Love

Peaktop Chinese Restaurant 2, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Love consists in this, 
that two solitudes protect and touch and greet each other. 

Rainer Maria Rilke, Letter to a Young Poet

Enough

Pre-dessert, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Enough is as good as a feast.

John Heywood

Wisdom

Thoughtful, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Wisdom is not bought.

African proverb

Truth

Tulip 5 (2013, 5.10), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Truth is truth

To the end of reckoning.

William Shakespeare

Resurrection

Wall 3, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Only where graves are is there resurrection.

Karl Barth

Word

Tulip 1 (2013, 5.10), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     A word is dead
     When it is said,
     Some say.
     I say it just begins
     to live that day.

        Emily Dickinson

Arrival

RIC_3556-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Every step an arrival.

Denise Levertov, 

Overland to the Island

Love

Tulip (2013, 5.6), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     Love is just a word
     until someone comes along
     and gives it meaning.

        Paulo Coelho

Child

RIC_9214-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


A mother's body remembers her babies - the folds of soft flesh,the softly furred scalp against her nose.
Each child has it's own entreaties to body and soul.

Barbara Kingsolver

Healing Stones

Healing Stones, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

If you truly hold a stone,

you can feel the mountain it came from.

Mark Nepo, 

The Book of Awakening

The Dweller

Hands 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


These bodies are perishable,
but the Dweller in these bodies is eternal.

Bhagavad Gita

Suffering & Happiness

RIC_4682-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     The truth is: my suffering doesn't have to be 
     out of view for you to be happy, and you don't have 
     to quiet your grief for me to be peaceful.
     Allowing our suffering and happiness to touch each 
     other opens a depth of compassion that helps us 
     to complete each other. 

        Mark Nepo, 
        Hearing the Cries of the World, Parabola (Summer 2013)

Thou

Flowers (2013, 4.30), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Thou
Whom I do not know
But whose I am.

Dag Hammarskjöld

Happiness

Wanda's Pie in the Sky 2, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     It is always worth itemising happiness, 
     there is so much of the other thing in a life, 
     you had better put down the markers for
     happiness while you can.

        Sebastian Barry, The Secret Scripture

Strangers

TB 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Strangers are those whose story we have not heard. 

Bo Forbes

Essence

Tulips, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     The nature of the rain is the same but
     it grows thorns in the marshes and
     flowers in the garden.

       Arab Proverb

To be free

Wanda's Pie in the Sky 3, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


To be free is not merely to cast off one's chances, 
but to live in a way that respects and enhances 
the freedom of others. 

Nelson Mandela

Good intentions

Wanda's Pie in the Sky 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

I myself am made entirely of flows, stitched together with good intentions.

Augustine Burroughs, 

Magical Thinking: True Stories

Journey

Labyrinth 2, St James UC, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


I will walk a thousand leagues in falsehood, 
that one step of the journey may be true.

Junayd

Saint

Bird House, St. James UC, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     A Saint is one who does not know how it is possible
     not to love, not to help, not to be sensitive 
     to the anxiety of others. 

        Abraham Heschel

Lamenting

Wall 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Perhaps the most important reason for "lamenting" 
is that it helps us to realize our oneness with all things, 
to know that all things are our relatives.

Black Elk

Life

RIC_0015-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     Each of us is carving a stone, erecting a column,
     or cutting a piece of stained glass in the
     construction of something much bigger than 
     ourselves.

        Adrienne Clarkson

By your example

Candles 1 (2013, 4.13), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

The world is changed by your example,

not by your opinion.

Paulo Coelho

Eternity

Full Moon, Toronto, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     I saw Eternity the other night,
     Like a great ring of pure and endless light.

        Henry Vaughan, The World

Life

Bird House 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Life does not require a material abundance; 
it requires only a material sufficiency.

Wendell Berry, Blessed are the Peacemakers

War

RIC_4095, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

War is what happens when language fails.

Margaret Atwood

Love

Swan, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Love costs all we are
and will ever be.
Yet it is only love
which sets us free.

Maya Angelou

Dawn

RIC_3417-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Death does not extinguish the light.

It puts out the lamp because the dawn has come.

Rabindranath Tagore

Emptiness

RIC_8022-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

The experience of emptiness engenders compassion. 

Tibetan Buddhist Saying

Arts

RIC_3919-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     The arts draw us deeply into the parts of ourselves 
     our most urgent questions and desires lodge. 
     These desiring questions have as their source and end, God. 

        Wendy M. Wright

Fall in love

RCC_6335-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Fall in love in such a way 
that it frees you from any connecting. 

Rumi

Hope

RIC_4321-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

When it seems too much... 

Hold fast to the dearest hopes embedded in your life with others. 

Or rather, let those hopes hold you...

Tom Reynolds

In God's Image

RIC_6139-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


All humans, friends and enemies alike, 
have the same dignity, deserve the same respect, 
and are worthy of the same compassion
because they are, all alike, made in God's image. 

Wendell Berry, Blessed Are the Peacemakers

Life Abundant

RIC_4418-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     To be free of indifference would be 
     to have life more more abundantly.

        Wendell Berry, Blessed Are the Peacemakers

At Home

Distillery Distract 6, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

The spiritual life is 

about becoming more at home in your own skin. 

Parker J. Palmer

Shedding

Earth Hour 7 (2013, 3. 23), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

From the beginning,

the key to renewal has been

the casting off of old skin.

Thich Nhat Hanh, 

Living Buddha, Living Christ

Singing Freedom

RIC_4022-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

The caged bird sings

with a fearful trill

of things unknown

but longed for still

and his tune is heard

on the distant hill

for the caged bird

sings of freedom.

Maya Angelou,

I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings

God Who Is

_DSC6567, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

It is the whole of nature,

extending from the beginning to the end 

that constitutes the one image of God Who Is.

St. Gregory of Nyssa

Peace

RCC_9009, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Until there is peace between religions,

there can be no peace in the world. 

Hans Kung

Kingdom of God

Baptism Font (2013, 2.24), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

We do not go to the Kingdom of God, 

but the kingdom of God comes to us.

Thich Nhat Hanh, 

Living Buddha, Living Christ

Faith

RIC_4124, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


In Buddhism, faith means confidence in our and others' abilities
to wake up to our deepest capacity of loving and understanding.

Thich Nhat Hanh, Living Buddha, Living Christ

Living Love

Lamp (2013, 3.22), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     In the end, it is not enough to think what we know. 
     We must live it. For only by living it can Love show itself
     as the greatest principle.

        Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

Live loud

Lamp 2 (2013, 3.22), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Live loud enough in your heart
and there is no need to speak.

Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening.

Tenderness

Freelton, Ontario 2, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Tenderness does not choose its own use.

It goes out to everything equally.

Jane Hirshfield

Transitions

Waiting, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


So long as you haven't experienced this:
to die and so to grow, 
you are only a troubled guest 
on the dark earth.

Goethe

Resemblance

Good Friday 2013, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


My confidence comes from the belief that all human beings
resemble each other, that others carry wounds like mine – that 
they will therefore understand. 

Orhan Pamuk, My Father's Suitcase

Choice

Gate 1 (2013, 3.23), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


It's a choice. Every minute in your life is a choice, and we have a choice as to how we will see the world and how we will see ourselves in it.

James Orbinski

Gentleness

Easter Egg Muffin, Knead Bakery, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

In a gentle way,
you can shake the world.

Mahatma Gandhi

Wounds

Memories of Korea, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


We all have wounds; they are part of what it means 
to be human. Whether physical, psychological, or spiritual, our wounds are like crazy glue; they bond us in solidarity. 

Bo Forbes

Peace

Egg Candle, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     If you want oneness in society,
     you have to teach people to go inside
     instead of going outside, 
     because if they want peace, 
     they need to find it within. 

        Ram Dass