KarenElissa’s most recent Quotables

All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing.

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.

I often think of the set pieces of liturgy as certain words which people have successfully addressed to God without their getting killed.

Catholicism is a deep matter, you cannot take it in a teacup.

Wherever I am, at home in a hotel, in a train, plane or airport, I would not feel irritated, restless, and desirous of being somewhere else or doing something else. I would know that here and now is what counts and is important because it is God himself who wants me at this time in this place.

The Feast of the Assumption is for days when the rent is due, when the baby is crying, and its raining outside...This Feast reminds us of the bigger picture. One day God will reward all of our hidden earthly sacrifice with a crown in heaven, just as He honored Our Blessed Mother.

I insist books are not absolutely dead things: they are as lively as those fabulous dragons' teeth, and being sown up and down, may chance to spring up armed men.

Sometimes when I get up in the morning, I feel very peculiar. I feel like I've just got to bite a cat! I feel like if I don't bite a cat before sundown, I'll go crazy! But then I just take a deep breath and forget about it. That's what is known as real maturity.

There are not over a hundred people in the United States who hate the Catholic Church. There are millions, however, who hate what they wrongly believe to be the Catholic Church... As a matter of fact, if we Catholics believed all of the untruths and lies which were said against the Church, we probably would hate the Church a thousand times more than they do.

The outcome of any serious research can only be to make two questions grow where only one grew before.

Whenever you find yourself on the side of the majority it’s time to pause and reflect.

When European missionaries came, the Africans had the land and the Europeans had the Bible. The Europeans asked the Africans to close their eyes in prayer. When they said amen and opened their eyes, the Europeans had the land and the Africans had the Bible. But the Africans got the better end of the deal because the Bible then gave them the rationale to ask for their land to be returned and their rights respected.

We want our society to be characterized by vigorous debate and dissent, where to disagree is part and parcel of a vibrant community ... and not think that those who disagree, who express dissent, are disloyal or unpatriotic.

We cannot be facile and say bygones will be bygones, because they will not be bygones and will return to haunt us. True reconciliation is never cheap, for it is based on forgiveness, which is costly. Forgiveness in turn depends on repentance, which has to be based on an acknowledgment of what was done wrong, and therefore on disclosure of the truth. You cannot forgive what you do not know.

The yearning to know what cannot be known, to comprehend the incomprehensible, to touch and taste the unapproachable arises from the image of God in the nature of man. Deep calleth unto deep and though polluted and landlocked by the mighty disaster theologians call the Fall, the soul senses it's origins and longs to return to its source.

The worst sin towards our fellow creatures is not to hate them, but to be indifferent to them; that's the essence of inhumanity.

God comes to us, not only to give us peace, but also to disturb us. Inner restlessness and disquiet can well be God sowing the first seeds of faith in the human heart.

As frozen ground thaws, gentle God,
also soften my hard attitudes
and melt my cold heart.
Ready me for new life.
Tender my soul for the arrival of spring.
Let Easter happen in me and all around me.
Warm my expectations
and make me ready for what you have prepared
as I deepen my prayer
and my walk with you.
Amen.

If we submit everything to reason, our religion will have no mysterious and supernatural element. If we offend the principles of reason, or religion will be absurd and ridiculous.

If there must be trouble, let it be in my day, that my child may have peace.