#religious

When we attempt to clear up the mess others have made, or when we love the unlovely, we demonstrate the kind of weirdness God likes. We give the lie to the evolutionary survival of the fittest maxim... ↗

— Ann Benton

#religious #service #value-of-life #age

These people fail to realize that it is on the inside that God must be defended, not on the outside. They should direct their anger at themselves. For evil in the open is but evil from within that has been let out. The main battlefield for good is not the open ground of the public arena but the small clearing of each heart. ↗

— Yann Martel

#religious #anger

Among [Applewhite's] other teachings was the classic cult specialty of developing disdain for anyone outside of the Heaven's Gate commune. Applewhite flattered his would-be alien flock that they were an elite elect far superior to the non-initiated humans whom he considered to be deluded zombies.[...]Applewhite effectively fed his paranoid persecution complex to his followers to ensure blind loyalty to the group and himself while fostering alienation from the mundane world. This paradoxical superior/fearful attitude towards “Them” (i.e., anyone who is not one of “Us”) is one of the simplest means of hooking even the most skeptical curiosity seeker into the solipsistic netherworld of a [mentally unbalanced] leader's insecure and threatened worldview. ↗

— Zeena Schreck

#mass-suicides #psychopathology #religious-science-fiction #sects #sociology

If you pay attention to those aspects of God that demonstrate love, truth, beauty, intelligence, order, and spiritual evolution, those aspects will begin to expand in your life. Bit by bit, like a mosaic, disparate fragments of grace will merge to form a complete picture. Eventually this picture will replace the ore threatening one you have carried around inside you since infancy. ↗

— Deepak Chopra

#inspirational #love #religious #spiritual #beauty

From infancy to death human life is surrounded by their (the angels) watchful care and intercession. Beside each believer stands an angel as protector and shepherd leading him to life. Already here on earth the Christian life shares by faith in the blessed company of angels and men united to God. ↗

— Catechism of the Catholic Church

#religious #death

For the lips of an immoral woman drip honey, and her mouth is smoother than oil; but in the end she is as bitter as wormword, sharp as a two-edged sword. Her feet go down to death, her steps lay hold of hell ↗

— Justin Cronin

#morality #religious #sin #thought-provoking #death

It is either coincidence piled on top of coincidence," said Hollus, "or it is deliberate design. ↗

— Robert J. Sawyer

#chance #coincidenc-e #fine-tuning #id #intelligent-design

No one disputes that seeming order can come out of the application of simple rules. But who wrote the rules? ↗

— Robert J. Sawyer

#intelligent-design #naturalism #religious-science-fiction #science #theism

Dreaming is what you do when your eyes are closed...living is what you do with that dream once you open your eyes! ↗

— Nathan Parks

#angels-and-demons #dark #darkfantasy #demons #religious

The Weaver My life is but a weaving between my Lord and me; I cannot choose the colors He worketh steadily. Oft times He weaveth sorrow And I, in foolish pride, Forget He sees the upper, And I the underside. Not til the loom is silent And the shuttles cease to fly, Shall God unroll the canvas And explain the reason why. The dark threads are as needful In the Weaver's skillful hand, As the threads of gold and silver In the pattern He has planned. ↗

— Benjamin Malachi Franklin

#poem #poems #poetry #religious #religious-faith