Claire Walker > Claire's Quotes

“It is foolish to think that we will enter heaven without entering into ourselves.”
― St. Teresa of Avila

“To love at all is to be vulnerable. Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable.”
― C.S. Lewis, The Four Loves

“The great illusion of leadership is to think that man can be led out of the desert by someone who has never been there.”
― Henri J.M. Nouwen, The Wounded Healer: Ministry in Contemporary Society

“The measure of love is to love without measure.”
― Francis de Sales

“When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives mean the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.”
― Henri Nouwen, Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life

“A person's rightful due is to be treated as an object of love, not as an object for use.”
― Pope John Paul II, Love and Responsibility

“There are those who seek knowledge for the sake of knowledge; that is Curiosity.

There are those who seek knowledge to be known by others; that is Vanity.

There are those who seek knowledge in order to serve; that is Love.”
― Bernard of Clairvaux

“Without love, deeds, even the most brilliant, count as nothing.”
― St. Therese of Lisieux

“the real "work" of prayer is to become silent and listen to the voice that says good things about me.

To gently push aside and silence the many voices that question my goodness and to trust that I will hear the voice of blessing-- that demands real effort. ”
― Henri J.M. Nouwen, Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World

“When one loves, one does not calculate.”
― St. Thérèse de Lisieux

“The important thing is not to think much but to love much; and so do that which best stirs you to love.”
― Teresa of Avila

“Each of us is the result of a thought of God. Each of us is willed. Each of us is loved. Each of us is necessary.”
― Pope Benedict XVI

“Love between man and woman cannot be built without sacrifices and self-denial.”
― John Paul II, Love and Responsibility

“It is theologically and anthropologically important for woman to be at the center of Christianity. Through Mary, and the other holy women, the feminine element stands at the heart of the Christian religion.”
― Pope Benedict XVI

“God freely created us so that we might know, love, and serve him in this life and be happy with him forever. God's purpose in creating us is to draw forth from us a response of love and service here on earth, so that we may attain our goal of everlasting happiness with him in heaven.
All the things in this world are gifts of God, created for us, to be the means by which we can come to know him better, love him more surely, and serve him more faithfully.
As a result, we ought to appreciate and use these gifts of God insofar as they help us toward our goal of loving service and union with God. But insofar as any created things hinder our progress toward our goal, we ought to let them go.”
― St. Ignatius of Loyola