Pope John Paul Quotes

Man always travels along precipices ... His truest obligation is to keep his balance. ~ Pope John Paul II

The Church's teaching on ownership diverges radically from collectivism as proclaimed by Marxism and "rigid" capitalism. The primacy of the person over things joint ownership of the means of work. ~ Pope John Paul II

Be demanding of the world around you; be demanding first of all with yourselves. Be children of God; take pride in it! ~ Pope John Paul II

You will reciprocally promise love, loyalty and matrimonial honesty. We only want for you this day that these words constitute the principle of your entire life and that with the help of divine grace you will observe these solemn vows that today, before God, you formulate. ~ Pope John Paul II

Faith and Reason are like two wings of the human spirit by which is soars to the truth. ~ Pope John Paul II

Motherhood involves a special communion with the mystery of life, as it develops in the mother's womb. The mother is filled with wonder at this mystery of life, and 'understands' with unique intuition what is happening inside her. In the light of the 'beginning', the mother accepts and loves as a person the child she is carrying in her womb. This unique contact with the new human being developing within her gives rise to an attitude towards human beings - not only towards her own child, but every human being - which profoundly marks the woman's personality. ~ Pope John Paul II

Young friends, do not hesitate to follow the example of Pedro, who 'pleased God and was loved by him' and who, having come to perfection in so short a time, lived a full life. ~ Pope John Paul II

The Gospel of life must be proclaimed and human life defended in all places and all times. ~ Pope John Paul II

The problem of pornography is that it does not reveal too much of a woman but too little. ~ Pope John Paul II

We must reflect the light of Christ through lives of prayer and joyful service to others. ~ Pope John Paul II

The most faithful disciples of Christ have been builders of peace, to the point of forgiving their enemies, sometimes even to the point of giving their lives for them. ~ Pope John Paul II

We have lost a very important religious figure who dedicated his life to peace and justice for all. [on the death of Pope John Paul II ~ Mahmoud Abbas

In the annals of history, few men have left a more positive imprint on the world than Pope John Paul II. ~ Vito Fossella

Christ assigns as a duty to every man the dignity of every woman: and simultaneously ... He also assigns to every woman the dignity of every man. ~ Pope John Paul II

Nobody is so poor he has nothing to give, and nobody is so rich he has nothing to receive. ~ Pope John Paul II

I had the good fortune of living in Rome for seven years, from 1994 to 2001. So, I kind of saw firsthand the impact that Pope John Paul II had on people. ~ Chris Matthews

The saints have always been the source and origin of renewal in the most difficult moments in the Church's history. ~ Pope John Paul II

Apart from the mercy of God, there is no other source of hope for mankind. ~ Pope John Paul II

Dear young people of every language and culture, a high and exhilarating task awaits you: that of becoming men and women capable of solidarity, peace and love of life, with respect for everyone. Become craftsmen of a new humanity, where brothers and sisters - members all of the same family - are able at last to live in peace. ~ Pope John Paul II

Hands are the heart's landscape. ~ Pope John Paul II

Although I have lived through much darkness, I have seen enough evidence to be unshakably convinced that no difficulty, no fear is so great that it can completely suffocate the hope that springs eternal in the hearts of the young ... Do not let that hope die! Stake your lives on it! We are not the sum of our weaknesses and failures; we are the sum of the Father's love for us and our real capacity to become the image of his Son. ~ Pope John Paul II

To the family is entrusted the task of striving, first and foremost, to unleash the forces of good ... ~ Pope John Paul II

And Christ, through His own salvific suffering, is very much present in every human suffering, and can act from within that suffering by the powers of His Spirit of truth, His consoling spirit. ~ Pope John Paul II

Mary is the sure path to our meeting with Christ. Devotion to the Mother of the Lord, when it is genuine, is always an impetus to a life guided by the spirit and values of the Gospel. ~ Pope John Paul II

Everybody that is just is called to form part of the Kingdom of Heaven-whether they be Buddhas, Jews, or Atheists-as long as they are good. ~ Pope John Paul II

It can therefore be said that, from the viewpoint of the doctrine of the faith, there are no difficulites in explaining the origin of man, in regard to the body, by means of the theory of evolution. ~ Pope John Paul II

Every act of true love towards a human being bears witness to and perfects the spiritual fecundity of the family, since it is an act of obedience to the deep inner dynamism of love as self-giving to others. ~ Pope John Paul II

The sacraments infuse holiness into the terrain of man's humanity: they penetrate the soul and body, the femininity and masculinity of the personal subject, with the power of holiness. ~ Pope John Paul II

Love of Christ does not distract us from interest in others, but rather invites us to responsibility for them, to the exclusion of no one ... . ~ Pope John Paul II

Remember: Christ is calling you; the Church needs you; the Pope believes in you and he expects great things of you. ~ Pope John Paul I

Motherhood implies from the beginning a special openness to the new person: and this is precisely the woman's 'part'. In this openness, in conceiving and giving birth to a child, the woman 'discovers herself through a sincere gift of self'. ~ Pope John Paul II

Man cannot relinquish himself or the place in the visible world that belongs to him; he cannot become the slave of things, the slave of economic systems, the slave of production, the slave of his own products. A civilization purely materialistic in outline condemns man to such slavery, even if at times, no doubt, this occurs contrary to the intentions and the very premise of its pioneers. ~ Pope John Paul II

The conviction which we must share and spread is that the call to holiness is directed to all Christians. This is not a question of privilege or of spiritual elitism. It is a question of a grace offered to all the baptized. ~ Pope John Paul II

Every effort to make society sensitive to the importance of the family, is a great service to humanity. ~ Pope John Paul II

The encouragement and the deepening of Eucharistic worship are proofs of the authentic renewal which the Council set itself as an aim and of which they are the central point. ~ Pope John Paul II

Through adoration, the Christian mysteriously contributes to the radical transformation of the world and to the sowing of the Gospel. Anyone who prays to the Savior draws the whole world with him and raises it to God. Those who stand before the Lord are therefore fulfilling an eminent service. They are presenting to Christ all those who do not know him or are far from him: they keep watch in his presence on their behalf. ~ Pope John Paul II

The Eucharist is the full realization of the worship which humanity owes to God, and it cannot be compared to any other religious experience ... The risen Lord ... calls the faithful together to give them the light of His Word and the nourishment of His Body as the perennial sacramental wellspring of redemption. The grace flowing from this wellspring renews mankind, life, and history. ~ Pope John Paul II

The Eucharist is the heart of the Church. Where Eucharistic life flourishes, there the life of the church will blossom. ~ Pope John Paul II

In the Eucharistic Sacrifice the Church venerates the memory of Mary the ever Virgin Mother of God and the memory of Saint Joseph, because he fed Him whom the faithful must eat as the Bread of Life ~ Pope John Paul II

That is the dignity of America, the reason she exists, the condition of her survival, yes, the ultimate test of her greatness: to respect every human person, especially the weak and most defenseless ones, those as yet unborn. ~ Pope John Paul II

Men and women will retain their sex in heaven ~ Pope John Paul II

Young people are threatened ... by the evil use of advertising techniques that stimulate the natural inclination to avoid hard work by promising the immediate satisfaction of every desire. ~ Pope John Paul II

To be actively pro-life is to contribute to the renewal of society through the promotion of the common good. It is impossible to further the common good without acknowledging and defending the right to life, upon which all the other inalienable rights of individuals are founded and from which they develop. ~ Pope John Paul II

On the basis of his work each person is fully entitled to consider himself a part owner of the great workbench at which he is working with everyone else. A way toward that goal could be found by associating labor with the ownership of capital joint ownership of the means of work, sharing by the workers in the management and/or profits of businesses, so-called shareholding by labor, etc. ~ Pope John Paul II

Humankind, which discovers its capacity to transform and in a certain sense create the world through its own work, forgets that this is always based on God's prior and original gift of things that are. People think that they can make arbitrary use of the earth, subjecting it without restraint to their wills, as though the earth did not have its own requisites and a prior God-given purpose, which human beings can indeed develop but must not betray. ~ Pope John Paul II

If development is the new name for peace, war and preparations for war are the major enemy of the healthy development of peoples. If we take the common good of all humanity as our norm, instead of individual greed, peace would be possible. ~ Pope John Paul II

[St. Francis] looked upon creation with the eyes of one who could recognize in it the marvelous work of the hand of God. His solicitous care, not only towards men, but also towards animals is a faithful echo of the love with which God in the beginning pronounced his 'fiat' which brought them into existence. We too are called to a similar attitude. ~ Pope John Paul II

The ecological crisis in the world had become so obviously serious that Pope John Paul II felt the need to rebuke the wealthy classes of the industrialized nations for creating that crisis: Today, the dramatic threat of ecological breakdown is teaching us the extent to which greed and selfishness, both individual and collective, are contrary to the order of creation. ~ Howard Zinn

In order to see Jesus, we first need to let him look at us! ~ Pope John Paul II

We must open our eyes to admire God who hides and at the same time reveals himself in things and introduces us into the realms of mystery ... we must be pure and simple like children, capable of admiring, being astonished, of marveling, and being enchanted by the divine gestures of love and closeness we witness. ~ Pope John Paul II

Eucharistic worship is not so much worship of the inaccessible transcendence as worship of the divine condescension, and it is also the merciful and redeeming transformation of the world in the human heart ~ Pope John Paul II

Reason and faith cannot be separated without diminishing the capacity of men and women to know themselves, the world and God in an appropriate way. ~ Pope John Paul II

I think, internally, we Catholics have known this for a long time. I think we're just thrilled and grateful that the rest of the world now is sharing in the esteem and gratitude that we've had for Pope John Paul II for 26 and a half years. ~ Chris Matthews

Much of the violence that humanity suffers in our times is rooted inmisunderstanding as well as in the rejection of the values and identityof foreign cultures. Tourism improves relationships between individualsand peoples; when they are cordial, respectful, and based on solidarity theyconstitute, as it were, an open door to peace and harmonious coexistence ~ Pope John Paul II

Where others teach that man does not find himself until he finds God, John Paul gives an empathetic yes and then adds this: Man does not become his truest and most real self unless and John Paul believed that man is by nature part of a whole, that he does not exist alone. He lives in society with other men, who are, like him, God's children. And it is in giving to man, in giving until it hurts, that man in the deepest way finds God. For God himself is a constant giving. (p 126-127) ~ Peggy Noonan

Yes, the South-becoming always poorer-and the North-becoming always richer ... Richer, too in the resources of weapons with which the superpowers and blocs can mutually threaten each other. In the light of Christ's words (Mt. 25), this poor South will judge the rich North. And the poor people and poor nations-poor in different ways, not only lacking food, but also deprived of freedom and other human right-will judge those people who take these goods away from them, amassing to themselves the imperialist monopoly and political supremacy at the expense of others. ~ Pope John Paul II

Social justice cannot be attained by violence. Violence kills what it intends to create. ~ Pope John Paul II

So far as I am aware no leader of a party of the European left in the past twenty-five years has declared capitalism as such to be unacceptable as a system. The only public figure to do so unhesitatingly was Pope John Paul II. ~ Eric Hobsbawm

The ultimate test of your greatness is the way you treat every human being. ~ Pope John Paul II

Another name for peace is development. ~ Pope John Paul II

The body, in fact, and it alone is capable of making visible that which is invisible; the spiritual and the divine. ~ Pope John Paul II

The human being is single, unique, and unrepeatable, someone thought of and chosen from eternity, someone called and identified by name ~ Pope John Paul II

The battle against the devil, which is the principal task of Saint Michael the Archangel, is still being fought today, because the devil is still alive and active in the world. ~ Pope John Paul II

Christ is the sacrament of the invisible God - a sacrament that indicates presence. God is with us. ~ Pope John Paul II

Wars generally do not resolve the problems for which they are fought and therefore ... prove ultimately futile. ~ Pope John Paul II

Never again war. Never again hatred and intolerance. ~ Pope John Paul II

Pope John Paul, a man of peace and compassion, was one of the most revered leaders of our time. ~ Bill Williams

When we go before Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament we represent the one in the world who is in most need of God's Mercy." We "Stand in behalf of the one in the world who does not know Christ and who is farthest away from God and we bring down upon their soul the Precious Blood of The Lamb. ~ Pope John Paul II

In the designs of Providence, there are no mere coincidences. ~ Pope John Paul II

Abortion, euthanasia, human cloning, for example, risk reducing the human person to a mere object: life and death to order, as it were! ~ Pope John Paul II

John O'Sullivan has forcefully argued that the simultaneous presence in the highest offices of Reagan, Thatcher and Pope John Paul II was the cause of the Soviet collapse. ~ Roger Scruton

Our very contract with nature has a deep restorative power; contemplation of its magnificence imparts peace and serenity. ~ Pope John Paul II

My desire is for the young people of the entire world to come closer to Mary. She is the bearer of an indelible youthfulness and beauty that never wanes. May young people have increasing confidence in her and may they entrust their lives to her. ~ Pope John Paul II

When a parliamentary or social majority decrees that it is legal, at least under certain conditions, to kill unborn human life, is it not really making a tyrannical decision with regard to the weakest and most defenseless of human beings? ... While public authority can sometimes choose not to put a stop to something which were it prohibited would cause more serious harm, it can never presume to legitimize as a right of individuals even if they are the majority of the members of society an offense against other persons caused by the disregard of so fundamental a right as the right to life. ~ Pope John Paul II

Deep within yourself, listen to your conscience which calls you to be pure ... a home is not warmed by the fire of pleasure which burns quickly like a pile of withered grass. Passing encounters are only a caricature of love; they injure hearts and mock God's plan. ~ Pope John Paul II

Humanity looks to works of art to shed light upon its path and its destiny. ~ Pope John Paul II

If the aim is globalization without marginalization, we can no longer tolerate a world in which there live side by side the immensely rich and the miserably poor, the have-nots deprived even of essentials and people who thoughtlessly waste what others so desperately need. Such countries are an affront to the dignity of the human person. He further said, Ethics demand that systems be attuned to the needs of man, and not that man be sacrificed for the sake of the system. ~ Pope John Paul II

The great danger for family life, in the midst of any society whose idols are pleasure, comfort and independence, lies in the fact that people close their hearts and become selfish. ~ Pope John Paul II

The Church counters the culture of death with the culture of love. ~ Pope John Paul II

The other day a little girl in the fifth grade put me in an awkward spot by stating: 'Is it fair that Jesus created seven sacraments and only six of them are available to women?' She was referring, obviously, to Holy Orders to which -- according to eternal tradition -- only males are admitted. What could I answer? After looking around, I said: "In this classroom I see boys and girls. You boys can ask: 'Is anyone among the males of the world the father of Jesus?' The boys' answer: 'No, because Saint Joseph was only the putative father.' But you girls" -- I went on -- "can ask: 'Was one of us women the mother of Jesus?' And the answer is: 'Yes.'" Then I said: "You are right, but think this over. If no woman can be pope or bishop or priest, this is compensated for a thousand times over by the divine maternity, which honors exceptionally both woman and motherhood." My little protester seemed convinced. ~ Pope John Paul I

People must not attempt to impose their own 'truth' on others. The right to profess the truth must always be upheld, but not in a way that involves contempt for those who may think differently. Truth imposes itself solely by the force of its own truth. ~ Pope John Paul II

Thanks to meetings and discussions with experts in the natural sciences, with physicists and biologists as well as with historians, I have learned to appreciate the importance of those other branches of knowledge which involve the scientific disciplines; these are likewise capable of attaining the truth from different perspectives. The splendor of the truth–Veritatis Splendor–constantly needs to accompany them, enabling people to meet, to exchange ideas, and to enrich one another. ~ Pope John Paul II

I found myself immediately attracted to Pope John Paul II when, upon his election to the Papacy, his published speeches invariably called attention to the need for recognizing the dignity of the human being as a child of God. ~ Robert H. Schuller

If you really wish to follow Christ, if you want your love for him to grow and last, then you must be faithful to prayer. It is the key to the vitality of your life in Christ. Without prayer, your faith and love will die. If you are constant in daily prayer and in the Sunday celebration of Mass, your love for Jesus will increase. And your heart will know deep joy and peace, such as the world could never give. ~ Pope John Paul II

To recite the Rosary is nothing other than to contemplate the face of Christ with Mary. ~ Pope John Paul II

When our whole life is one faith, hope, love, prayer and silence, a consecrated life always bound up in the Eucharist, then the 'urge' towards God springs ... ~ Pope John Paul II

A nation that kills its own children has no future. ~ Pope John Paul II

The only really effective means of enabling States to deal with the grave problem of poverty is to provide them with the necessary resources through foreign financial aid - public and private - granted under reasonable conditions, within the framework of international commercial relations regulated with fairness. ~ Pope John Paul II

My dear Péguy, it would, however, be wrong to wait, to postpone continually. He who takes the road of later ends then on the road of never. I know some people who seem to turn life into a perpetual waiting room. The trains come and go, and they say: 'I'll leave another time! I'll make a confession on my deathbed!' Visconti-Venosta said of the 'hero Anselmo':

A day goes by, and then another,
But the hero Anselmo never returns.

Here we have the opposite: an Anselmo who never sets out. ~ Pope John Paul I

Furthermore, because God created it, The human body can remain nude and uncovered and preserve its splendour and its beauty. ~ Pope John Paul II

A philosophy which no longer asks the question of the meaning of life would be in great danger of reducing the merely accessory functions, with no real passion for the search for truth. ~ Pope John Paul II

This was borne out again in October 1996 when Pope John Paul II, standing in the context of a train of Catholic thought which stretched back to the Church Fathers said, in essence, "Looks like there's some good evidence for some sort of biological evolution."[22] That is, he said, as so many Catholics have already said, that there is nothing in divine revelation that particularly forbids you to believe that God made Adam from the dust of the earth r-e-a-l-l-y s-l-o-w-l-y rather than instantaneously (and used other creatures to somehow assist in the process) so long as you bear in mind that God did, in fact, create man and woman (particularly the soul, which is made directly by God and is not a result of the collision of atoms).

--Making Senses of Scripture ~ Mark Shea

Through Mary, we come to her Son more easily. ~ Pope John Paul II

A person is an entity of a sort to which the only proper and adequate way to relate is love ~ Pope John Paul II

You, too, be courageous! The world needs convinced and fearless witnesses. It is not enough to discuss, it is necessary to act! ~ Pope John Paul II

Man's life comes from God: it is his image and imprint, as sharing in his breath of life. God therefore is the sole Lord of this life: Man cannot do with it as he wills. ~ Pope John Paul II

God of our fathers, you chose Abraham and his descendants to bring your name to the nations: We are deeply saddened by the behaviour of those who in the course of history have caused these children of yours to suffer, and, asking your forgiveness, we wish to commit ourselves to genuine brotherhood with the people of the covenant. ~ Pope John Paul II

[Speaking of marriage and family] In this entire world there is not a more perfect, more complete image of God, Unity and Community. There is no other human reality which corresponds more, humanly speaking, to that divine mystery. ~ Pope John Paul II

Have no fear of moving into the unknown. Simply step out fearlessly knowing that I am with you, therefore no harm can befall you; all is very, very well. Do this in complete faith and confidence. ~ Pope John Paul II

In our time, in particular, there exists another form of ownership which is becoming no less important than land: the possession of know-how, technology and skill. The wealth of the industrialized nations is based much more on this kind of ownership than on natural resources. ~ Pope John Paul II