courage on Selfishness

God, the fact that we feel uncomfortable is evidence that we perceive the injustices in our world. We don’t ask you to help us hear the cries of injustice, but rather to give us courage to act against...

You have to decide what your highest priorities are and have the courage—pleasantly, smilingly, nonapologetically, to say “no” to other things. And the way you do that is by having a bigger “yes” burn...

Our God, we have been slow to stand and slow to act. We have been unmoved in the face of wrongs. Rather than welcoming others, we have put up walls. We have served this god of self-preservation. But y...

Father, we confess to boasting in success and security. We have denied you rather that desire you. We have cowered when we needed to be courageous. Jesus, we long to be people who follow you, no matte...

Take the case of courage. No quality has ever so much addled the brains and tangled the definitions of merely rational sages. Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to li...

Cautious, careful people, always casting about to preserve their reputation and social standing, never can bring about a reform. Those who are really in earnest must be willing to be anything or nothi...

Silence is evil's closest ally.

Loving God**, we reflect on the times when we took too long to obey you. Give us courage next time.(silent reflection)** Merciful God**, we reflect on the instances where we failed to see your leadin...

Disturb us, Lord, when we are too pleased with ourselves; when our dreams have come true because we dreamed too little; when we arrived safely because we sailed too close to the shore. Disturb us, Lo...

It is curious that physical courage should be so common in the world and moral courage so rare.

A truly remarkable example of sacrificial courage took place in Folsom, New Mexico, in 1908. When a flood was racing toward the valley, a resident from the hills warned a local woman, S. J. Brooks, th...

Long before morning I knew that what I was seeking to discover was a thing I'd always known. That all courage was a form of constancy. That it is always himself that the coward abandoned first. Af...

Few men are willing to brave the disapproval of their fellows, the censure of their colleagues, the wrath of their society. Moral courage is a rarer commodity than bravery in battle or great intellige...

Courage is almost a contradiction in terms. It means a strong desire to live, taking the form of a readiness to die.

The film the Dead Poets Society is set in 1959 at Welton Academy, a strict, elite, all-boys preparatory school. The main character, Todd Anderson, is a shy and insecure student who struggles wit...

Society has taught us that vulnerability is synonymous with weakness—but it’s just the opposite. Vulnerability is the willingness to show up and be seen by others in the face of uncertain outcomes. Th...

Gracious God, You have called us out of darkness and into the light of Your love. You have redeemed us and made us whole in order to set us free from bondage. The challenge You place before us is to d...

I’d grown up in a Boston suburb where people’s homes were set behind deep hedges or protected by huge yards and neighbors hardly knew each other. And they didn’t need to: nothing ever happened in my t...

A certain amount of opposition is great help to a man. Kites rise against, not with the wind.

Courage is always greatest when blended with meekness; intellectual ability is most admirable when it sparkles in the setting of a modest self-distrust; and never does the human soul appear so strong ...

Almost all heroic individuals face grave crises while they are still on the road to reaching the ultimate decision that they will remain faithful to their selves, whatever the cost.

Honest and courageous people have very little to say about either their courage or their honesty.

In the battle of life, it is not the critic who counts; nor the one who points out how the strong person stumbled, or where the doer of a deed could have done better. The credit belongs to the person ...

Courage is a virtue only so far as it is directed by prudence.

And we are put on earth a little space, That we may learn to bear the beams of love.

O Holy One, we call to you and name you as eternal, ever-present, and boundless in love. Yet there are times, O God, when we fail to recognize you in the dailyness of our lives. Sometimes shame clench...

The things we say yes to and the things we say no to determine the terrain of our future. My convoluted journey is posted with invitations, and my RSVPs account for the twists and turns. Sometimes, ha...

In the second century, a priest from Antioch named Sulpicius had steadfastly refused to sacrifice to the gods, even under torture, and was being led away to be beheaded. As he walked, a Christian name...

The British romantic poet Lord Byron (George Gordon) grew up with the disability of clubfoot, which kept him from engaging in many of the activities and joys of childhood. He was nevertheless, a perso...

Despair gives courage to a coward.