Sunday

Transformational Truth 14:

Keep your thoughts positive, because your thoughts become your words.

Keep your words positive, because your words become your behaviors.

Keep your behaviors positive, because your behaviors become your habits.

Keep your habits positive, because your habits become your values.

Keep your values positive, because your values become your destiny.

~ Ghandi

Dalai Lama

We need a sense of the oneness of the 7 billion human beings alive today. When I meet people, I don't think about being different from them, about being Tibetan, Buddhist or even the Dalai Lama. I only think about being a human being. We all share the potential for positive and negative emotions, yet one of our special qualities is our human mind, our intelligence. If we use it well we'll be successful and happy.

"To practice five things under all circumstances constitutes perfect virtue; these five are gravity, generosity of soul, sincerity, earnestness, and kindness."

- Confucius

The truth of God can never be contained, except symbolically, inside human words. The truth of God can never be reduced to the words of scripture, to the conclusions of church councils in Nicaea or Ephesus, to the creeds adopted over the centuries, to the ninety-five theses nailed on a church door in Wittenberg or to the pronouncements of some presumed-to-be infallible ecclesiastical leader.

God is not a noun, that demands to be defined, God is a verb that invites us to live, to love and to be.

Bishop John Shelby Spong

“Be still, and the world is bound to turn herself inside out to entertain you. Everywhere you look, joyful noise is clanging to drown out quiet desperation.” -- Barbara Kingsolver in High Tide in Tucson

“The ego-shell in which we live is the hardest thing to outgrow.”

- D.T. Suzuki: a Japanese author of books and essays on Buddhism, Zen and Shin that were instrumental in spreading interest in both Zen and Shin to the West

Intellect takes you to the door, but it doesn't take you into the house.

~ Shams Tabrizi

"It is not joy that makes us grateful, it is gratitude that makes us joyful."

-David Steindl-Rast: Catholic Benedictine monk, notable for his active participation in interfaith dialogue

“Frequently people think compassion and love

are merely sentimental. No! They are very demanding.

If you are going to be compassionate, be prepared for action.”

- Archbishop Desmond Tutu