Children

Jacqueline Treloar's art displayed at Kingston Road United Church 9, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Children aren't colouring books.

You don't get to fill them with your colours.

Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner

Meaning

Toronto Pearson Airport Terminal 1 #2, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     We now live in a world where information is
     potentially unlimited. Information is cheap, 
     but meaning is expensive. 
     Where is the meaning? 
     Only human beings can tell you where it is. 
     We’re extracting meaning from our minds and 
     our own lives.

        George Dyson

Visualization

Calling Lakes Centre 1 (2013, 6.11), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Every field has some central tension it is trying to resolve. Visualization deals with the inhuman scale of the information and the need to present it at the very human scale of what the eye can see. 

Martin Wattenberg, The Economist, 2010

Eye

Calling Lakes Centre 24 (2013, 6.11), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

The soul, fortunately, has an interpreter – 

often an unconscious but still a faithful interpreter – 

in the eye. 

Charlotte Brontë, Jane Eyre

Storytelling

Calling Lakes Centre 30 (2013, 6.11), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


God calls us to reconciliation through the mutuality 
of relationship and through the outpouring of love.  
The story telling, the breaking one's heart and spirit open, the mutuality that is shared are great steps in relationship building, creation mending, and reconciliation seeking. 

Miriam Spies

Dreams

Sky Light 2 (2013, 6.4), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Are dreams a way for God to prepare us for the future?

Gary Woolsey

Sin

Distillery Distract 3, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


There is only one sin, only one. And that is theft. 
Every other sin is a variation of theft. ... 
When you kill a man, you steal a life. 
You steal his wife's right to a husband, 
rob his children of a father. 
When you tell a lie, you steal someone's right to the truth. 
When you cheat, you steal the right to fairness. 

Khaled Hosseini, The Kite Runner

Symbols

RCC_6146-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Symbols are living mirrors of the deepest understandings that have no words.

Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

Originality

RIC_4802-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion,
for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric. 

Bertrand Russell

Spreading Light

RIC_0855-1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

There are two ways of spreading light: 

to be the candle or the mirror that reflects it. 

Edith Wharton

Hope

Flowers (2013, 5.31), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Don't let anyone rob you of hope. 

Pope Francis

Shadows

Hoop Reflection 2 (2013, 6.3), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     In art and photography 
     it's the shadows that give a piece a depth. 
     It's the shadows.
     In our lives it's the shadows and the light together. 
     It's the grief and the joy 
     that bring beauty and depth and character. 

        Nancy Berns

We are

Closer to High Noon, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


We are critical. 
We are the subjects of change, not the objects. 
We have to be the protagonists of change. 
No-one can save anyone else. 

Federico, New Internationalist, June 2013

Dark & Light

Passage (2013, 6.1), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     It is so much darker when a light goes out 
     than it would have been had it never shone.

        John Steinbeck, The Winter of Our Discontent

Learning to See

Light 1 (2013, 5.29), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


Learning to see means at first bearing witness to what we are 
and where we are, right now, at this very moment.

Laura Dunn and David Ulrich

The Days

Bloor Street United Church 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     The days are nouns: touch them
     The hands are churches that worship the world.

        Naomi Shihab Nye,
        The Words Under the Words

Wonder

Garden Centre 1 (2013, 5.20), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


How can this be?
Such calm, such peace, such solitude
in this world of woe.

David Budbill, The Sixth of January

To be fully human

Traffic Light, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     There is no disconnect around technology and design that will
     allow us to be fully human until we pay attention to suffering, 
     the poverty, to exclusion, to unfairness, to injustice.

        Bryan Stevenson

Love

Rainbow on ceiling, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Who is the victim here?
Love is the victim.

Who is the villain?

Love that never dies.

Erica Jong,

Parable of the Four-Poster

Companions

Mural 1 Annex, Toronto (2013, 5.19), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


we are for each other: then
laugh, leaning back in my arms
for life's not a paragraph

And death i think is no parenthesis

e. e. cummings

Remembering

Freelton, Ontario 1, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     The earth is created, and moves us
     on our journey
     toward remembering.

        Susan Litwak, 
        Tonight Everyone in the World Is Dreaming the Same Dream

Tender Care

Tulip 3 (2013, 5.10), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


But I, being poor, have only my dreams;
I have spread my dreams under your feet;
Tread softly because you tread on my dreams.

W. B. Yeats, He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven

I See Your Face

RIC_4973-2, a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     To each
     To each
     To each
     I know
     There will be faces
     with yours and mine.

        Ben Okri, I See Your Face

Opening

Garden Centre 6 (2013, 5.20), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


No bird can fly
without opening its wings,
and no one can love
without exposing their heart.

Mark Nepo, The Book of Awakening

Understanding

Garden Centre 3 (2013, 5.20), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     Without understanding there cannot be true love, 
     and without love there cannot be true
     understanding.

        Thich Nhat Hanh, Living Buddha, Living Christ

Water

Mural 2 Annex, Toronto (2013, 5.19), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


When you only see waves, you might miss the water. 
But if you are mindful, you will be able to touch water
within the waves as well. 

Thich Nhat Hanh, Living Buddha Living Christ

Forgiveness

Tulip 12(2013, 5.10), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.

Forgiveness is the act of admitting we are like other people. 

Christina Baldwin

Arrival

Mural 5 Annex, Toronto (2013, 5.19), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


The truth is, most of us discover where we are headed when we arrive. 

Bill Watterson

Seeing

Garden Centre 2 (2013, 5.20), a photo by rchoephoto on Flickr.


     Never be so focused on what you're looking for 
     that you overlook the things you actually find. 

        Ann Patchett, State of Wonder

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