Prayers For Our Ancestors Quotes & Sayings

Everything I see, I now see through a mother's eyes. — Jennifer Hudson

In a society so estranged from animals as ours, we often fail to credit them with any form of language. If we do, it comes under the heading of communication rather than speech. And yet, the great silence we have imposed on the rest of life contains innumerable forms of expression. Where does our own language come from but this unfathomed store that characterizes innumerable species?
We are now more than halfway removed from what the unwritten word meant to our ancestors, who believed in the original, primal word behind all manifestations of the spirit. You sang because you were answered. The answers come from life around you. Prayers, chants, and songs were also responses to the elements, to the wind, the sun and stars, the Great Mystery behind them. Life on earth springs from a collateral magic that we rarely consult. We avoid the unknown as if we were afraid that contact would lower our sense of self-esteem. — John Hay

It is a sad thing to look at happiness only through another's eyes. — Marguerite Gardiner, Countess Of Blessington

She was poisoned, but the reason she was crying was that her husband didn't want her anymore. — Eula Biss

My friends are all geeks. And many of them are scientists who love playing outside as much as I do. — Antony Garrett Lisi

Trying to impress my mother with words was one of my favourite pursuits. — John Mayer

Poverty is a national waste as well as individual waste. We are all diminished when any of us are denied proper education. The nation is the poorer - a poorer economy, a poorer civilization, because of this human and national waste. — Gough Whitlam

The free way of life proposes ends, but it does not prescribe means. — Robert Kennedy

It may not make sense to you, now, but when you get older you'll understand that sometimes things have to be done. Hard things. But everyone will hate the person who finally does them. But if they do them anyway, that's the mark of true honor. — Rhiannon Held Silver

Unlike the made and broken promises of love, the transactions of employment were absolute. "Love's — Suanne Laqueur

The capacity to get free is nothing; the capacity to be free is the task. — Andre Gide

Across the continent, on the shores of small tributaries, in the shadows of sacred mountains, on the vast expanse of the prairies, or in the safety of the woods, prayers are being repeated, as they have for thousands of years, and common people with uncommon courage and the whispers of their ancestors in their ears continue their struggles to protect the land and water and trees on which their very existence is based. And like small tributaries joining together to form a mighty river, their force and power grows. — Winona LaDuke

But when I saw the cursive grace of Guido Rahr's fly line writing prayers I couldn't read to the river gods of Outer Mongolia, I knew my name was written there too. Fly fishing was going to be my version of my father's sport, my nod to my Scottish ancestors and to my self, and to the fish crazed part of America I had claimed as my own. — Jessica Maxwell

I don't have time to feel sorry for myself. I've got to think. — Libba Bray

The African powers, child. The spirits. The loas. The orishas. The oldest ancestors. You will hear people from Haiti and Cuba and Brazil and so call them different names. You will even hear some names I ain't tell you, but we all mean the same thing. Them is the ones who does carry we prayers to God Father, for he too busy to listen to every single one of we on earth talking at he all the time. Each of we have a special one who is we father or mother, and no matter what we call it, whether Shango or Santeria or Voudun or what, we all doing the same thing. Serving the spirits. — Nalo Hopkinson

As individuals, we must think nobler thoughts. We must not encourage vile thoughts or low aspirations. We shall radiate them if we do. If we think noble thoughts, if we encourage and cherish noble aspirations, there will be that radiation when we meet people, especially when we associate with them. — David O. McKay

What use is a god with boundless mercy, sir? You mock me as a pagan, yet the gods of my ancestors pronounce clearly their ways and punish severely when we break their laws. Your Christian god of mercy gives men licence to pursue their greed, their lust for land and blood, knowing a few prayers and a little penance will bring forgiveness and blessing. — Kazuo Ishiguro