Saints And Misfits Quotes

The truth does not change according to our ability to stomach it.

The shame should have been all his but I chose to carry it around this whole time.

the why you do something is important.

Sometimes people who appear great can be the real deal. The husk, the fruit, and the kernel align.

There are diverse ways of reading texts, depending on who you are. We all access books differently.

Why we do an action is what determines its quality. A quality action or not.

The same three non-Muslims show up to our open house every year. They get serenaded as though they're royalty because we get to post "Mosque Opens Door to Greater Community, and THEY CAME!

Because when we do things without a why, we become husks. Easily crumpled, no fruit inside.

Life doesn’t end. It can start again.

Because when we just do things without a why, we become husks. Easily crumpled, no fruit inside.

Do you wish to rise? Begin by descending. You plan a tower that will pierce the clouds? Lay first the foundation of humility. — Saint Augustine

Perfection is achieved, not when there is nothing more to add, but when there is nothing left to take away.” – Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Many times people feel as if they are lacking

The forests were foris, 'outside.' In them lived the outcasts, the mad, the lovers, brigands, hermits, saints, lepers, the paquis, fugitives, misfits, the persecuted, wild men. Where else could they go? Outside of the law and human society one was in the forest. But the forest's asylum was unspeakable. One could not remain human in the forest; one could only rise above or sink below the human level.

While you're alive it's shameful to worm your way into the Calendar of Saints. Disbelief in yourself is more saintly. It takes real talent not to dread being terrified by your own agonizing lack of talent. Disbelief in yourself is indispensable. Indispensable to us is the loneliness of being gripped in the vise, so that in the darkest night the sky will enter you and skin your temples with the stars, so that streetcars will crash into the room, wheels cutting across your face, so the dangling rope, terrible and alive, will float into the room and dance invitingly in the air. Indispensable is any mangy ghost in tattered, overplayed stage rags, and if even the ghosts are capricious, I swear, they are no more capricious than those who are alive. Indispensable amidst babbling boredom are the deadly fear of uttering the right words and the fear of shaving, because across your cheekbone graveyard grass already grows. It is indispensable to be sleeplessly delirious, to fail, to leap into emptiness. Probably, only in despair is it possible to speak all the truth to this age. It is indispensable, after throwing out dirty drafts, to explode yourself and crawl before ridicule, to reassemble your shattered hands from fingers that rolled under the dresser. Indispensable is the cowardice to be cruel and the observation of the small mercies, when a step toward falsely high goals makes the trampled stars squeal out. It's indispensable, with a misfit's hunger, to gnaw a verb right down to the bone. Only one who is by nature from the naked poor is neither naked nor poor before fastidious eternity. And if from out of the dirt, you have become a prince, but without principles, unprince yourself and consider how much less dirt there was before, when you were in the real, pure dirt. Our self-esteem is such baseness.... The Creator raises to the heights only those who, even with tiny movements, tremble with the fear of uncertainty. Better to cut open your veins with a can opener, to lie like a wino on a spit-spattered bench in the park, than to come to that very comfortable belief in your own special significance. Blessed is the madcap artist, who smashes his sculpture with relish- hungry and cold-but free from degrading belief in himself.

Mr. Ram was a dedicated person—that means he didn’t let go of the things that were important to him. He was dedicated to Seniors Games Club every week. He got dressed up to go. Everyone knew he was serious about spending time with his friends, that’s how dressed up he was. He was dedicated to people. Even though he was a serious person, with a lot on his mind, he made sure to let you know he remembered you. Always. He smiled at jokes even if they were only sort of funny. He remembered that it was a person who was telling the joke, so he smiled for that person. He was dedicated to reading good books, even if they were from another generation or didn’t make complete sense to him. He read the first Harry Potter when he was ninety years old because someone told him it was good. He would have read the rest of the series if that someone had been able to find the large-type versions in the library for him.* He smiled one of his loudest smiles ever at the Shel Silverstein poem about a pet snowball. But his favorite Shel Silverstein poem was “The Little Boy and the Old Man.” Like the old man in the poem, he was dedicated to someone too, dedicated to helping her find out what the really important things for her were. What she should be dedicated to. She misses him but was happy to have had someone like him in her life. Thank you, Mr. Ram, for the warmth of your hand. *Someone still regrets that they didn’t find the rest of the HP books for him.

It’s hard sometimes to move in obscurity when everyone else around you is so Instagram worthy. Even the person who’s telling you not to care so much about looking great

I need an eraser that fills the entire screen of my brain.

I wish there were a way to still my heart. It feels like it’s not mine and wants out of my body. I seal it shut with another shrug

Six misfits against the whole fucking world.

Six misfits against the whole fucking world. Regardless of what happens, what a tale it will be.

A ‘No’ uttered from the deepest conviction is better than a ‘Yes’ merely uttered to please, or worse, to avoid trouble

We’re two sad and angry women, about to wreak vengeance on one unsuspecting monster.

In 2 Corinthians 4:6-7, Paul wrote, “For it is the God who commanded light to shine out of darkness, who has shone in our hearts to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ. But we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the excellence of the power may be of God and not of us.” And that brings us full circle to where we started in this chapter: at the end of the day there is no human explanation for the growth of the church. The world thinks we’re odd and bizarre. We’re the losers. We’re the privy pots. And yet, through the mouths of Paul and other misfits across the centuries, the church inexplicably moves in the history of the world with immense power beyond anything else. The gospel alone turns sinners into saints by transplanting men and women from the kingdom of darkness into the kingdom of God’s dear Son—from eternal death to everlasting life. That is power to create new beings fit for God’s presence and glory. If we brought a bus load of movie stars, corporate titans, or Ivy League professors into our church (assuming they’d condescend to get on a bus), they’d look at us and laugh: “These people can’t change the world!” No, we can’t. But for those who remain faithful to the whole truth of Christianity, God is changing the world through us. He’s been doing it through all history.