Christian Mystics Quotes & Sayings

Why do you think the Bible has survived thousands of years of tumultuous history Why is it still here Is it because its stories are such compelling reading Of course not ... but there is a reason. There is a reason Christian monks spend lifetimes attempting to decipher the Bible. There is a reason that Jewish mystics and Kabbalists pore over the Old Testament. And that reason Robert is that there exist powerful secrets hidden in the pages of this ancient book ... a vast collection of untapped wisdom waiting to be unveiled. — Dan Brown

In the post-Christian world, all Christians will be mystics. — Karl Rahner

For the Christian mystics, detachment meant to leave attachment so that God could enter you and take over completely and you could climb the ladder to their heaven. Kind of crazy, but what the hell? — Gerald Stern

The Alexandrian Mystics' emphasis on silent prayer gave their teachings interior depth missing from Western theology today. — Amos Smith

Who can be against progress, after all? But it's a fraudulent use of the word - because for the Progressive, progress is marked not be how free you are, but how much government can 'do' for you. — Rick Perry

I don't know what to make of the Muslim mystics, especially those who have come to be known as the Sufis. What do they experience in their mystic experiences? Could they have encountered the same God we do in our Christian mysticism? — Tony Campolo

It seems to me that when we listen to the Muslim mystics as they talk about Jesus and their love for Jesus, I must say, it's a lot closer to New Testament Christianity than a lot of the Christians that I hear. In other words if we are looking for common ground, can we find it in mystical spirituality, even if we cannot theologically agree, Can we pray together in such a way that we connect with a God that transcends our theological differences? — Tony Campolo

Most countries in Africa have the capacity to be great agricultural producers, but they do only subsistence production. So a family will produce for themselves and nothing more. Why? Because of the systems: The markets are not there to go beyond. — Nicolas Berggruen

Sookie is about as radically different from me and a lot of the work I've previously done as you could possibly come up with. — Anna Paquin

Religion often has conflict with science but spirituality is a science. — Debasish Mridha

It's just because I have picked a little about mystics that I have no use for mystagogues. Real mystics don't hide mysteries, they reveal them. They set a thing up in broad daylight, and when you've seen it it's still a mystery. But the mystagogues hide a thing in darkness and secrecy, and when you find it, it's a platitude. — G.K. Chesterton

What is asserted by a man is an opinion; what is asserted by a woman is opinionated. A woman with ideas and the ability to express them is something of a social embarrassment, like an unhousebroken pet. — Marya Mannes

There's something great about the idea of working the land and living communally. That's healthy. That's good. — Paul Rudd

I know I'm a long way from greatness, but I am beginning to come at it in my own way. I can go through the basic motions pretty well, don't rely quite as religiously on specific fly patterns as I once did, have worked out ways of compensating for some of my most egregious weaknesses and have come to count heavily on timing because it's a hell of a lot easier to catch fish when the fish are biting. — John Gierach

Theology at its best doesn't seek to solve, but to behold. — Amos Smith

God is mystery, surpassing the senses and all knowledge, and yet God is at the core of our being. — Amos Smith

We have been through this is biennial convulsion four or five different times over the past 10 or 12 years, and now it appears that we are going through this quiet agony all over again. — Everett Dirksen

It wasn't until I was 35 or 36, when I wrote 'Danny and the Deep Blue Sea,' that I began to get some notoriety, though I only made $5,000. — John Patrick Shanley

Jesus always existed. At the same time Jesus was begotten (made human). This is the perplexing and elusive mystic core of Christian faith. — Amos Smith

All else-valor, a good name, glory, everything in heaven and earth-is secondary to the charm of riches. — Horace

Nirvana is something within you. It is not an external reality. No god thunders down from the mountaintop. Just as the great mystics in the Christian, Jewish and Muslim faiths all discovered, God is within the self. God is virtually inseparable from ourselves. — Karen Armstrong

being attached to any one philosophy or religion
dwelling on moot differences and wanting to fit in
despite the path all are led Home in time
following an alternative pathway is certainly no crime
Krishna, Buddha, Allah or Zohar Kabbalah
devoted nonviolently, one is led to Nirvana
Hindu Sages, Zen Masters or Christian Mystics
many tongues, but identical truth spoken from their lips
mentioning Self or no-self or God is Father or Mother
according to their culture emphasizing one method or another
allness vs. nothingness, meditation vs. prayer
devotion in practice is all you should care
when Truth reveals itself you're beyond all conception
then not a single man-made word will hold any traction — Jarett Sabirsh

I have been holding a dialogue with myself and girding myself to stand fast without running. — Sylvia Plath

Free expression is the gateway to assimilation. Consequently, radical Islam cannot tolerate it. — Andrew C. McCarthy

It is ... necessary to whip up the population in support of foreign adventures. Usually the population is pacifist, just like they were during the First World War. The public sees no reason to get involved in foreign adventures, killing, and torture. So you have to whip them up. And to whip them up you have to frighten them. — Noam Chomsky

She already felt dead in everything but name. What remained to be taken from her? She longed to be enfolded, welcomed, into the earth - to breathe no more, love no more, hurt no more — Alan Brennert

Dialogue with Catholics and other nonevangelical Christians offered some correction to the Church Growth movement's fixation on cultural accommodation and baptism rates. However - save for those few who converted - evangelicals attracted to other Christian traditions have made those traditions their own. They assemble do-it-yourself liturgies from a hodgepodge of monastic prayers and mystics' visions. They lionize medieval dissenters - Celtic monks, or renegade Franciscans - but don't understand their broader Catholic context. Without quite realizing what they have done, evangelicals often use these ancient teachings and practices to confirm, rather than challenge, their own assumptions. History becomes a sidekick to one's twenty-first-century journey with Jesus. — Molly Worthen

You know, all mystics - Catholic, Christian, non-Christian, no matter what their theology, no matter what their religion - are unanimous on one thing: that all is well, all is well. Though everything is a mess, all is well. Strange paradox, to be sure. But, tragically, most people never get to see that all is well because they are asleep. They are having a nightmare. — Anthony De Mello

There's a rich legend of this in other cultures, this speaking with ancestors. The Christian mystics communicated with angels. — James Redfield

Gnosis in Greek means knowledge, or to know. This does not refer to factual knowledge, but to an intuitive or spiritual understanding that comes from experience. The early Gnostics were mystics, people who knew that you could experience God for yourself instead of going into a church and being told what to believe. In Hebrew, to know means to experience - so, according to the Hebrews, knowing God means to experience Him. This is what most all early Hebrews and Christians were striving to do. Unfortunately, the Church got in the way of personal experience, by creating "organized religion." There's a saying which states, "Religion is for the masses, and mysticism is for the individual." If you want to be a sheep and follow along with the masses to get a generic, candy-coated version of your spirituality, then follow the teachings of the Christian fathers. If you want to explore your own individual spirituality, you must go deeply inside yourself, instead of through church doors. — Jordan Maxwell

Don't be stupid, privacy is an illusion in today's electronic world. And i always investigate the people who interest me — Shannon McKenna

Silence, is the mother of prayer, a return from the captivity of sin, unconscious success in virtue, a continuous ascension to heaven. — St. John Climacus

Christian literature makes reference to many episodes that parallel the experiences of those going a yogic way. Saint Anthony, one of the first desert mystics, frequently encountered strange and sometimes terrifying psychophysical forces while at prayer. — Willigis Jager