Beatitudes Quotes

It is well for us if we have learned to listen to the sweet persuasion of the Beatitudes, but there are crises in all lives which require also the emphatic "Thou shalt not" of the decalogue which the founders wrote on the gateposts of their commonwealth. ~ John Greenleaf Whittier

I was sure the old man knew nothing about the beatitudes, ecstasies, dazzling reverberations of sexual encounters. Cut out the poetry was his message. Clinical sex, deprived of all the warmth of love - the orchestration of all the senses, touch, hearing, sight, palate; all the euphoric accompaniments, back-ground music, moods, atmosphere, variations - forced him to resort to literary aphrodisiacs. ~ Anais Nin

Blessings on the poor in spirit! The kingdom of heaven is yours" (Matt. 5:3) doesn't mean, "You will go to heaven when you die." It means you will be one of those through whom God's kingdom, heaven's rule, begins to appear on earth as in heaven. The Beatitudes are the agenda for kingdom people. They are not simply about how to behave, so that God will do something nice to you. They are about the way in which Jesus wants to rule the world. ~ N. T. Wright

Blessed are the young, for they shall inherit the national debt. ~ Herbert Hoover

Blessed are the cracked, for they shall let in the light. ~ Groucho Marx

The Beatitudes reveal the profile of the Christian, the character of the one who has had a life-changing encounter with the grace of God. In light of God's overwhelming goodness, the sinner sees his own poverty of spirit and mourns not only for his own sin but also for the spiritual sickness of the world. Therefore, he grows meek and longs for all the more earnestly for true righteousness. Therefore, he practices mercy and enjoys purity and makes peace. Therefore, he gladly endures persecution for the sake of Jesus. ~ R. W. Glenn

I see the beatitudes of books displayed on a bookshelf. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

All the beatitudes manifest in the sacred-time. ~ Lailah Gifty Akita

Blessed are they whose bodies get destroyed in the service of others. ~ Swami Vivekananda

Blessed are the forgetful, for they get the better even of their blunders. ~ Friedrich Nietzsche

The late Kurt Vonnegut, the satirical American author, wrote: For some reason, the most vocal Christians among us never mention the beatitudes. But - often with tears in their eyes - they demand that the Ten Commandments be posted in public buildings. And of course that's Moses, not Jesus. I haven't heard one of them demand that the Sermon on the Mount, the beatitudes, be posted anywhere. ~ Philip Yancey

Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.
[Matt 5:4] ~ Anonymous

To put the issue bluntly, are the Beatitudes true? If so, why doesn't the church encourage poverty and mourning and meekness and persecution instead of striving against them? What is the real meaning of the Beatitudes, this cryptic ethical core of Jesus' teaching? ~ Philip Yancey

Scripture scholars contend that the original language of the Beatitudes should not be rendered as "Blessed are the single-hearted" or "Blessed are the peacemakers" or "Blessed are those who struggle for justice." Greater precision in translation would say, "You're in the right place if...you are single-hearted or work for peace." The Beatitudes is not a spirituality, after all. It's a geography. It tells us where to stand. ~ Gregory J. Boyle

The examination of conscience has an important educational value. it teaches us to look sincerely at our own lives, to compare them with the truth of the Gospel and to evaluate them with parameters that are not only human but drawn from divine Revelation. Comparison with the Commandments, with the Beatitudes, and above all with the Precept to love, represents the first great 'school of penance ~ Pope Benedict XVI

HELPED are those who are content to be themselves; they will never lack mystery in their lives and the joys of self-discovery will be constant.
HELPED are those who love the entire cosmos rather than their own tiny country, city, or farm, for to them will be shown the unbroken web of life and the meaning of infinity.
HELPED are those who live in quietness, knowing neither brand name nor fad; they shall live every day as if in eternity, and each moment shall be as full as it is long.
HELPED are those who love others unsplit off from their faults; to them will be given clarity of vision.
HELPED are those who create anything at all, for they shall relive the thrill of their own conception, and realize an partnership in the creation of the Universe that keeps them responsible and cheerful.
HELPED are those who love the Earth, their mother, and who willingly suffer that she may not die; in their grief over her pain they will weep rivers of blood, and in their joy in her lively response to love, they will converse with the trees.
HELPED are those whose ever act is a prayer for harmony in the Universe, for they are the restorers of balance to our planet. To them will be given the insight that every good act done anywhere in the cosmos welcomes the life of an animal or a child.
HELPED are those who risk themselves for others' sakes; to them will be given increasing opportunities for ever greater risks. Theirs will be a vision of the word in which no ~ Alice Walker

I have often wondered why people never want to put a stone monument of the Eight Beatitudes on a courthouse lawn. Then I realize that the Eight Beatitudes of Jesus would probably not be very good for any war, any macho worldview, the wealthy, or our consumer economy. ~ Richard Rohr

Look at the commencement of His ministry. In the Beatitudes with which the Sermon on the Mount opens, He speaks: "Blessed are the poor in spirit; for theirs is the kingdom of heaven. ~ Andrew Murray

New beatitudes came from him [Bobby]: "Blessed are those who live in hovels, for God will give them palaces in heaven."
He gave them new commandments:
"God weeps when anyone kills in his name; kill not.
"God hates hate; hate not.
"God loves love; love more.
"You need not trust in God; you need hope that God will trust in you.
"You are your own master. The way is within you. ~ Randy Attwood

Blessed is he who has learned to laugh at himself for he shall never cease to be entertained. ~ John Boswell

Modern formulations are necessary even in defense of very ancient truths. Not because of any alleged anachronism in the old ideas – the Beatitudes remain the essential statements of the Western code – but because the idiom of life is always changing ~ William F. Buckley Jr.

After all, the Beatitudes don't tend to look a lot like modern Christianity. We choose a political team. We select a denominational preference. We hitch our cart to a branch of philosophy. Anyone that disagrees is quickly and succinctly judged, and simultaneously disregarded as worthless. Big problem with that approach. We are supposed to be loving those who don't agree with us to Jesus - and you can't love those whom you deem worthless. ~ Mark Steele

Blessed is the man who's lost it all. ~ Switchfoot

I don't - you know, I'm very disillusioned with our political system. If we don't wake up in America and realize that we have to vote out of our courage and integrity for candidates who reflect our own beatitudes, and not the beatitudes of the war machine and the corporations, we are - we're doomed. ~ Cindy Sheehan

It has to do with seeing God. "Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God" (Matthew 5:8). ~ John Piper

British Beatitudes! ... Beer, beef, business, bibles, bulldogs, battleships, buggery and bishops. ~ James Joyce

Blessed are the hearts that can bend; they shall never be broken. ~ Albert Camus

We need to build up society in the light of the Beatitudes, walking towards the Kingdom with the least among us. ~ Pope Francis

An Attitude of Gratitude Delivers To You Altitude of Beatitudes. ~ Jaachynma N.E. Agu

Blessed are the poor in spirit; yours is the kingdom of heaven! What could the church do, not just say, that would make the poor in spirit believe that? Blessed are the mourners; they shall be comforted! How will the mourners believe that, if we are not God's agents in bringing that comfort? Blessed are the meek; they shall inherit the earth. How will the meet ever believe such nonsense if the church does not stand up for the rights against the rich and the powerful, in the name of the crucified Messiah who had nowhere to lay his head? Blessed are those who hunger and thirst for God's justice; how will that message get through, unless we are prepared to stand alongside those who are denied justice and go on making a fuss until they get it? Blessed are the merciful; how are people to believe that, in a world where mercy is weakness, unless we visit the prisoner and welcome the prodigal? Blessed are the pure in heart; how will people believe that, in a world where impurity is a big business, unless we ourselves are worshipping the living God until our own hearts are set on fire and scorched through with his purity? Blessed are the peacemakers; how will we ever learn that, in a world where war in one country means business for another,, unless the church stands in the middle and says that there is a different way of being human, a different way of ordering our common life? Blessed are the persecuted and insulted for the kingdom's sake, for Jesus' sake; how will that message ever ~ N.T. Wright

Blessed are those who do whatever they can wherever they are, for no one is devoid of resources or opportunities. ~ Daniel Quinn

Agape, the love of each one of us for the other, from the closest to the furthest, is in fact the only way that Jesus has given us to find the way of salvation and of the Beatitudes. ~ Pope Francis

When Mary asserts explicitly that God is on the side of the poor, we can understand it within the tension of what it means to be blessed as the poor in spirit. Rather than elevating poverty to a form of righteousness, Jesus is instead calling for a revolution of imagination around the nature of what we consider true blessing. Jesus is here declaring that the humble and repentant heart is the fertile soil of his kingdom. ~ Jamie Arpin-Ricci

The Beatitudes correspond to the Decalogue, with blessings in lieu of the forbidden. ~ James Mikolajczyk

The Beatitudes, far from being a new set of virtues that further divide the religious haves and have nots, are words of hope and healing to those who have been marginalized. ~ James Bryan Smith

Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall take flack from both sides.- Unofficial UN Motto ~ Robert Asprin

A friend of mine says that in the world of religion we often have ignorance on fire and intelligence on ice.
The thing I love about The Beatitudes Society is they represent faith and intelligence on fire and there's enthusiasm and passion and a realization that a more open and progressive approach to faith is something to celebrate. ~ Brian D. McLaren

Blessed are those who can laugh at themselves, for they shall never cease to be amused,'" Gabriel quoted. "One of the unrecorded Beatitudes. ~ Terri Garey

Even when they call us mad, when they call us subversives and communists and all the epithets they put on us, we know we only preach the subversive witness of the Beatitudes, which have turned everything upside down. ~ Oscar Romero