Men cannot be our enemies--even men called Vietcong! If we kill men, what brothers will we have left? With whom shall we live then?

Beauty and goodness are there in each of us. A true spiritual partner is one who encourages you to look deep inside yourself for the beauty and love you've been seeking. A true teacher is someone who helps you discover the teacher in yourself.

You must always check things out by going to the person in question and asking for his or her help: "Dear one, I am suffering so much, help me please.

I have been offered the noble opportunity to join my voice with that of the Crucified as He cries out, 'Father, forgive them.

Do not be too severe upon the errors of the people, but reclaim them by enlightening them.

May I never get too busy in my own affairs that I fail to respond to the needs of others with kindness and compassion.

God has left sin in the world in order that there may be forgiveness: not only the secret forgiveness by which He Himself cleanses our souls, but the manifest forgiveness by which we have mercy on one another and so give expression to the fact that He is living, by His mercy, in our own hearts.

AN ELDER was asked by a certain soldier if God would forgive a sinner. And he said to him: Tell me, beloved, if your cloak is torn, will you throw it away? The soldier replied and said: No. I will mend it and put it back on. The elder said to him: If you take care of your cloak, will God not be merciful to His own image?

We do not exist for ourselves alone, and it is only when we are fully convinced of this fact that we begin to love ourselves properly and thus also love others. What do I mean by loving ourselves properly? I mean, first of all, desiring to live, accepting life as a very great gift and a great good, not because of what it gives us, but because of what it enables us to give to others.

We do not really know how to forgive until we know what it is to be forgiven. Therefore we should be glad that we can be forgiven by our brothers. It is our forgiveness of one another that makes the love of Jesus for us manifest in our lives, for in forgiving one another we act towards one another as He has acted towards us.

conversion is no more spectacular than learning to love the people we live with and work among.

Who can be good, if not made so by loving? —St. Augustine