If only we could all wear a heart right across the center of us so there was always this knowing: God has not forgotten you. God has not abandoned you. God’s love is around you everywhere. When you feel in your marrow how you’re His Beloved, you do more than look for signs of His love in the world, more than have a sign of His love; you actually become a sign of His love.
— Ann Voskamp, The Broken Way, p. 23
If there is one thing failure has taught me, it is the value of regret. Regret is one of the most powerful emotional reminders that change and growth are necessary. In fact, I’ve come to believe that regret is a kind of package deal: A function of empathy, it’s a call to courage and a path toward wisdom. Like all emotions, regret can be used constructively or destructively, but the wholesale dismissal of regret is wrongheaded and dangerous. “No regrets” doesn’t mean living with courage, it means living without reflection. To live without regret is to believe you have nothing to learn, no amends to make, and no opportunity to be braver with your life.
— Brené Brown, Rising Strong, p. 210-211.
God is always presented as full of joy, especially when he pardons.
— Pope Francis, The Name of God Is Mercy, p. 117
What if the busted and broken hearts could feel there’s a grace that holds us and calls us Beloved and says we belong and no brokenness ever has the power to break us away from being safe? What if we experienced the miracle of grace that can touch all our wounds?
I wanted to write it on walls and on the arms scarred with wounds, make it the refrain we sing in the face of the dark and broken places: No shame. No fear. No hiding. All’s grace. It’s always safe for the suffering here. You can struggle and you can wrestle and you can hurt and we will be here. Grace will meet you here; grace, perfect comfort, will always be served here.
— Anne Voskamp, The Broken Way, p. 20-21
You are made for perfection, but you are not yet perfect. You are a masterpiece in the making.
— Archbishop Desmond Tutu, quoted by Douglas Abrams in The Book of Joy, p. 92
As a parent, would you be pleased with dutiful children who went around heavy-hearted, oppressed with guilt and anxiety, fearful of suffering consequences for their every misdeed and never lightening up enough to share a laugh or a relaxing moment with you? Don’t loving parents want their children to enjoy life? “Which of you, if his son asks for bread, will give him a stone?” (Matthew 7:9).
— Mike Mason, Champagne for the Soul, p. 40
We turn Toddler brain feelings into Adult brain values by activating instinctual motivations to improve, appreciate, protect, and connect. We make the final transition from feelings to values by expanding on “I’m disappointed, but I’m okay.” It looks like this: “I’m disappointed, so I will improve, appreciate, connect, protect.”
— Steven Stosny, Soar Above, p. 117
Everything beautiful is a bit of love frozen: the love that gives is to the gift as water is to ice. Ah, you should hear our torrent shout in the spring! The thought of God fills me so full of life, that I want to go and do something for everybody.
— George MacDonald, Warlock O’Glenwarlock, chapter 22, quoted in Discovering the Character of God, edited by Michael Phillips, p. 230.
Regret is a tough but fair teacher.
To live without regret is to believe you have
nothing to learn,
no amends to make, and
no opportunity to be braver with your life.
— Brené Brown, Rising Strong, p. 184
Corruption is the sin which, rather than being recognized as such and making us humble, is elevated to a system, it becomes a mental habit, a way of living. We no longer feel the need for forgiveness and mercy, but we justify ourselves and our behaviors. Jesus says to his disciples: Even if your brother offends you seven times a day and seven times a day he returns to you to ask for forgiveness, forgive him. The repentant sinner, who sins again and again because of his weakness, will find forgiveness if he acknowledges his need for mercy. The corrupt man is the one who sins but does not repent, who sins and pretends to be Christian, and it is this double life that is scandalous.
— Pope Francis, The Name of God Is Mercy, p. 81