Quotes about Freedom

The "Western" segment of the church today lives in a bubble of historical illusion about the meaning of discipleship and the gospel. We are dominated by the essentially Enlightenment values that rule American culture: pursuit of happiness, unrestricted freedom of choice, disdain of authority.

Fact 1: It is okay to be who you are wherever you are.

In creating human beings in his likeness so that we could govern in his manner, God gave us a measure of independent power. Without such power, we absolutely could not resemble God in the close manner he intended, nor could we be God's coworkers. The locus or depository of this necessary power is the human body. This explains, in theological terms, why we have a body at all. That body is our primary area of power, freedom, and—therefore—responsibility.

Can anyone now seriously believe that if people are only permitted or enabled to do what they want, they will then be happy or more disposed to do what is right?

Let go of offence. Let go of fear. Let go of revenge. Don't live angry, let go now!

A loveless world is a dead world, and always there comes an hour when one is weary of prisons, of one's work, and of devotion to duty, and all one craves for is a loved face, the warmth and wonder of a loving heart.

Let go of the past. Let go of the future. Let go of the present. Proceed to the opposite shore with a free mind, leaving behind all conditioned things.

We are free to choose our actions, . . . but we are not free to choose the consequences of these actions.

What would the world look like if we asked ourselves the following more often; are our actions helping others find a way to feel more freer, more dignified and more beautiful?

The chains of military despotism, once fastened upon a nation, ages might pass away before they could be shaken off.

...the right of the individual to elect freely the manner of his care in illness must be preserved.

. . . I hope that when you're my age, you'll be able to say as I have been able to say: We lived in freedom, we lived lives that were a statement, not an apology.