Thomas Berry Quotes and Sayings - Page 1
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“The destiny of humans cannot be separated from the destiny of earth.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“The natural world is the larger sacred community to which we belong. To be alienated from this community is to become destitute in all that makes us human. To damage this community is to diminish our own existence.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“The child awakens to a universe. The mind of the child to a world of meaning. Imagination to a world of beauty. Emotions to a world of intimacy. It takes a universe to make a child both in outer form and inner spirit. It takes a universe to educate a child. A universe to fulfill a child.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“Gardening is an active participation in The deepest mysteries of the universe.”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“The universe must be experienced as the Great Self. Each is fulfilled in the other: the Great Self is fulfilled in the individual self, the individual self is fulfilled in the Great Self. Alienation is overcome as soon as we experience this surge of energy from the source that has brought the universe through the centuries. New fields of energy become available to support the human venture. These new energies find expression and support in celebration. For in the end the universe can only be explained in terms of celebration. It is all an exuberant expression of existence itself..”
-- Thomas Berry -
“We are not lacking in the dynamic forces needed to create the future. We live immersed in a sea of energy beyond all comprehension.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“We need to move: from a spirituality of alienation from the natural world to a spirituality of intimacy with the natural world from a spirituality of the divine as revealed in words to a spirituality of the divine as revealed in the visible world about us..”
-- Thomas Berry -
“We lose our souls if we lose the experience of the forest, the butterflies, the song of the birds, if we can't see the stars at night.”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“We might sometimes reflect and recall that the purpose of all our science, technology, industry, manufacturing, commerce, and finance is celebration, planetary celebration. This is what moves the stars through the heavens and the earth through its seasons. The final norm of judgment concerning the success or failure of our technologies is the extent to which they enable us to participate more fully in this grand festival.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“The Universe story is the quintessence of reality. We perceive the story. We put it in our language, the birds put it in theirs, and the trees put it in theirs. We can read the story of the Universe in the trees. Everything tells the story of the Universe. The winds tell the story, literally, not just imaginatively. The story has its imprint everywhere, and that is why it is so important to know the story. If you do not know the story, in a sense you do not know yourself; you do not know anything.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thomas Berry, Thomas Mary Berry, Thomas E. Clarke, Anne Lonergan (1991). “Befriending the Earth: A Theology of Reconciliation Between Humans and the Earth”, Mystic, Conn. : Twenty-Third Publications
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“The universe is a communion of subjects, not a collection of objects.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thomas Berry (2010). “Evening Thoughts”, p.17, Counterpoint
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“The world of life, of spontaneity, the world of dawn and sunset and starlight, the world of soil and sunshine, of meadow and woodland, of hickory and oak and maple and hemlock and pineland forests, of wildlife dwelling around us, of the river and its wellbeing--all of this [is] the integral community in which we live.”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“The universe is composed of subjects to be communed with, not objects to be exploited. Everything has its own voice. Thunder and lightening and stars and planets, flowers, birds, animals, trees, ~~ all these have voices, and they constitute a community of existence that is profoundly related.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : "A Language Older Than Words". Book by Derrick Jensen (p. 361), 2000.
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“We are talking only to ourselves. We are not talking to the rivers, we are not listening to the wind and stars. We have broken the great conversation. By breaking that conversation we have shattered the universe. All the disasters that are happening now are a consequence of that spiritual 'autism.'”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thich Nhat Hanh, John Stanley, David Loy, Mary Evelyn Tucker, John Grim (2013). “Spiritual Ecology: The Cry of the Earth”, p.59, The Golden Sufi Center
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“If the earth does grow inhospitable toward human presence, it is primarily because we have lost our sense of courtesy toward the earth and its inhabitants.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“The time has come to lower our voices, to cease imposing our mechanistic patterns on the biological processes of the earth, to resist the impulse to control, to command, to force, to oppress, and to begin quite humbly to follow the guidance of the larger community on which all life depends.”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“Teaching children about the natural world should be seen as one of the most important events in their lives.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thomas Berry, Thomas Mary Berry (1996). “Creative Energy: Bearing Witness for the Earth”, Random House (NY)
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“The real skill is to raise the sails and to catch the power of the wind as it passes by.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“For the emergent process, as noted by the geneticist Theodore Dobzhansky, is neither random nor determined but creative. Just as in human order, creativity is neither a rational deductive process nor the irrational wandering of the undisciplined mind but the emergence of beauty as mysterious as the blossoming of a field of daisies out of the dark Earth.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“From a large planet of overwhelming magnitude, unlimited resources and endless mystery, the Earth has suddenly become a small planet, thoroughly explored, limited in resources, and reduced in mystery.”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“It's all a question of story. We are in trouble just now because we do not have a good story. We are in between stories. The old story, the account of how we fit into it, is no longer effective. Yet we have not learned the new story.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thomas Berry, Thomas Mary Berry (1996). “Creative Energy: Bearing Witness for the Earth”, Random House (NY)
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“Diversity is the magic. It is the first manifestation, the first beginning of the differentiation of a thing and of simple identity. The greater the diversity, the greater the perfection.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“We will go into the future as a single sacred community, or we will all perish in the desert.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“Once you adopt and communicate a quality policy, stick with it, live it, and protect it. You get only one chance!”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“In relation to the earth we have been autistic for centuries. Only now have we begun to listen with some attention and with a willingness to respond to the earth's demands that we cease our industrial assault, that we abandon our inner rage against the conditions of our earthly existence, that we renew our human participation in the grand liturgy of the universe.”
-- Thomas BerrySource : Thomas Berry, Thomas Mary Berry (1996). “Creative Energy: Bearing Witness for the Earth”, Random House (NY)
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“As humans we are born of the Earth, nourished by the Earth, healed by the Earth.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“We need merely understand that the evolutionary process is neither random nor determined but creative. It follows the general pattern of all creativity. While there is no way of fully understanding the origin moment of the universe we can appreciate the direction of evolution in its larger arc of development as moving from lesser to great complexity in structure and from lesser to greater modes of consciousness. We can also understand the governing principles of evolution in terms of its three movements toward differentiation, inner spontaneity, and comprehensive bonding.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“What does the Earth Desire? I will put it in just a few short sentences... To be admired in her loveliness, To be tasted in her delicious fruits, To be listened to in her teaching, To be endured in the severity of her discipline, To be cared for as a maternal source from whence we come, a destiny to which we return. It's very simple...”
-- Thomas Berry -
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“The reduction of the earth to an object simply for human's use/ possession is unthinkable in most traditional cultures... the earth belongs to itself and to all the component members of the community.”
-- Thomas Berry -
“Just now one of the significant historical roles of the primal people of the world is not simply to sustain their own traditions, but call the entire civilized world back to a more authentic mode of being.”
-- Thomas Berry
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