous blob of flesh, incapable of response. The amoeba has a minimum of structure, but I doubt it has much fun.'

Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.123.

LOVE IS A POLICY

'Love is not an emotion. It is a policy.'
Hugh Bishop in Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.45.

THE POINT OF WRITING

'...I write to be read.'
Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.20.

THE FUNCTIONN OF AN IMAGE

'An image is something that helps us catch a glimpse of reality.'

Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.17

HUMILITY DEFINED

'Humility is throwing oneself away in complete concentration on something or someone else.'

Madeleine L'Engle, A Circle of Quiet, p.11.

GOD LIKES YOU

'Forgetting God’s delight and joy in us stunts our ability to enjoy God’s love. Forgiveness – as beautiful and crucial as it is not enough.'

Kelly M Kapic, You're Only Human, p.19.

BEAUTY

'I remembered what a farmer once said to me about a particularly fine horse: 'I could have stood and looked at that horse for ever.' In that pasture with it's trees in the evening sunlight, I felt I could have stood and watched that horse for ever, the zest and heavy grace of his movements.'

Adrian Bell, The Men and the Fields, p.113.

DEEP LOVE

'The deepest love is not a painful lack seeking satisfaction for oneself, but a bountiful overflow seeking the good for one's beloved, in generative acts both large and small.'

Leon Kass & Hannah Mandelbaum, Reading Ruth: Birth, Redemption and the Way of Israel, p.88.

IT TAKES THE BODY OF CHRIST TO BE LIKE CHRIST

'It Takes an Entire Community to Reflect the One Messiah.'
Kelly M Kapic, You're Only Human, p.177.