JMRZ

“Awe is more than an emotion; it is a way of understanding, insight into a meaning greater than ourselves. The beginning of awe is wonder, and the beginning of wisdom is awe.

Awe is an intuition for the dignity of all things, a realization that things not only are what they are but also stand, however remotely, for something supreme. Awe is a sense for the … mystery beyond all things. It enables us … to sense in small things the beginning of infinite significance, to sense the ultimate in the common and the simple; to feel in the rush of the passing the stillness of the eternal. What we cannot comprehend by analysis, we become aware of in awe.

Faith is not belief, an assent to a proposition; faith is attachment to transcendence, to the meaning beyond the mystery.

Knowledge is fostered by curiosity; wisdom is fostered by awe. Awe precedes faith; it is the root of faith. We must be guided by awe to be worthy of faith.

Forfeit your sense of awe, let your conceit diminish your ability to revere, and the universe becomes a market place for you. The loss of awe is the avoidance of insight. A return to reverence is the first prerequisite for a revival of wisdom, for the discovery of the world as an allusion to God.”
― Abraham J. Heschel

“We must continue to hold our attention on God during the day. To support our attention, I have said more than once: Remember God through a briefly worded prayer ... Stand with reverence before God, with the mind in the heart, and strive toward Him with longing.”
― Theophan the Recluse

“To write a book is for me very much the same thing as to pray. Both involve discipline. If the artist works only when he feels like he, he's not apt to build up much of a body of work. Inspiration more often comes during the work than before it, because the largest part of the job of the artist is to listen to work, and go where it tells him to go. Ultimately, when you are writing, you stop thinking and write what you hear.

To pray is to listen also, to move through my own chattering to God, to that place where I can be silent and listen to what God may have to say ... The greatest moment of prayer come in the midst of fumbling and faltering prayer, rather than the odd moment when one decides to try to turn to God.”
― Madeleine L'Engle, Walking on Water: Reflections on Faith and Art

“What feels like suffering, depression, uselessness—moments when God has withdrawn—are often deep acts of trust and invitations to intimacy on God’s part.”
― Richard Rohr, The Universal Christ: How a Forgotten Reality Can Change Everything We See, Hope For and Believe