{"id":9742,"date":"2026-05-07T22:12:39","date_gmt":"2026-05-08T02:12:39","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/?p=9742"},"modified":"2026-05-07T22:12:39","modified_gmt":"2026-05-08T02:12:39","slug":"a-lover-not-a-dictator","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/?p=9742","title":{"rendered":"A Lover, Not a Dictator"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"800\" height=\"600\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-9743\" srcset=\"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64.jpg 800w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64-300x225.jpg 300w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64-768x576.jpg 768w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64-640x480.jpg 640w, https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Rohr64-400x300.jpg 400w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 800px) 100vw, 800px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Everything belongs.  God uses everything.  There are no dead-ends.  There is no wasted energy.  Everything is recycled.  Sin history and salvation history are two sides of one coin.  I believe with all my heart that the Gospel is all about the mystery of forgiveness.  When you &#8220;get&#8221; forgiveness, you get it.  We use the phrase &#8220;falling in love.&#8221;  I think forgiveness is almost the same thing.  It&#8217;s a mystery we fall into: the mystery is God.  God forgives all things for being imperfect, broken, and poor.  Not only Jesus but all the great people who pray that I have met in my life say the same thing.  That&#8217;s the conclusion they come to.  The people who know God well &#8211; the mystics, the hermits, those who risk everything to find God &#8211; always meet a lover, not a dictator.  God is never found to be an abusive father or a tyrannical mother, but always a lover who is more than we dared hope for.  How different than the &#8220;account manager&#8221; that most people seem to worship.<\/p>\n<p>&#8212; Richard Rohr, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sonderbooks.com\/Nonfiction\/everything_belongs.html\">Everything Belongs<\/a><\/em>, p. 130-131<\/p>\n<p>Photo: Irises, South Riding, Virginia, May 2, 2026<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Everything belongs. God uses everything. There are no dead-ends. There is no wasted energy. Everything is recycled. Sin history and salvation history are two sides of one coin. I believe with all my heart that the Gospel is all about the mystery of forgiveness. When you &#8220;get&#8221; forgiveness, you get it. We use the phrase [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[46,11,13,15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-9742","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-acceptance","category-forgiveness","category-god","category-love"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9742","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=9742"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9742\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9744,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9742\/revisions\/9744"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=9742"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=9742"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/sonderbooks.com\/sonderquotes\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=9742"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}