Faith, Spirituality and Religion

Closer is He than breathing, and nearer than hands and feet.

 

The Church’s one foundation

 

Often when I pray I wonder if I am not posting letters to a non-existent address.

 

A young man who wishes to remain a sound atheist cannot be too careful of his reading.

 

The dead don’t die. They look on and help.

 

If we find the answer to that [why it is that we and the universe exist], it would be the ultimate triumph of human reason—for then we would know the mind of God.

 

Lord, make me an instrument of Your peace!

 

Praised be You, my Lord, with all your creatures,

 

Do you believe in fairies? Say quick that you believe! If you believe, clap your hands!

 

No coward soul is mine, No trembler in the world’s storm-troubled sphere: I see Heaven’s glories shine, And faith shines equal, arming me from fear.

 

I hope to see my Pilot face to face When I have crossed the bar.

 

I am Merlin Who follow the Gleam.

 

Flower in the crannied wall, I pluck you out of the crannies, I hold you here, root and all, in my hand, Little flower—but if I could understand What you are, root and all, and all in all, I should know what God and man is.

 

Cast all your cares on God; that anchor holds.

 

More things are wrought by prayer Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice Rise like a fountain for me night and day.

 

I found Him in the shining of the stars, I mark’d Him in the flowering of His fields, But in His ways with men I find Him not.

 

Man’s word is God in man.

 

One God, one law, one element, And one far-off divine event, To which the whole creation moves.

 

There lives more faith in honest doubt, Believe me, than in half the creeds.

 

The great world’s altar-stairs, That slope through darkness up to God.

 

Let knowledge grow from more to more, But more of reverence in us dwell; That mind and soul, according well, May make one music as before.

 

Believing where we cannot prove.

 

There are three lessons I would write, Three words as with a burning pen, In tracings of eternal light Upon the hearts of men.

 

Teach us, good Lord, to serve Thee as Thou deservest: To give and not to count the cost; To fight and not to heed the wounds; To toil and not to seek for rest; To labor and not ask for any reward Save that of knowing that we do Thy will.