24 - 31 May 2009

To help us through the struggles of life we need something or someone to make hope a reality. This realisation is behind this week’s quotation:

“To be truly radical is to make hope possible rather than despair convincing”.

Raymond Williams (1921-1988, novelist, cultural theorist).

Williams does not say how we make hope possible. Religion or spirituality has played a major part in many people’s lives in helping them when despair could easily get the upper hand. My experience is that religion or spirituality needs a human face for this to be effective.

17 - 24 May 2009

Over the last few weeks the quotations have been about the struggles of life. This week’s quotation follows the previous one which described the power struggle between humans as a virus. It is by a French palaeontologist, who I would also describe as a mystic, Teilhard de Chardin:

“The persons in the street get in my way because I collide with them as possible rivals. I shall like them as soon as I see them as partners in the struggle.”

Teilhard de Chardin (1881-1955, Jesuit priest, palaeontologist and geologist). If you want to find out more about Teilhard de Chardin, there are links at www.bolton.ac.uk/Chaplaincy/Thought/.