Like apes, we breed, sleep, and die. Yet like God we say, "I am." We are ontological oxymorons.
Interpretation
The quote reflects on the complex nature of human existence, contrasting our biological aspects with our conscious identity.
In this quote, Peter Kreeft highlights the paradoxical nature of humanity. On one hand, we share basic biological functions with animals, such as breeding and dying; on the other hand, we possess a self-awareness and a unique ability to assert our existence, which distinguishes us from other creatures. This duality presents us as 'ontological oxymorons,' beings that embody contradictory characteristics, emphasizing the profound nature of human existence.
In practice
This quote can be used in a philosophical discussion about what it means to be human.
Trusting God's grace means trusting God's love for us rather than our love for God. [...] Therefore our prayers should consist mainly of rousing our awareness of God's love for us rather than trying to rouse God's awareness of our love for him, like the priests of Baal on Mount Carmel (1 Kings 18:26-29).
Remembering the facts of death and Heaven gives us an even more pressing reason to learn to pray: We do not have an infinite amount of time. We are one day nearer Home today than we ever were before. I guarantee you that after you die you will not say 'I spent too much time praying; I wish I had watched more TV instead.'
The modern mind always tends to reduce the greater to the lesser rather than seeing the lesser as reflecting the greater.
Our soul, like Mary's body, is to receive God Himself if only we, like her, believe, consent and receive; if only we speak her truly magic word fiat, "let it be." It is the creative word, the word God used to create the universe.
Protestants believe that the sacraments are like ladders that God gave to us by which we can climb up to Him. Catholics believe that they are like ladders that God gave to Himself by which He climbs down to us.
One of the few things in life that cannot possibly do harm in the end is the honest pursuit of the truth.
Adults are only obsolete children.
In those days, we imagined ourselves as being kept in some kind of holding pen, waiting to be released into our lives. And when the moment came, our lives -- and time itself -- would speed up. How were we to know that our lives had in any case begun, that some advantage had already been gained, some damage already inflicted? Also, that our release would only be into a larger holding pen, whose boundaries would be at first undiscernible.
e quindi uscimmo a riveder le stelle" ("and thence we came forth to see again the stars")
β¦but there they lay, sprawled across the field, craved far more by the vultures than by wives.
All token Blacks have the same experience. I have been pointed at as a solution to things that have not yet begun to be solved, because pointing at us token Blacks eases consciences of millions, and this is dreadfully wrong.
Men seldom, or rather never for a length of time and deliberately, rebel against anything that does not deserve rebelling against.
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