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Quote by Richard Rohr

“People wanted to me to describe more about what I call "the container," and then describe what the second half of life feels like.”

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Richard Rohr

Richard Rohr is an American theologian, writer, and priest, born in 1943. He is known for his profound insights into Christian spirituality and his critical thinking about contemporary society. more

“The father of a daughter is nothing but a high-class hostage. A father turns a stony face to his sons, berates them, shakes his antlers, paws the ground, snorts, runs them off into the underbrush, but when his daughter puts her arm over his shoulder and says, 'Daddy, I need to ask you something,' he is a pat of butter in a hot frying pan.”

“What I wish I had said in the book [Falling Upward] is that part of the attraction of conservative religions, such as Mormonism, Mennonite, Amish, groups we would consider very traditional, is that they actually do the first half of life very well. They are often very happy people.”

People Firsts Wells Said Book Fall Wish Half Groups Conservative Attraction Traditional Very Happy Happy People Mormonism Amish

Author:Richard Rohr

“When you do the first half of life well, you have a good sense of yourself. Most of our mainline Christian denominations, in my opinion, don't do the first or second halves very well. We don't really give people a good container, we give them a bunch of legalisms.”

People Giving Firsts Wells Christian Half Opinion Bunch Good Sense Denominations Containers Legalism Christian Denominations

Author:Richard Rohr

“We don't have much wisdom about the second half when things really open up and end up looking a lot more progressive. In my own Catholic church, for example, we're sort of circling the wagons today by thinking that more moral strictures, more exclusionary rules on this or that, that that's going to do for the first half of life. I don't think it really does.”

Thinking Firsts Doe Ends Today Church My Own Half Moral Example Catholic Progressive Catholic Church Wagons

Author:Richard Rohr

“If you stay in the mainstream of life, in other words, you let in the suffering of the world that invariably enters all of our lives by the time we're in our middle years, when we've experienced a few deaths and read a few headlines. Famine, poverty, abuse, you can't keep that all blocked out. If you let those things teach you, influence you, change you, those are the events that transition you without you even knowing it to become more compassionate. In other words, you hold onto your values, but you do it much more inclusively, humbly and in an open ended way. Suffering takes you there.”

Ifs World Way Years Suffering Values Poverty Teach Knowing Our Lives Influence Middle Events Abuse Live By Transition Compassionate Mainstream Without You Famine Headlines Blocked

Author:Richard Rohr

“After 32 years as a priest , I think its fair to say that most institutional churches are very limited in addressing higher levels of spiritual consciousness.”

Thinking Years Spiritual Church Levels Consciousness Higher Fairs Priests Higher Level

Author:Richard Rohr

“If you're the head of the organization that has to pay salaries, bills and keep the money coming, you have to be concerned with pleasing the middle. I find it means you have to dumb down your message to something less radical than the gospel. It can't be the real gospel. It has to be "churchiness" that pleases everyone, so they come back next Sunday and keep putting money in the collection plate. I don't mean that in a cynical way. I just think it's what happens.”

Ifs Thinking Way Mean Real Happens Next Pay Middle Please Messages Concerned Organization Bills Radical Dumb Collections Sunday Cynical Plates Salary

Author:Richard Rohr

“To keep the middle coming back, you can't say some radically conservative or radically progressive things. That's been the bane of organized religion. It makes me wonder if Jesus' first definition of the church as "two or three gathered in my name" is not still the best way.”

Ifs Way Firsts Stills Two Three Jesus Names Church Wonder Middle Definitions Conservative Best Way Organized Progressive Coming Back Organized Religion Bane

Author:Richard Rohr

“Many people I know who are doing truly helpful and healing ministry find their primary support from a couple of enlightened friends, and only secondarily, if at all, from the larger organizations.”

People Ifs Knows Healing Support Couple Organization Primaries Enlightened Helpful Ministry

Author:Richard Rohr

Quote by Richard Rohr

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