Richard Rohr
Richard Rohr
Richard Rohr, O.F.M.is a Franciscan friar ordained to the priesthood in the Roman Catholic Church in 1970. He is an internationally known inspirational speaker and has published numerous recorded talks and books, most recently Yes, And...: Daily Meditations, Immortal Diamond: The Search for Our True Self, Falling Upward: A Spirituality for the Two Halves of Life, The Naked Now: Learning to See as the Mystics See, and Eager to Love: The Alternative Way of Francis of Assisi...
NationalityAmerican
ProfessionClergyman
CountryUnited States of America
There are three things we have to let go of. The first is the compulsion to be successful. Second, is the compulsion to be right-especially theologically right. (That's merely an ego trip, and because of this "need" churches split in half, with both parties prisoners of their own egos.) Finally, there is the compulsion to be powerful, to have everything under control.
There is nothing to prove and nothing to protect. I am who I am and it's enough.
The true mystic is always both humble and compassionate, for she knows that she does not know.
We cannot avoid the globalization of knowledge and information. When I was a boy growing up in Kansas, I could never think about a Buddhist, or a Hindu, or Muslim, or even a Protestant - I grew up in such a Catholic ghetto. That's not possible anymore, unless you live in a cave or something. So either we have knowledge of what the other religions and other denominations are saying, and how they tie into the common thread, or we end up just being dangerously ignorant of other people and therefore prejudiced.
Maturity is the ability to joyfully live in an imperfect world.
Much of the Christian religion has largely become “holding on” instead of letting go. But God, it seems to me, does the holding on (to us!), and we must learn the letting go (of everything else).
It is at the bottom where we find grace; for like water, grace seeks the lowest place and there it pools up.
Let’s state it clearly: One great idea of the biblical revelation is that God is manifest in the ordinary, in the actual, in the daily, in the now, in the concrete incarnations of life, and not through purity codes and moral achievement contests, which are seldom achieved anyway.
When you haven't found inner meaning, you will always substitute outer performance. It's the only way to fill that void, that sense of significance - that I am significant. So almost the degree of outer performance can, in many cases, mirror the lack of inner alignment.
Faith is not for overcoming obstacles; it is for experiencing them—all the way through!
Would you respect a God you could comprehend? And yet very often that’s what we want - a God who reflects our culture, our biases, our economic, political, and military systems.
A person who can laugh and go with life does not demand to be in control, which is why the most controlling people may be sarcastic but lack an authentic sense of humor.
The cross is the standing statement of what we do to one another and to ourselves. The resurrection is the standing statement of what God does to us in return.
When we fail we are merely joining the great parade of humanity that has walked ahead of us and will follow after us.