Rafael Quotes

He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad.

Love is not finding someone to live with. It's finding someone you can't live without.

Most don't deserve your tears... and the ones that do will never make you cry.

What is it with you and that book?" Rafael laughed. "We have a personal relationship.

I looked at Micah, who shrugged. I looked at Rafael, who shook his head. Nice that none of us knew why he was undressing.

There can be no faith without doubt. No strength without temptation. (Rafael)

His family could not understand the attraction to Marxism. It offered nothing and demanded everything, including your soul.

...it is human nature, I suppose, to be futile and ridiculous.

Prolific irony - For 8 years, the finger on the button that could end the world belonged to a president who couldn't pronounce the word "nuclear.

But I like my madness. There is a thrill in it unknown to such sanity as yours. ~ Book 1, Chapter 9,

Rafael?” ”Yeah?” „Do we all have monsters?” „Yes.” „Why does God give us so many monsters?” „You want to know my theory?” „Sure.” „I think it’s other people who give us monsters. Maybe God doesn’t have anything to do with it.

It became visible as a firefly in the dark that the political climate was swiftly getting more and more oppressive.

A man must sometimes laugh at himself or go mad,’ said he. ‘Few realize it. That is why there are so many madmen in the world.

We are all born to love people and use things. Unfortunately, we grow to love things and use people...

In this populist regime, everything belongs to the people. If everyone owned everything , then, of course, no one owned anything. So how could it be theft if no one owned it?

This, this here, could be worship. ‘This—’ Lucifer pressed an innocent kiss to the prince’s sweet, divine mouth. This could be religion.

You can't believe that AIDS is a curse from God against Gays without accepting that Lyme Disease is a curse from the same God against Deer Hunters...

I felt my cell phone buzz, and I looked at the screen. Ranger. “Your GPS just went blank,” Ranger said when I answered. “The car exploded.” There was a beat of silence. “Rafael won the pool,” Ranger said. “Are you okay?” “Yes.” “I’ll send someone.

In vain, I love you; in vain, the dawn streaming onto you, beside me; in vain, I want to be yours, your angel. Angel of love, angel of Michael.

Your right of religious freedom ends where my right of religious abstinence begins...

A handicap parking permit is not a reward for a lifetime of poor eating habits...

Haven’t you ever wondered why Father is so strict about our subservience? It’s because disobedience is creation,” a shivering breath, “create with me, Michael, and let’s call it sin.

When power becomes the ultimate goal, freedom must be shackled.

He could not understand how a person born in the United States who knew the English language and culture and was educated with at least a high school degree failed to provide for his own subsistence without government assistance.

Do you know, André, I sometimes think that you have no heart.' 'Presumably because I sometimes betray intelligence.

At last, he fully understood that change comes from within. It was up to him to get up and fight for a better life.

Rafael, the Rat King, stared at the carnage with black-button eyes. "She is dead." "Ding dong, the witch is dead,

Let's all stand for the separation of Church and hate...

To do what you imply would require nothing short of divine intervention. You must change man, not systems.

He was born with a gift of laughter and a sense that the world was mad. And that was all his patrimony.

But they were fated to misunderstand each other.

Berjanjilah untuk tidak meninggalkan aku, apapun yang akan terjadi nanti.” ~Rafael Alexander

Regret of neglected opportunity is the worst hell that a living soul can inhabit

You're everything to me, the stars and the moons, the heat and the cold, the earth and the seeds, the waters and the flowers, but you are not God.

Oh, sweet Jesus, English, I'm in love with you! Isn't that reason enough to marry me and put me out of my misery? - Rafael pg 451

I was shaking when our lips parted and he leaned his forehead against mine, his fingers carding through my hair, my hands on his face. "I won't let them," Rafael said. "I won't let anyone take you away. I'll protect you. I'll always protect you. I don't care how. I just will.

Thirstily he set it to his lips, and as its cool refreshment began to soothe his throat, he thanked Heaven that in a world of much evil there was still so good a thing as ale.

He was suffering from the loss of an illusion.

It came to Mr. Blood, as he trudged forward under the laden apple-trees on that fragrant, delicious July morning, that man—as he had long suspected—was the vilest work of God, and that only a fool would set himself up as a healer of a species that was best exterminated.

Do you expect sincerity in man when hypocrisy is the very keynote of human nature? We are nurtured on it; we are schooled in it, we live by it; and we rarely realize it.’ – Book 3, Chapter 16

Would you have this?” the Protectorat hissed at his son. Rafael's gaze narrowed in a slow inspection while she stared defiantly back. Rafael's gaze faltered, shot briefly toward Leon, and then down. His answer was obvious: no. And in spite of everything, in the face of all the other more important dangers that threatened her, it still stung that someone, some boy, found her ugly. Gaia burned with sudden hate for all of them. The Protectorat saw. He smiled slightly. “I thought not,” said the Protectorat, releasing her with a flick. He turned back toward his family. “I can't thrust her on any family I know, no matter what her genes are. She's a freak, not a hero. I'd rather make a hero out of Myrna Silk.” Leon had been standing tensely throughout this exchange. “I'd take Gaia,” Leon said, his low voice resonating in the space.

But I want to stay here. (Jeff) And people in hell want ice water and if you don’t go to the boat, you’ll probably be able to take it to them in person in about twenty minutes. (Rafael)

Truth is so often disconcerting.

Only he who is without anything is without enemies.

There remained the sea, which is free to all, and particularly alluring to those who feel themselves at war with humanity.

Dan apapun yang terjadi nanti. Apapun yang akan terpapar di hadapanmu nanti, bagaimanapun buruknya nanti. Ingatlah malam ini, malam di saat aku mengatakan bahwa aku mencintaimu dengan sepenuh hatiku.” ~Rafael Alexander

Sígueme contando sobre aquellos días cuando teníamos los corazones envueltos en papel regalo.

I am afraid, monsieur, you will have to kill me first, and I have a prejudice against being killed before nine o'clock.

A convicted felon can’t vote, own a gun, become a fireman, work as a licensed healthcare professional, or even cut hair… but he can take a company public.

In every situation, there’s never a shortage of people who will covertly promote their own best interest.. with diligence.

It is not human to be wise,’ said Blood. ‘It is much more human to err, though perhaps exceptional to err on the side of mercy.

Abortion isn't for everyone.... neither are children.

Darwin is my copilot.

Attacking a lightning rod doesn't make you lightning..." Regarding Barack Obama

It’s not how much money you make. It’s how much you keep.

The greatest threats to Democracy are comfort and apathy.

If there were more "Planned Parenthoods," there'd be fewer abortions.

The audience may forget a plot, the witty dialog or the special effects but they’ll always remember how a film made them feel.

We shouldn't evaluate our leaders by how many hats they can wear on their heads... We must judge them by the amount of shoes they've worn on their feet.

It’s okay to call the pet you adopted a “rescue.” The kid you adopted… not so much.

A portion of the electorate will always levitate toward the scratch and sniff candidate, granting them superficial appeasement without any substance.

Books aren’t easy. If you want easy, watch the fucking movie.

People sometimes exaggerate this business of humility. It’s a question simply of knowing who you are, where you are, and that the world will continue exactly as it is without you.

The loudest voices - those proponents of laws related to the control of the vagina - should at least be required to have one.

The shaman helps you figure it out. I already know what I'm going to be." I prodded him in the ribs. He couldn't just leave me hanging like that. "A speech therapist." he said. The whole world could have stopped. I wouldn't have noticed. Rafael gave me an unusually stoic look. "I'm going to get your voice back someday," he said. "I though that was obvious.

Whispering — “I daydream of you, of loving you.” “How do you love me?” “Like this.” Yearning mouth — it’d press soft to the smooth of his tunic. “Like a flower, like a symphony, trapped in my throat, like you’re an eternity, and I need you in my veins.

I have no sense of humor about losing

The political spectrum is not a straight, bi-polar line. It's a circle.

When the media enjoy such excessive profits from this mass hysteria, what incentive do they have to restrain it?

There is a God...... And she loves everyone.

The loudest voices for immigration reform are required to have names like 'Running Bull' or 'Brave Eagle.

Before the constitution can protect the people it must first protect the person.

It’s not how fast you go but how far you go fast.

When your wife asks you for your opinion, she doesn't really want your opinion. She wants her opinion - just in a deeper voice.

Following religious principles because you fear the consequences isn't faith…. It’s superstition.

Only sheep need a shepherd.

Mind being the seat of the soul, and literature being the expression of the mind, literature, it follows, is the soul of an age, the surviving and immortal part of it.

Long after people forget what you said or did, they’ll remember how you made them feel.

there is no worse hell than that provided by the regrets for wasted opportunities.

When all is said, a man's final judgment of his fellows must be based upon his knowledge of himself

The U.S. Constitution provides for 3 Federal Offenses. Today there are over 4,500 and counting with every session. A new law is nothing more than our government revealing its lack of creativity.

Knowing what to do is one thing. Knowing you’re the one who’s going to do it is something else entirely.

The American Gun movement is actually very easy to understand. All of them, little boys with self esteem issues, exacerbated by an ever-present gun/phallic relation disorder. Apparently big guns fit well in small hands.

Open the history of the past at whatsoever page you will and there you shall find coincidence at work bringing about events that the merest chance might have averted. Indeed, coincidence may be defined as the tool used by Fate to shape the destinies of men and nations.

You can't get on Facebook and complain about the NSA's data mining operation - On Facebook - the most invasive, privacy harmful institution on the planet. It's like whining about a paper cut while swimming in a shark tank.

But the thing is that I’m in love with Rafael’s story. I think I understand when Adam says that all our stories are different but in some ways our stories are all the same. I never really got that. But when I start to read Rafael’s journal, it’s as if I can see myself. It’s better than a mirror.

If the windmill should prove too formidable," said he, from the threshold, "I may see what can be done with the wind.

I feel aged. I feel as if you’ve aged me with your own hands, Michael. Ripened me. Like a red fruit, at the edge of a branch, hanging at its peak. Beautiful — and just about to fall.

Enduring means accepting. Accepting things as they are and not as you would wish them to be, and then looking ahead, not behind.

What a man dares to do, he should dare to confess- unless he is a coward.

There are roughly 1,200 dogs trained to detect bombs and bomb making materials in the US - and over 40,000 trained to detect marijuana. Some of the bomb-dogs are also cross trained as drug-dogs which accounts for their ability to sleep well at night.

Kimah.’ ‘I’ve filled libraries with all the things I wanted to say to you.’ ‘I just want to go visit you. I haven’t in a while.’ ‘I want to see if you sleepwalk, and if you might speak to me, tell me what you are dreaming about.

Most of this world's misery is the fruit not as priests tell us of wickedness, but of stupidity.... And we know that of all stupidities he considered anger the most deplorable.

We are all, he says, the sport of destiny. Ah, but not quite. Destiny is an intelligent force, moving with purpose.

Tal vez el que construyó este barrio pensó que las esquinas eran parte de la circunferencia de la vida donde el amor es un punto central equidistante de la curva infinita del dolor

The idea of equality is a by-product of the sentiment of envy. Since it must always prove beyond human ower to raise the inferior mass to a superior stratum, apostles of equality must ever be inferiors seeking to reduce their betters to their level. It follows that a nation that once admits this doctrine of equality will be dragged by it to the level, moral, intelletual and political, of its most worthless class.

Your beloved what, exactly? Beloved friend? Brother?” “Simply my beloved.” Michael smiled back, grand but sleepy, before he swung up to sit again. He scooted even closer to Lucifer, chuckling warm, perhaps at the confusion on the other’s irises and brows and mouth. “My beloved Lucifer.

There is another Eden, within me. I have it nestled between the heat of love. This is love.’ But when the sounds of heavy steps, approaching, came, they’d hastily rise. Gathering their clothes, taking each other’s hands, and laughing, they’d run away from Him, as fast they could. So that He doesn’t see, doesn’t notice. Two angels creating love, creating.

Well, as Hannah Arendt famously said, there can be a banal aspect to evil. In other words, it doesn't present always. I mean, often what you're meeting is a very mediocre person. But nonetheless, you can get a sort of frisson of wickedness from them. And the best combination of those, I think, I describe him in the book, is/was General Jorge Rafael Videla of Argentina, who I met in the late 1970s when the death squad war was at its height, and his fellow citizens were disappearing off the street all the time. And he was, in some ways, extremely banal. I describe him as looking like a human toothbrush. He was a sort of starch, lean officer with a silly mustache, and a very stupid look to him, but a very fanatical glint as well. And, if I'd tell you why he's now under house arrest in Argentina, you might get a sense of the horror I felt as I was asking him questions about all this. He's in prison in Argentina for selling the children of the rape victims among the private prisoners, who he kept in a personal jail. And I don't know if I've ever met anyone who's done anything as sort of condensedly horrible as that.

People spoke to foreigners with an averted gaze, and everybody seemed to know somebody who had just vanished. The rumors of what had happened to them were fantastic and bizarre though, as it turned out, they were only an understatement of the real thing. Before going to see General Videla […], I went to […] check in with Los Madres: the black-draped mothers who paraded, every week, with pictures of their missing loved ones in the Plaza Mayo. (‘Todo mi familia!’ as one elderly lady kept telling me imploringly, as she flourished their photographs. ‘Todo mi familia!’) From these and from other relatives and friends I got a line of questioning to put to the general. I would be told by him, they forewarned me, that people ‘disappeared’ all the time, either because of traffic accidents and family quarrels or, in the dire civil-war circumstances of Argentina, because of the wish to drop out of a gang and the need to avoid one’s former associates. But this was a cover story. Most of those who disappeared were openly taken away in the unmarked Ford Falcon cars of the Buenos Aires military police. I should inquire of the general what precisely had happened to Claudia Inez Grumberg, a paraplegic who was unable to move on her own but who had last been seen in the hands of his ever-vigilant armed forces [….] I possess a picture of the encounter that still makes me want to spew: there stands the killer and torturer and rape-profiteer, as if to illustrate some seminar on the banality of evil. Bony-thin and mediocre in appearance, with a scrubby moustache, he looks for all the world like a cretin impersonating a toothbrush. I am gripping his hand in a much too unctuous manner and smiling as if genuinely delighted at the introduction. Aching to expunge this humiliation, I waited while he went almost pedantically through the predicted script, waving away the rumored but doubtless regrettable dematerializations that were said to be afflicting his fellow Argentines. And then I asked him about Senorita Grumberg. He replied that if what I had said was true, then I should remember that ‘terrorism is not just killing with a bomb, but activating ideas. Maybe that’s why she’s detained.’ I expressed astonishment at this reply and, evidently thinking that I hadn’t understood him the first time, Videla enlarged on the theme. ‘We consider it a great crime to work against the Western and Christian style of life: it is not just the bomber but the ideologist who is the danger.’ Behind him, I could see one or two of his brighter staff officers looking at me with stark hostility as they realized that the general—El Presidente—had made a mistake by speaking so candidly. […] In response to a follow-up question, Videla crassly denied—‘rotondamente’: ‘roundly’ denied—holding Jacobo Timerman ‘as either a journalist or a Jew.’ While we were having this surreal exchange, here is what Timerman was being told by his taunting tormentors: Argentina has three main enemies: Karl Marx, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of society; Sigmund Freud, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of the family; and Albert Einstein, because he tried to destroy the Christian concept of time and space. […] We later discovered what happened to the majority of those who had been held and tortured in the secret prisons of the regime. According to a Navy captain named Adolfo Scilingo, who published a book of confessions, these broken victims were often destroyed as ‘evidence’ by being flown out way over the wastes of the South Atlantic and flung from airplanes into the freezing water below. Imagine the fun element when there’s the surprise bonus of a Jewish female prisoner in a wheelchair to be disposed of… we slide open the door and get ready to roll her and then it’s one, two, three… go!