"My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together."  --Desmond Tutu

"It is true that Love knows no such word as "impossible," for it deems "all things possible, all things allowed.'"  --St. Therese of Lisieux

"Try as much as possible to be wholly alive, with all your might, and when you laugh, laugh like hell."  --William Saroyan

Prayer Leads to Compassion

Prayer and action can never be seen as contradictory or mutually exclusive. Prayer without action grows into powerless pietism, and action without prayer degenerates into questionable manipulation. If prayer leads us into deeper unity with the compassionate Christ, it will always give rise to concrete acts of service. And if concrete acts of service do indeed lead us to a deeper solidarity with the poor, the hungry, the sick, the dying, and the oppressed, they will always give rise to prayer. In prayer we meet Christ, and in him all human suffering. In service we meet people, and in them the suffering Christ. . . .

Action with and for those who suffer is the concrete expression of a compassionate life and the final criterion of being a Christian. Such acts do not stand beside the moments of prayer and worship but are themselves such moments. Why? Because Jesus Christ, who did not cling to his divinity, but became as we are, can be found where there are hungry, thirsty, alienated, naked, sick, and imprisoned people. Precisely when we live in an ongoing conversation with Christ and allow the Spirit to guide our lives, we will recognize Christ in the poor, the oppressed, and the downtrodden and will hear his cry and respond to it wherever he is revealed.

--Henri Nouwen

"I love you, Jesus, and bear in mind the words of St. John of the Cross: 'The least act of pure love is of more value than all the other works put together.'"  --St. Therese of Lisieux

“Unless you are willing to do the ridiculous, God will not do the miraculous. When you have God, you don’t have to know everything about it; you just do it.”  --Mother Angelica

"I am always discovering in [the Gospels] new lights and hidden mysterious meanings. I know and I have experienced that "the Kingdom of God is within us." (Luke 17:21)"  --St. Therese of Lisieux