Emily Hess

“Our everyday experience does not prepare us to assimilate the gaping hugeness of the Grand Canyon or the crashing grandeur of Niagara Falls..... we have no response at the ready; our usual frames of reference don't fit... which is why the experience of awe has been called a 'reset button' for the human brain.”
― Caroline Paul, Tough Broad: From Boogie Boarding to Wing Walking―How Outdoor Adventure Improves Our Lives as We Age

“Unthinkable to most people today, obvious to most people tomorrow: We are all better off without the whole sorry business. And in the vocabulary of civilized people, who will miss the term "slaughterhouse"?”
― Matthew Scully, Fear Factories: Arguments about Innocent Creatures and Merciless People

“A few generations from now, after all, who is really going to care about most of the things we worry and argue about in politics today? No one after we have moved along, will think any more or less of us because we got it right or wrong on tax policy, on this program or that one, or on most of the other political questions, except security issues, that are often just contests for advantage, having not much to do with justice or conscience, and that will someday be as faintly recalled as the silver-versus-gold debates of another era. But how human beings treat the innocent and defenseless creatures under our power- that's one of those revealing marks we leave behind. It ranks with the most fundamental of human responsibilities. As a political cause it can hold its own in any fair tests of comparative importance.”
― Matthew Scully, Fear Factories: Arguments about Innocent Creatures and Merciless People

“Mother, Father, God, Universal Power.
Remind us daily of the sanctity of life.

Touch our hearts with the glorious oneness of all creation,
As we strive to respect all the living beings on this planet.
Penetrate our souls with the beauty of this earth,
As we attune ourselves to the rhythm and flow of our seasons.
Awaken our minds with the knowledge to achieve a world in perfect harmony
And grant us the wisdom to realize that we can have heaven on earth

by Jo Poore”
― Elizabeth Roberts, Life Prayers : From Around the World : 365 Prayers, Blessings, and Affirmations to Celebrate the Human Journey