Quotes about Empathy

forgiveness always heals; it does not matter whether you are Hindu, Buddhist, Catholic or Jewish. Forgiveness is one of the patterns that is always true, it is part of The Story. There is no specifically Catholic way to feed the hungry or to steward the earth.

If we do not transform our pain, we will most assuredly transmit it.

Do not get rid of your hurts until you have learned all that they have to teach you.

Holier-than-thou people usually end up holier than nobody.

We mend and renew the world by strengthening inside ourselves what we seek outside ourselves, and not by demanding it of others or trying to force it on others.

As Dorothy Day once wisely said, "What the Gospel forever takes away from Christians is the right to judge between the worthy and the unworthy poor.

We have been shown how to fight hate without becoming hate ourselves. We have been given a Companion and a Friend and not just a good idea. We have been given joy in the midst of failure, and not just a way of winning or being right.

It is the egoic illusion of our own perfect rightness that often allows us to crucify others.

As the Dalai Lama says, "My religion is kindness; my only religion is kindness.

Isn't that ironic? The point of the Christian life is not to distinguish oneself from the ungodly, but to stand in radical solidarity with everyone and everything else. This is the full, final, and intended effect of the Incarnation—symbolized by its finality in the cross, which is God's great act of solidarity instead of judgment.

Higher stages always empathetically include the lower, or they are not higher stages!

Even with all the best intentions in the world, given our different temperaments, backgrounds, and the way we process our data and information, we are going to step on one another's toes. Two people with absolutely good will can deeply hurt one another. Good people hurt one another because we all come at reality in different ways. That's why, for Jesus, the only way to achieve union is through forgiveness, not through making sin impossible.