Nicole Schwartz-Eck

“Those who insist on preserving yesterday when today has already swept it away like sand on a beach lose the opportunity to guide the present. Rather they insist on resisting the present to the point that it simply fails to notice them anymore. It is a choice whether to run the risk of becoming part of a comfortable but insignificant cult in a society that is passing or participate in the efforts of a society that is rushing to regain its balance in a headwind of major proportions.”
― Joan D. Chittister, Between the Dark and the Daylight: Embracing the Contradictions of Life

“Theology very naturally follows belief, but belief very rarely follows judgment.”
― Jen Hatmaker, Interrupted: When Jesus Wrecks Your Comfortable Christianity

“But all of what Jesus says in this chapter should be read in light of the opening few verses: “Do whatever they teach you and follow it” (23: 3). All of it should be read in light of Jesus’ words in the earlier sermon, “unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and the Pharisees, you will never enter” (5: 20). It seems unreasonable to suggest, in light of Jesus’ comparison, that the Pharisees were not a serious, and highly influential, religious movement during the first century. Jesus’ “woes” against the tradition’s bearers is not a direct attack on tradition itself, but an attack on its appropriation especially when “justice, and mercy, and faith” are disregarded (23: 23). Religious practices ought not to replace genuine acts of piety for the sake of others. For this Jesus states clearly, “I desire mercy and not sacrifice” (9: 13; 12: 7).”
― David Desilva, Invitation to the New Testament: Participant Book: A Short-Term DISCIPLE Bible Study

“Rogue waves are the dangerous ones; they are the ones that no one takes note of or prepares to manage. These are the movements we should have seen but did not. Or, worse, they are what we saw coming but refused to acknowledge in the hope that ignoring them would make them go away.”
― Joan D. Chittister, Between the Dark and the Daylight: Embracing the Contradictions of Life