Translation

RIC_1138, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Remember that writing is translation and 

the opus to be translated is yourself. 

E. B. White

Prayers

RIC_1045, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


That is what the world needs above all else: not people who “say prayers” with greater or less regularity, but people who are prayers.


Kalistos Ware, The Power of the Name

Nothing lasts, nothing passes

RIC_0899, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

     Nothing lasts, and yet nothing passes, either.
     And nothing passes just because nothing lasts.
      
      Philip Roth, The Human Stain

Seeing

RIC_1119, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

It’s never enough just to tell people about some new insight. Rather, you have to get them to experience it in a way that evokes its power and possibility. Instead of pouring knowledge into people’s heads, you need to help them grind a new set of eyeglasses so they can see the world in a new way. 

John Seely Brown, Seeing Differently: Insights on Innovation

Dream

RC1_8919, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

El sueño que no se alimenta de sueño desaparece.

The dream which is not fed with dream disappears.

Antonio Porchia, Voices, translated by W. S. Merwin

A Prayer of Thanksgiving

RIC_1127, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Creator God,
We give you thanks for all creation –
         The planets, the cosmos, the waters, the land, the air, the plants, the trees,
         The four legged, the two legged, the wing-ed,
We give thanks for creation made whole and good and wise.

We give thanks that you speak to us
         In ways we can hear in our hearts.
We give you thanks that you hear us
         In ways we can be heard in truth.
We give thanks that you lead us
         In ways we can lead others in humility.
We give you thanks that you love us
         In ways we can love ourselves and others with courage.
And we give thanks that you gather us in community
         In ways we can live lives of justice, kindness, and humility.
Miigwech. Nya:weh
Amen.

Kim Uyede-Kai, Prayer offered at Francis Sandy Theological School Annual Celebration and Graduation (June 17, 2011)

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Changes and Transitions

RIC_1143
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

The first task of change management is to understand the destination and how to get there, the first task of transition management is to convince people to leave home.

William Bridges, Managing Transitions: Making the Most of Change

Wisdom

RIC_1130
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

The beginning of wisdom is to call things by their right names.

Chinese proverb

Changes

RIC_0890
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind is part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter into another.

Anatole France

Transitions

RIC_1090
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

Transitions begin with endings.

Pamela Seigle

Sam M. Intrator & Megan Scribner, eds., Leading from within

Do I dare?

RIC_1075
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

    And indeed there will be time
To wonder, “Do I dare?” and, “Do I dare?” …
Do I dare
Disturb the universe?

T. S. Eliot, The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

To care for the earth

RIC_1056
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

To care for the mountain, your heart must be a mountain.
To care for the river, your heart must be a river.

Shozo Tanaka, environmentalist

Masao Takenaka, When the Bamboo Bends: Christ and Culture in Japan

Beyond forgetting

RIC_0896
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

let me remember beyond forgetting
     that my life is not a solitary thing –
          it is a bit of the rushing tide
a leaf of the bending tree –

Winston O. Abbott

Questions

RIC_1125
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

Where is the Life we have lost in living?
Where is the wisdom we have lost in knowledge?
Where is the knowledge we have lost in information?

T. S. Eliot, Choruses from The Rock

By invocation

RIC_0902
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

We are not lacking in the dynamic forces needed to create the future. We live immersed in a sea of energy beyond all comprehension. But this energy, in an ultimate sense, is ours not by domination but by invocation.

Thomas Berry

This Road

RCC_2417
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

I have always known that at last I would take this road, but yesterday I did not know that it would be today.

Narihara

Making room for the other

RC1_8898
Originally uploaded by rchoephoto

The classic sign of God's mystery is to entertain, to make room for the other.

Kathleen Noris, Dakota

Whole Heart

The only whole heart is a broken heart.

Mitch Albom, have a little faith: a true story