Quotations

These are from an article in The Christian Century - "God is not Beyond" by Christian Wiman

"Faith is forged not by the mind alone but by the mind's risky messy encounter with the world at large. Faith is not something you have; it is something you do."

"Silence is the language of faith. Action - be it church or charity, politics or poetry - is the translation."

"Do not pray to be at peace in your belief. Pray that your anxieties be given peaceful outlets, that you may be the means to a peace which you yourself do not feel."

"Faith is not a new life in this sense; it is the old life newly seen."

"To feel God - to find God - does not usually require that we renounce all worldly possessions and enter a monastery, or give our lives over to some cause of social justice, or create some sort of sacred art, or begin spontaneously speaking in tongues.
All too often the task to which we are called is simply to show a kindness to the irritating person in the cubicle next to us, say, or touch the face of a spouse from whom we ourselves have been long absent, letting grace wake love from our intense, self-enclosed sleep."

Christian Wiman is the editor of Poetry magazine.