Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

"I feel a distaste for hunting, first because of a kind of Buddhist respect for the unity and sacredness of all life, and also because the pursuit of a hare or chamois strikes me as a kind of 'escape of energy,' that is, the expenditure of our effort in an illusory end, one devoid of profit."

"Neither the Christian attitude of love for all mankind nor humane hopes for an organized society must cause us to forget that the 'human stratum' may not be homogeneous."

"It is our duty as men and women to proceed as though limits to our abilities do not exist."

"The most satisfying thing in life is to have been able to give a large part of oneself to others."

"God is not remote from us. He is at the point of my pen, my (pick) shovel, my paint brush, my (sewing) needle - and my heart and thoughts."

"There is almost a sensual longing for communion with others who have a large vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendship between those engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality impossible to describe."

"Someday, after mastering the winds, the waves, the tides and gravity, we shall harness for God the energies of love, and then, for a second time in the history of the world, man will have discovered fire."

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

"“Joy is the infallible sign of the presence of God.”"

"We are one, after all, you and I, together we suffer, together exist and forever will recreate one another."

"It is the destiny of things real to destroy those that are artifice."

"In the end, only the truth will survive."

"“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.”"

"Above all, trust in the slow work of God. We are quite naturally impatient in everything to reach the end without delay. We should like to skip the intermediate stages. We are impatient of being on the way to something unknown, something new. And yet it is the law of all progress that it is made by passing through some stages of instability— and that it may take a very long time. And so I think it is with you; your ideas mature gradually—let them grow, let them shape themselves, without undue haste. Don’t try to force them on, as though you could be today what time (that is to say, grace and circumstances acting on your own good will) will make of you tomorrow. Only God could say what this new spirit gradually forming within you will be. Give Our Lord the benefit of believing that his hand is leading you,and accept the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete."

"The world is round so that friendship may encircle it."

"There is almost a sensual longing for communion with others who have a large vision. The immense fulfillment of the friendship between those engaged in furthering the evolution of consciousness has a quality impossible to describe."

"We are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience."

"The most telling and profound way of describing the evolution of the universe would undoubtedly be to trace the evolution of love."

"The most empowering relationships are those in which each partner lifts the other to a higher possession of their own being."

"You have told me, O God, to believe in hell. But you have forbidden me to think...of any man as damned"