Spiritual Nurture Quotes & Sayings

There is only one basic desire that motivates the spiritual seeker-to make the experience of God, of divine bliss and joy, the center of the life experience. We are spiritual beings living in a material universe, and as such, our first priority is to nurture that eternal part of us. The eleventh step of AA's twelve-step program states it beautifully: "Sought through prayer and meditation to improve our conscious contact with God as we understood him, praying only for knowledge of his will for us and the power to carry that out." — Douglas Bloch

The widespread assumption that ethical behavior takes the fun out of life is false. In actuality, living ethically ensures that relationships in our lives, including encounters with strangers, nurture our spiritual growth. — Bell Hooks

Yet, beloved, there remains, after all, the blackness that is prophecy, the blackness that is inexplicable hope in the face of savage hopelessness...

Beloved, if the enslaved could nurture, on the vine of their desperate deficiency of democracy, the spiritual and moral fruit that fed our civilization, then surely we can name and resist demagoguery; we can protest, and somehow defeat, the forces that threaten the soul of our nation. To not try, to give up on the possibility that we can make a difference, can make the difference, is to give up on our past. on our complicated, difficult, but victorious past. Donald Trump is not our final, or ultimate, problem. The problem is, instead, allowing hopelessness to steal our joyful triumph before we work hard enough to achieve it. — Michael Eric Dyson

If you don't know what to do next take the oath that will enhance your soul and erase your ego, & from the quiet space inside yourself, you will know what to do. — Nikki Rowe

In a culture where busyness is a fetish and stillness is laziness, rest is sloth. But without rest, we miss the rest of God: the rest he invites us to enter more fully so that we might know him more deeply. "Be still, and know that I am God." Some knowing is never pursued, only received. And for that, you need to be still. Sabbath is both a day and an attitude to nurture such stillness. It is both time on a calendar and a disposition of the heart. It is a day we enter, but just as much a way we see. Sabbath imparts the rest of God - actual physical, mental, spiritual rest, but also the rest of God - the things of God's nature and presence we miss in our busyness. — Mark Buchanan

The clergy profession is fundamentally self-defeating. Its stated purpose is to nurture spiritual maturity in the church - a valuable goal. In actuality, however; it accomplishes the opposite by nurturing a permanent dependence of the laity on the clergy. Clergy become to their congregations like parents whose children never grow up, like therapists whose clients never become healed, like teachers whose students never graduate. — Christian Smith

When we feel deeply drawn to someone, we cathect them; that is, we invest feelings or emotion in them. That process of investment wherein a loved one becomes important to us is called "cathexis". I his book Peck rightly emphasizes that most of us "confuse cathecting with loving." We all know how often individuals of cathecting insist that they love the other person even if they are hurting of neglecting them. Since their feiling is that of cathexis, they insist that what they feel is love.
When we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another's spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful and abusive. — Bell Hooks

Listening is a gift of spiritual significance that you can learn to give to others. When you listen, you give one a sense of importance, hope and love that he or she may not receive any other way. Through listening, we nurture and validate the feelings one has, especially when he or she experiences difficulties in life. — H. Norman Wright

Every man must nurture is spiritual soul daily. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Maintain a balance life: Nurture your physical, emotional, and spiritual needs. — Lailah Gifty Akita

In Aristotle ... leisure is a far more noble, spiritual goal than work ... leisure is pursued solely for its own sake ... : the pleasures of music and poetry, ... conversation with friends, and ... gratuitous, playful speculation. In Latin, the ultimate good is otium - the opposite is negotium, or gainful work.
We have sought too much counsel in the proto-Calvinist work ethic preached by St Paul ... during the cessation of work we nurture family, educate, nourish friendships ... in loafing, most of our innovations come ... the routine of daily work has too often served as ... sleep ... a refuge from two crucial states - awakedness to the needs of others, and to the transcendent, which only comes ... loitering, dallying, tarrying, goofing off. — Francine Du Plessix Gray

You can prepare for any challenge, if you daily nurture your mental, emotional, physical and spiritual well-being. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The roots of the Divine are entrenched in this body. If you nurture the roots, how can you avoid the flowering? — Jaggi Vasudev

When we understand love as the will to nurture our own and another's spiritual growth, it becomes clear that we cannot claim to love if we are hurtful and abusive. Love and abusive cannot coexist. Abuse and neglect are, by definition, the opposites of nurturance and care. — Bell Hooks

However, community is first of all a quality of the heart. It grows from the spiritual knowledge that we are alive not for ourselves but for one another.
Community is the fruit of our capacity to make the interests of others more important than our own.
The question, therefore, is not 'How can we make community?' but, 'How can we develop and nurture giving hearts?' — Henri Nouwen

The purpose of journeying together in spiritual friendship and spiritual community (whether there are just two of you or whether you are in a small group) is to listen to one another's desire for God, to nurture that desire in each other and to support one another in seeking a way of life that is consistent with that desire. — Ruth Haley Barton

Testimony in new age writing affirms the way in which embracing a love ethic transforms life for the good. Yet a lot of this information only reaches those of us who have class privilege. And often, individuals whose lives are rich in spiritual and material well-being, who have diverse friends from all walks of life who nurture their personal integrity, tell the rest of the world these things are impossible to come by. I am talking here about the many prophets of doom who tell us that racism will never end, sexism is here to stay the rich will never share their resources. We would all be surprised if we could enter their lives for a day. Much of what they are telling us cannot be had, they have. But in keeping with a capitalist-based notion of well-being, they really believe there is not enough to go around, that the good life can only be had by a few. — Bell Hooks

Our soul is like a soft and gentle flower, it needs to be nurtured, cared for, tended to, with sufficient sunlight, fresh air and freedom to bloom into its most precious and beautiful form. This, my friend, is self-love. — Miya Yamanouchi

Divine election is a theme mentioned often in sacred Scripture. God has chosen to reveal this truth for the spiritual nurture and growth of the people of God. — John Samson

The Latin words humus, soil/earth, and homo, human being, have a common derivation, from which we also get our word 'humble.' This is the Genesis origin of who we are: dust - dust that the Lord God used to make us a human being. If we cultivate a lively sense of our origin and nurture a sense of continuity with it, who knows, we may also acquire humility. — Eugene H. Peterson

The second dynamic is that each vocation presents many spiritual and moral issues, ethical quandaries, temptations, discouragements, and other questions that particularly confront the Christians in that profession. A good deal of spiritual nurture in the church is very general and only addresses generic or private-world matters. But we spend most of our week in our vocational field, and we need to hear how other Christians have dealt with the same problems we face every day. — Timothy J. Keller

Nurture your divine strength. — Lailah Gifty Akita

When we see love as the will to nurture one's own or another's spiritual growth, revealed through acts of care, respect, knowing, and assuming responsibility, the foundation of all love in our life is the same. There is no special love exclusively reserved for romantic partners. Genuine love is the foundation of our engagement with ourselves, with family, with friends, with partners, with everyone we choose to love. — Bell Hooks

So many times when we get into emergencies and the situation seems totally hopeless - it's actually a setup. God wants to do something great. He wants to demonstrate his power, so that his name will be praised in a new and greater way. The next generation will hear all about it. After all, their spiritual nurture is far more important than material things. — Jim Cymbala

All of us are on a spiritual journey and we all have a spirituality, an ultimate commitment and practices that express and nurture that commitment.
Spirituality is not like frosting on a cake, an additional and optional layer, but is more like the baking powder that pervades an entire cake with its leavening power. — Bradley Hanson

A woman by her very nature is maternal
for every woman, whether ... married or unmarried, is called upon to be a biological, psychological or spiritual mother
she knows intuitively that to give, to nurture, to care for others, to suffer with and for them
for maternity implies suffering
is infinitely more valuable in God's sight than to conquer nations and fly to the moon. — Alice Von Hildebrand

Realizing the emptiness of a "spirituality"
and of a "spiritual" nurture
that remains in the clouds need not bring us or our children to a dead end. It is a turning point. Now we can begin to deepen our awareness of the genuine spirituality of life's humblest moments. — Jean Grasso Fitzpatrick

We cultivate love when we allow our most vulnerable and powerful selves to be deeply seen and known, and when we honor the spiritual connection that grows from that offering with trust, respect, kindness, and affection. Love is not something we give or get, it's something we nurture and grow - a connection that can only be cultivated between two people when it exists within each one of them. We can only love others as much as we love ourselves. Shame, blame, disrespect, and betrayal damage the roots from which love grows. Love can only survive these injuries if they are acknowledged, healed, and rare. — Summer Innanen

Let's nurture our spirits until they shine; and then let's strip down to our naked souls and dance through life until we drop little bits of light behind us that glow like fireflies in the night. — Cristen Rodgers

There is unusual power in united prayer. God has planned for His people to join together in prayer, not only for Christian fellowship, spiritual nurture, and growth, but also for accomplishing His divine purposes and reaching His chosen goals. — Wesley L. Duewel

Strive to engage in activities that require constant self-development. Nurture and develop the physical body, but also our spiritual nature. We exist for a purpose: to honor our spirituality. When we do, we cannot help but love others. Hurting others is easily recognized as a crime against ourselves. It's no coincidence that all religions teach this at their core. — Janet M. Tavakoli

Therefore, this is a question of whether we, humans, can change our culture and begin to truly care for all Creation, nurture all Life and thereby avert our own extinction. As such, this is a deeply spiritual issue and we can begin to act today, regardless of age. But the good news is that this is not a question of whether we will change our culture, but a question of when. — Shailesh Rao