Quotes & Sayings About The Beatitudes

Blessed are the sleepy ones: for they shall soon fall off. — Friedrich Nietzsche

To put the issue bluntly, are the Beatitudes true? If so, why doesn't the church encourage poverty and mourning and meekness and persecution instead of striving against them? What is the real meaning of the Beatitudes, this cryptic ethical core of Jesus' teaching? — Philip Yancey

Blessed are the cracked, for they shall let in the light. — Groucho Marx

Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken. — Albert Camus

New beatitudes came from him [Bobby]: "Blessed are those who live in hovels, for God will give them palaces in heaven."
He gave them new commandments:
"God weeps when anyone kills in his name; kill not.
"God hates hate; hate not.
"God loves love; love more.
"You need not trust in God; you need hope that God will trust in you.
"You are your own master. The way is within you. — Randy Attwood

Children can see the beatitudes in nature. — Lailah Gifty Akita

I have met many, many farm workers and friends who love justice and who are willing to sacrifice for what is right. They have a quality about them that reminds me of the beatitudes. They are living examples that Jesus' promise is true: they have ben hungry and thirsty for righteousness and they have been satisfied. They are determined, patient people who believe in life and who give strength to others. They have given me more love and hope and strength than they will ever know. — Cesar Chavez

If we were to set out to establish a religion in polar opposition to the Beatitudes Jesus taught, it would look strikingly similar to the pop Christianity that has taken over the airwaves of North America. — Tony Campolo

I see the beatitudes of books displayed on a bookshelf. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Yet, happy are the pure of heart for they have known the music. — David Paul Kirkpatrick

Blessed are the meek, for to them we shall say "attaboy". — Christopher Moore

I don't - you know, I'm very disillusioned with our political system. If we don't wake up in America and realize that we have to vote out of our courage and integrity for candidates who reflect our own beatitudes, and not the beatitudes of the war machine and the corporations, we are - we're doomed. — Cindy Sheehan

Even when they call us mad, when they call us subversives and communists and all the epithets they put on us, we know we only preach the subversive witness of the Beatitudes, which have turned everything upside down. — Oscar Romero

After all, the Beatitudes don't tend to look a lot like modern Christianity. We choose a political team. We select a denominational preference. We hitch our cart to a branch of philosophy. Anyone that disagrees is quickly and succinctly judged, and simultaneously disregarded as worthless. Big problem with that approach. We are supposed to be loving those who don't agree with us to Jesus - and you can't love those whom you deem worthless. — Mark Steele

But, in order to be the community of Jesus' poor, the Church has constant need of the great ascetics. She needs the communities that follow them, living out poverty and simplicity so as to display to us the truth of the Beatitudes. She needs them to wake everyone up to the fact that possession is all about service, to contrast the culture of affluence with the culture of inner freedom, and thereby to create the conditions for social justice as well. — Pope Benedict XVI

Look at the commencement of His ministry. In the Beatitudes with which the Sermon on the Mount opens, He speaks: "Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. — Andrew Murray

Blessed are they whose bodies get destroyed in the service of others. — Swami Vivekananda

The Beatitudes reveal the profile of the Christian, the character of the one who has had a life-changing encounter with the grace of God. In light of God's overwhelming goodness, the sinner sees his own poverty of spirit and mourns not only for his own sin but also for the spiritual sickness of the world. Therefore, he grows meek and longs for all the more earnestly for true righteousness. Therefore, he practices mercy and enjoys purity and makes peace. Therefore, he gladly endures persecution for the sake of Jesus. — R. W. Glenn

Blessed are those who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused,'" Gabriel quoted. "One of the unrecorded Beatitudes. — Terri Garey

Blessed are the single-hearted, for they shall enjoy much peace. If you refuse to be hurried and pressed, if you stay your soul on God, nothing can keep you from that clearness of spirit which is life and peace. In that stillness you will know what His will is. — Amy Carmichael

A friend of mine says that in the world of religion we often have ignorance on fire and intelligence on ice.
The thing I love about The Beatitudes Society is they represent faith and intelligence on fire and there's enthusiasm and passion and a realization that a more open and progressive approach to faith is something to celebrate. — Brian D. McLaren

We need to build up society in the light of the Beatitudes, walking towards the Kingdom with the least among us. — Pope Francis

High above all earthly lower happiness, the blessedness of the eight Beatitudes towers into the heaven itself. They are white with the snows of eternity; they give a space, a meaning, a dignity to all the rest of the earth over which they brood. — Arthur Penrhyn Stanley

I love the melodies in the Old Testament, how preachers highlight them when they read from the Scripture. But I was influenced forever by the New Testament. I love the Beatitudes, informing us that the meek shall inherit the earth. — Maya Angelou

Blessed are they who have the gift of making friends,for it is one of God's best gifts. — Thomas Hughes

It has to do with seeing God. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God" (Matthew 5:8). — John Piper

All the beatitudes manifest in the sacred-time. — Lailah Gifty Akita

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall take flack from both sides.- Unofficial UN Motto — Robert Asprin

I was sure the old man knew nothing about the beatitudes, ecstasies, dazzling reverberations of sexual encounters. Cut out the poetry was his message. Clinical sex, deprived of all the warmth of love - the orchestration of all the senses, touch, hearing, sight, palate; all the euphoric accompaniments, back-ground music, moods, atmosphere, variations - forced him to resort to literary aphrodisiacs. — Anais Nin

Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt. — Herbert Hoover

Blessed are the dumbfucks. — Christopher Moore

For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the Beatitudes (Matthew 5). But, often with tears in their eyes, the demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course, that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the Beatitudes, be posted anywhere.
"Blessed are the merciful" in a courtroom? "Blessed are the peacemakers" in the Pentagon? Give me a break! — Kurt Vonnegut

Peacemaking contains all the elements of the Christian faith. Peacemaking is the result of not only taking the beatitudes seriously, but living them. It involves right relationships. Right relationships with God, right relationships with God's people and right relationships with God's creation. It involves love. Proper love of self, love of God and creation, and love of all people - even our enemies. It is not passive, it is active; it is peacemaking not peacekeeping. Above all, it is following the way of Jesus, which was the way of the cross, where his power was 'made perfect in weakness' (2 Cor. 12:9). — Donald R. Clymer

Blessed are the poor in spirit: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.
Blessed are they that mourn: for they shall be comforted.
Blessed are the meek: for they shall inherit the earth.
Blessed are they which do hunger and thirst after righteousness: for they shall be filled.
Blessed are the merciful: for they shall obtain mercy.
Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God.
Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.
Blessed are they which are persecuted for righteousness' sake: for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.
Matthew 5 — Anonymous

Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders. — Friedrich Nietzsche

They're called in the Scripture the Beatitudes. You know why they're called the Beatitudes without being prestigious? Because they should be the attitudes of every believer. That's the normal Christian life, not the abnormal Christian life. The normal Christian life is holiness. — Leonard Ravenhill

In the sacred-time, all beatitudes manifest. — Lailah Gifty Akita

The gospel has but a forced alliance with war. Its doctrine of human brotherhood would ring strangely between the opposed ranks. The bellowing speech of cartoon and the baptism of blood mock its liturgies and sacraments. Its gentle beatitudes would hardly serve as mottoes for defiant banners, nor its list of graces as names for ships-of-the-line. — Edwin Hubbel Chapin

Call me old-fashioned," Deepak said, "but I've always believed that hard work pays off. My version of the Beatitudes. Do the right thing, put up with unfairness, selfishness, stay true to yourself ... one day it all works out. Of course, I don't know that people who wronged you suffer or get their just deserts. I don't think it works that way. But I do think that one day you get your reward. — Abraham Verghese

Blessings on the poor in spirit! The kingdom of heaven is yours" (Matt. 5:3) doesn't mean, "You will go to heaven when you die." It means you will be one of those through whom God's kingdom, heaven's rule, begins to appear on earth as in heaven. The Beatitudes are the agenda for kingdom people. They are not simply about how to behave, so that God will do something nice to you. They are about the way in which Jesus wants to rule the world. — N. T. Wright

Agape, the love of each one of us for the other, from the closest to the furthest, is in fact the only way that Jesus has given us to find the way of salvation and of the Beatitudes. — Pope Francis

It is well for us if we have learned to listen to the sweet persuasion of the Beatitudes, but there are crises in all lives which require also the emphatic "Thou shalt not" of the decalogue which the founders wrote on the gateposts of their commonwealth. — John Greenleaf Whittier

The examination of conscience has an important educational value. it teaches us to look sincerely at our own lives, to compare them with the truth of the Gospel and to evaluate them with parameters that are not only human but drawn from divine Revelation. Comparison with the Commandments, with the Beatitudes, and above all with the Precept to love, represents the first great 'school of penance — Pope Benedict XVI

The Beatitudes, far from being a new set of virtues that further divide the religious haves and have nots, are words of hope and healing to those who have been marginalized. — James Bryan Smith

Becoming a child is living the Beatitudes and so finding the narrow gate into the Kingdom. — Henri J.M. Nouwen

The late Kurt Vonnegut, the satirical American author, wrote: For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the beatitudes. But - often with tears in their eyes - they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the beatitudes, be posted anywhere. — Philip Yancey

The Beatitudes are no spiritual "to do list" to be attempted by eager, rule-keeping disciples. It is a spiritual "done" list of the qualities God brings to bear in the people who follow Jesus. — Ronnie McBrayer

I am waiting
for the meek to be blessed
and inherit the earth ...
without taxes — Lawrence Ferlinghetti

The Beatitudes correspond to the Decalogue, with blessings in lieu of the forbidden. — James Mikolajczyk

Blessed is the man who's lost it all. — Switchfoot