Christ's own 'God-forsaken-ness' on the cross showed me where God is present where God had been present in those nights of deaths in the fire storms in Hamburg and where God would be present in my future whatever may come.
Jrgen MoltmannRead
It is only when human beings see themselves simply as human beings, no longer as gods, that they are in a position to perceive the wholly other nature of God.
Interpretation
Humans must recognize their limitations to truly understand the divine.
In this quote, Jrgen Moltmann emphasizes that when people shed their inflated self-perceptions and acknowledge their humanity, they become better positioned to comprehend the nature of the divine. The quote suggests that humility and self-awareness are key to spiritual understanding.
In practice
In a discussion about spirituality and self-awareness, one might refer to this quote to illustrate the importance of humility.
Christ's own 'God-forsaken-ness' on the cross showed me where God is present where God had been present in those nights of deaths in the fire storms in Hamburg and where God would be present in my future whatever may come.
As time goes on we become old, the future contracts, the past expands...But by future we don't just mean the years ahead; we always mean as well the plenitude of possibilities which challenge our creativity...In confrontation with the future we can become young if we accept the future's challenges.
Even the disciples of Jesus all fled from their master's cross. Christians who do not have the feeling that they must flee the crucified Christ have probably not yet understood him in a sufficiently radical way.
Totally without hope, one cannot live. To live without hope is to cease to live.
The turn from this end [despair] to a new beginning came from three things. A blooming cherry tree, the unexpected kindness of Scottish workers and their families, and the Bible.
Imprisoned professors taught imprisoned students free theology.
Is it treason to say the truth? A bitter truth, but no less true for that.
Drunkenness is temporary suicide.
How hard it is, how bitter it is to become a man!
Perhaps passing through the gates of death is like passing quietly through the gate in a pasture fence. On the other side, you keep walking, without the need to look back. No shock, no drama, just the lifting of a plank or two in a simple wooden gate in a clearing. Neither pain, nor floods of light, nor great voices, but just the silent crossing of a meadow.
Insanity is in the eyes of the beholder. So I will continue to live my personal folly.
As I started to pursue the subject more deeply I realized that walking was this wonderful meandering path through everything I was already interested in - gender politics, public space and urban life, demonstrations and parades and marches. The relationship between walking and thinking and between the mind and the body.
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