Those of us who came to be Christians get to remember that forgiveness cost God the death of God's son. It's an expensive thing in many ways.
Does taking the life of the perpetrator return your mom? No.
You don't think we have a copyright to forgiveness, it is done by people everywhere.
I hope that when the time comes, I am treated with compassion and allowed to pass on to the next phase of life's journey in the manner of my choice.
People will use their religion to justify virtually anything.
Our Lord wanted us to be Christ-like. Christ-like doesn't mean not having faults. It means that you do actually have a capacity to draw out the good that is in others.
Without forgiveness, there is no future. Forgiveness is not nebulous, impractical and idealistic. It's thoroughly realistic. It's real political in the long run.
People want much the same things, but they have been formed by history to have a particular perception of the other.
I am a Nobel Peace laureate and my business should be to try to bring stability, not to be a red rag to bulls.
You ask when is it that you can say yes we have had enough. It is enough revenge and I think now we have restored the equilibrium. It never happens!
All people would really want peace and all would want to be sure that they would not be taken advantage of.
God has been incredible in creating us to be persons.
Too many people think that reconciliation means you soft-pedal differences.
We are all afflicted by original sin; people succumbing to temptations to do and to be.
Catharsis returns us to the purpose for which were originally intended - to be called by God to do good - and thus ultimately returns us to ourselves.
Human beings can be awful, but they can also be tremendous.
Life is funny and we are really funny, especially when we get to be hoity toity; we can be so ridiculous. Life is fun.
I would hope that wherever I was I would be me. I have been influenced by some wonderful people who showed me that there is an integral relationship between faith and life at home. Evil is evil, repression is repression anywhere. And if it is not consistent with what one believes is God's will, then I would hope that one would be able to witness it, and there are wonderful people who do so in very great risks to themselves.
I think it is a good exercise to ask oneself, "How would I have wanted to be treated?"
Most poor people I know are proud and really want not a handout but a hand up. They do have an inherent pride and dignity, and we should treat them as those who have fallen on bad days.
Some of us might look like accidents, but I mean none of us is in fact an accident.
