Olivier Clement quotes

St. Seraphim, like Francis of Assisi, talked to animals. One day two nuns saw him deep in conversation with a bear. The bears of the Russian forests are very ferocious, and the two women were terrified. But Seraphim reassured them and showed them that he who is sanctified lives in peace with all creation, just as Adam did before the Fall.
-- Olivier Clement

#Fall #Animal #Two

The kenosis of the Son reveals the mystery of God who is Love. This gift of life is an extension of a mysterious exchange at the heart of the Deity. In God himself the One does not exclude the Other, it includes it. The Unity of God is so complete, so rich, that it is not solitude enclosed in itself, but rather the fullness of communion. And thereby, the source of all communion.
-- Olivier Clement

#Heart #Son #Solitude

Our nature is to worship, but unless that element is directed towards God it becomes "a senseless impersonal force, carrying us away in its momentum. It becomes a search for ecstasy - no matter what kind achieved through destruction...The worshipful integraton of nature in the person is inverted in a hellish imprisonment of the individual in nature."
-- Olivier Clement

#Spiritual #Elements #Matter

It is therefore essential to let the 'heart spirit' settle like calm water. Then it becomes a tranquil lake in which the sky is reflected, in which the face of Christ can be seen.
-- Olivier Clement

#Spiritual #Heart #Sky

For every person is a gaping space waiting to be filled with God.
-- Olivier Clement

#Faith #Inspiration #Space

Prayer and Theology are inseparable. True Theology is the adoration offered by the intellect. The intellect clarifies the moment of prayer, but only prayer can give it the fervor of the Spirit. Theology is light, prayer is fire.
-- Olivier Clement

#Prayer #Light #Fire

People never cease to project on to God their individual and collective obsessions, so that they can appropriate and make use of him. But they ought to understand that God cannot be apprehended from without, as if he were an object, for with him there is no outside nor can the Creator be set side by side with the creature.
-- Olivier Clement

#People #Use #Sides

By the grace of the spiritual master the cloud of the mercy of the Personality of Godhead is brought in, and then only, when the rains of Krishna consciousness fall, can the fire of material existence be extinguished.

Nothing is as easy or natural as consumer brands want us to think - no problem is as resolvable. Your hair will fall out, eventually. Yet we do have these brands, and we line our shelves with them. There's an inherent irony.

When you fall for the one that owns you, she’ll be the only one that has the power to make you cry.

Animals keep you company when you're really lonely. It helps because when you have a friend around who always likes you no matter what - it's harder to feel bad or down.

I'm a vegetarian and very much active in regards to how I feel about animal rights and protecting animals and giving animals a voice. But at the same time, I appreciate and respect other people's decisions to eat meat. The only thing that I hope is that people are educated, that they're aware, that they're living a conscious lifestyle.

It's disheartening that animal people criticize societies that enlist the help of actors or organize creative acts like 'I'd rather go naked than wear fur,' to increase public awareness to our cause. These are great/courageous ideas which time has come! Liberation of animals is REVOLUTION - not elegant performance/ intellectual competition. We should do most anything to advance the animal rights cause. All the bickering may make the one step forward... TWO STEPS BACKWARD???

Please also remember the pitiful gasping/thirsty little mouths/ beaks in summer. They'll appreciate abundant/fresh/cool/clean/ water! Food they can get easily in parks/sidewalks!

It's a great historical joke that when the Spanish met the Aztecs, it was a blind date made in serve-you-right heaven. At the time, they were the two most unpleasant cultures in the entire world, and richly deserved each other. Still, the story of how stout Cortes blustered, bullied and bludgeoned his way to collapsing an entire empire with a handful of contagious hoodlums is astonishing.

The spiritual master and Krishna are two parallel lines. The train, on two tracks, moves forward. The spiritual Master and Krishna are like these two tracks. They must be served simultaneously. Krishna helps one to find bona fide Spiritual Master and bona fide Spiritual Master helps one to understand Krishna. If one does not get bona fide Spiritual Master, then how he can ever understand Krishna ? You cannot serve Krishna without Spiritual Master, or serve just Spiritual Master without serving Krishna. They must be served simultaneously.

In the middle of nowhere, along a quiet stretch of road, the diner dreamt of the hungry dead. And of two men.