Nuns

"The path to heaven lies through heaven, and all the way to heaven is heaven."

"If you are what you ought to be, you will set fire to all Italy, and not only yonder. (Letter 368 to Stefano Maconi)"

"Catherine of Siena was only six years old when Jesus appeared to her dressed majestically as the Supreme Pontiff, with three crowns on his head and a red cloak, flanked by St. Peter, St. John, and St. Paul. She devoted herself to serving the Church and, in particular, the clergy and the Pope."

"India, as she is, is a problem which can only be read by the light of Indian history. Only by a gradual and loving study of how she came to be, can we grow to understand what the country actually is, what the intention of her evolution, and what her sleeping potentiality may be."

"Again and again he (Swami Vivekananda) would return upon the note of perfect rationality in his hero. Buddha was to him not only the greatest of Aryans but also 'the one absolutely sane man' that the world had ever seen. How he had refused worship! (...) How vast had been the freedom and humility of the Blessed One! (...) He alone was able to free religion entirely from the argument of the supernatural, and yet make it as binding in its force, and as living in its appeal, as it had ever been."

"The whole history of the world shows that the Indian intellect is second to none. This must be proved by the performance of a task beyond the power of others, the seizing of the first place in the intellectual advance of the world. Is there any inherent weakness that would make it impossible for us to do this? Are the countrymen of Bhaskaracharya and Shankaracharya inferior to the countrymen of Newton and Darwin? We trust not. It is for us, by the power of our thought, to break down the iron walls of opposition that confront us, and to seize and enjoy the intellectual sovereignty of the world."

"I believe that India is one, indissoluble, indivisible."

"Our whole past shall be made a part of the world’s life. That is what is called the realization of the national idea. But it must be realised everywhere,"

"Our daily life creates our symbol of God. No two ever cover quite the same conception."

"Hinduism would not be eternal were it not constantly growing and spreading, and taking in new areas of experience. Precisely because it has this power of self addition and re-adaptation, in greater degree than any other religion that the world has even seen, we believe it to be the one immortal faith."

"The book is nowhere a call to leave the world, but everywhere an interpretation of common life as the path to that which lies beyond. "Better for a man is his own duty, however, badly done than the duty of another, though that be easy. "Holding gain and loss as one, prepare for battle." That the man who throws away his weapons, and permits himself to be slain, unresisting in the battle, is not the hero of religion, but a sluggard and a coward; that the true seer is he who carries his vision into action, regardless of the consequences to himself; this is the doctrine of the "Gita" repeated again and again....Not the withdrawn, but the transfigured life, radiant, with power and energy, triumphant in its selflessness, is religion. "Arise!" thunders the voice of Sri Krishna, "and be thou an apparent cause!""

"We must create a history of India in living terms. Up to the present that history, as written by the English, practically begins with Warren Hastings, and crams in certain unavoidable preliminaries, which cover a few thousands of years...The history of India has yet to be written for the first time. It has to be humanized, emotionalized, made the trumpet-voice and evangel of the race that inhabit India."

"Beauty of place translates itself to the Indian consciousness as God's cry to the soul. Had Niagara been situated on the Ganga, it is odd to think how different would have been its valuation by humanity. Instead of fashionable picnics and railway pleasure-trips, the yearly or monthly incursion of worshipping crowds; instead of hotels, temples; instead of ostentatious excess, austerity; instead of the desire to harness its mighty forces to the chariot of human utility, the unrestrained longing to throw away the body, and realize at once the ecstatic madness of Supreme Union. Could contrast be greater?"

"For thousands of years must Indian women have risen with the light to perform the Salutation of the Threshold. Thousands of years of simplicity and patience, like that of the peasant, like that of the grass, speak in the beautiful rite. It is this patience of woman that makes civilisations. It is this patience of the Indian woman, with this her mingling of large power of reverie, that has made and makes the Indian nationality."

"For the attention of the poet-chronicler is fixed on the invisible shackles of selfhood that bind us all. He seems to be describing great events; in reality he does not for one instant forget that he is occupied with the history of souls, depicting the incidence of their experience and knowledge on the external world."

"In the sublime imagination of the Beatific Vision, he catches a hint of a deeper reality, but why, he asks, this distinction between time and eternity? Can the apprehension of the Infinite Good be conditioned by the clock? Oh, for a knowledge undimensioned, untimed, effect of no cause, cause of no effect!"

"… a single generation enamoured of foreign ways is almost enough in history to risk the whole continuity of civilization and learning. Ages of accumulation are entrusted to the frail bark of each passing epoch by the hand of the past, desiring to make over its treasures to the use of the future. It takes a certain stubbornness, a doggedness of loyalty, even a modicum of unreasonable conservatism maybe, to lose nothing in the long march of the ages; and, even when confronted with great empires, with a sudden extension of the idea of culture, or with the supreme temptation of a new religion, to hold fast what we have, adding to it only as much as we can healthfully and manfully carry."

"[Sister Nivedita] is a lady Hindus are proud of. She helped India by helping it to rediscover itself. No higher service could be rendered to a nation in the grip of self-forgetfulness... This explains why Sister Nivedita is Hindu India's hero."

"Our patriotic and noble-minded sister had adopted our land from Sindu to the seas as her Fatherland. She truly loved it as such, and had our nation been free, we would have been the first to bestow the right of citizenship on such loving souls. So the first essential may, to some extent, be said to hold good in her case. The second essential of common blood of Hindu parentage must, nevertheless and necessarily, be absent in such cases as these. The sacrament of marriage with a Hindu, which really fuses and is universally admitted to do so, two beings into one, may be said to remove this disqualification. But although this second essential failed, either way to hold good in her case, the third important qualification of Hindutva did entitle her to be recognized as a Hindu. For, she had adopted our culture and come to adore our land as her Holyland [sic]. She felt, she was a Hindu and that is, apart from all technicalities, the real and the most important test. But we must not forget that we have to determine the essentials of Hindutva in the sense in which the word is actually used by an overwhelming majority of people. And therefore we must say that any convert of non-Hindu parentage to Hindutva can be a Hindu, if bona fide, he or she adopts our land as his or her country and marries a Hindu, thus coming to love our land as a real Fatherland, and adopts our culture and thus adores our land as the Punyabhumi. The children of such a union as that would, other things being equal, be most emphatically Hindus."

"The Hindus have been so much humiliated and insulted since 1947 that sometimes it seems doubtful whether they are living in their own country adding that in Kashmir & Punjab Hindu blood is being shed so much so that even in Ayodhya unarmed Kar Sevaks including the Sadhus were brutally killed."

"Brother, we are willing to eat sevian at your house to celebrate Eid but you do not want to play with colours with us on Holi. We hear your calls to prayer along with our temple bells, but you object to our bells. How can unity ever come about? The Hindu faces this way, the Muslim the other. The Hindus writes from left to right, the Muslim from right to left. The Hindus pray to the rising sun, the Muslim faces the setting sun when praying. ... Whatever the Hindu does, it is the Muslim's religion to do its opposite (...)"

"When Sadhvi Ritambhara, a pro-Janmabhoomi campaigner (a cassette of a speech of hers was banned), tells an interviewer: "Politicians appease [the Muslims] at every step, while the Hindus are taken for granted. We can't even teach our children our religion in schools", the interviewer replies : "But this is a secular nation". No, in these circumstances it is not a secular nation. Either secular means anti-religious, and then all religion teaching should be banned from schools, also that of the minorities. Or secular means religiously neutral, and then the state should leave all the religions the same right to impart religious education in schools, including the Hindus. Passing off this communal discrimination as secular, is a very crude lie indeed."

"Be good, love the Lord, pray for those who do not know Him. What a great grace it is to know God!"

"If I were to meet those men who abducted me, or even those who tortured me, I would kneel and kiss their hands, for it that hadn’t happened, I would not be a Christian and a religious today."

"I pity them! No doubt they were unaware of the anguish they caused me. They were the masters and I was the slave. Just as it is natural for us to do good, so it is natural for them to behave as they did behave to me. They did so out of habit, not out of wickedness."

"Seeing the sun, the moon and the stars, I said to myself: Who could be the Master of these beautiful things? And I felt a great desire to see him, to know Him and to pay Him homage..."

"When a person loves another very much, she greatly wished to meet that person. Why then should I be afraid of death? Death brings us to God."

"My one occupation is to live in the presence of my Heavenly Father."

"I understand the full extent of the expression to surrender oneself, but I cannot explain it. I only know that it is very vast, that it embraces both the present and the future."

"The surrendered soul has found paradise on earth."

"A few days ago, I saw something that consoled me very much. It was during my thanksgiving, when I was making a few reflections on the goodness of God — and how would it be possible not to think of this in such moments: of this infinite goodness, uncreated goodness, source of all goodness! And without which there would be no goodness, neither in people nor in other creatures."

"My heart is Yours, my mind is Yours, my thoughts are Yours. Ask me for anything. Nothing matters now, since nothing I have is mine! Possess me, Jesus"

"I foresee an imminent danger."

"I haven’t any inyenzi [cockroaches]. They are human beings, your brothers and sisters."

"Simply go and tell him to never worry about my safety. I cannot leave these people (Tutsi refugees) alone. I’m ready to bear what might happen to them."

"Dearest brother, Thank you for wanting to help me. I would rather die than abandoning the forty-three persons for whom I am responsible. Pray for us, that we may come to God. Say ‘goodbye’ to our old mother and our brother. When I come to God, I shall pray for you. Keep well. Thank you for thinking of me. If God saves us, as we hope, we shall see each other tomorrow."

"We are praying for you before God so that you stop what you are doing to your compatriots."

"I have no more reason to live, now that you have killed all of my sisters."

"We used to call her a heroine as far back as the 1980s. She was that type of girl that everyone liked, she was selfless and had a generous heart, especially towards the neediest. ... Besides her church responsibilities, she was patriotic; she would always encourage us to love the country and all its children as we did for ourselves."

"Her impact extended beyond academic achievements, showing the spirit of unity and compassion. ... In the streets of Gisenyi, Niyitegeka's presence was a beacon of light and love, and her legacy lives on through the countless lives she touched and the hearts she warmed."

"When news broke that the President (Juvenal Habyarimana) had died (in a plane crash on April 6, 1994) and killings had broken out, we all decided to stay at the center praying ... Niyitegeka would comfort us, urging us to be courageous enough and offer ourselves as sacrifices of peace for the betterment of the country."

"She tried to save all who came to her for help, and when the Hutu extremists attacked her residence, she accompanied those who were seized simply for being Tutsi to their deaths, and so was put to death, too. ... She demonstrated her love, modeled after Jesus’ love, even at the price of her life. Her life demonstrates her belief that all people have value and dignity."

"Qui desitja servir Déu es menester que estiga molt content en tota cosa."

"I was born in a Christian family. I had the desire to join a convent from my early years onward. My calling to become a nun was not because of the effects of poverty on my family or because I was not performing well in class, but it was my choice to serve God."

"I have had many wonderful students over the years. Many have gone on for their master's and doctorate degrees and that has been most rewarding for me."

"I used to prefer teaching to administrative work, but by the time I left teaching in 1995, the students cared about nothing but the grades and they didn't care how they got them. I believe in knowledge for knowledge's sake. But students now need a reason for everything. Everything has to be useful and entertaining. And they don't study."

"L'apparition de la Très Saint Vierger sur la Montagne de La Salette par la bergère de La Salette avec l'imprimatur de Mgr l'éveque de Lecce, Pierre Téqui éditeur, Paris, 2018 (reprint), Ch. III pp. 16-26. ISBN 978-2-7403-2158-4 (in French) (full text of the messages given by the Virgin Mary to Mélanie Calvat and Maximin Giraud, firstly published on November 15, 1879 with nihil obstat and imprimatur by bishop Salvatore Luigi Zola and Archbishop Carmelo Cosma, vicar general of the Archdiocese of Lecce)."

"Where so ever ye fare by fryth or by fell: My dere chylde take hede how Trystam doo you tell. How many manere bestys of venery there were: Lysten to your dame and she shall you lere. Four manere of bestis of venere there are: The fyrste of theym is the harte: the seconde is the hare: The boore is one of tho: the wulfe and not one mo."

"And where that ye come in playne or in place: I shall you tell whyche ben bestys of en chace: One of theym is the bucke: a nother is the doo: The foxe and the marteron: and the wylde roo: And ye shall my dere chylde other bestys all: Where so ye theym fynde Rascall ye shall them call."

"A faythfulle frende wold I fayne finde, To fynde hym there he myghte be founde; But now is the worlde wext so unkynde, Yet frenship is fall to the grounde; (Now a frende I have founde) That I woll nother banne ne curse, But of all frendes in felde or towne, Ever, gramercy, myn own purse."

"I aske this question, which ben the meanes and the causes that enduce a man in to a merry spyryte: truly to my best dyscrecon it semeth good dysportes and honest gamys in whom a man joyeth without any repentance after. Thenne followeth it that gode dysportes and honest gamys ben cause of mannys fayr aege and longe life. And therefore now woll I chose of foure good dysportes and honest gamys, that is to wyte; of huntynge: hawkynge: fysshynge: and foulynge. The beste to my symple dyscrecon whyche is fysshynge: called anglynge, with a rodde and a lyne and an hoke: and thereof to treate as my symple wytte may suffice."

"Also ye shall not be ravenous in takyng of your sayd game as to moche at one tyme...whyche lyghtly be occasyon to dystroye your owne dysporte and other mennys also. As whan ye have suffycyent mese ye sholde coveyte nomore as at that tyme. Also ye shall besye yourselfe to nourysh the game in all that ye maye: and to destroye all such thynges as ben devourers of it."

"From an abbess disposed to turn author, we might more reasonably have expected a manual of meditations for the closet, or select rules for making salves, or distilling strong waters. But the diversions of the field were not thought inconsistent with the character of a religious lady of this eminent rank, who resembled an abbot in respect of exercising an extensive manorial jurisdiction, and who hawked and hunted in common with other ladies of distinction...The second of these treatises is written in rhyme. It is spoken in her own person; in which, being otherwise a woman of authority, she assumes the title of dame. I suspect the whole to be a translation from the French and Latin...The barbarism of the times strongly appears in the indelicate expressions which she often uses; and which are equally incompatible with her sex and profession."