Show me your hands. Do they have scars from giving? Show me your feet. Are they wounded in service? Show me your heart. Have you left a place for divine love?
Fulton J. SheenRead
The refusal to take sides on great moral issues is itself a decision. It is a silent acquiescence to evil. The Tragedy of our time is that those who still believe in honesty lack fire and conviction, while those who believe in dishonesty are full of passionate conviction.
Interpretation
Indecision on moral issues equates to supporting evil, reflecting a crisis of conviction in honesty versus dishonesty.
Fulton J. Sheen's quote highlights the moral obligation individuals have to take a stand on significant issues. It suggests that failing to do so is, in itself, a choice that tacitly supports evil. The quote further contrasts the passionate beliefs of those who embrace dishonesty with the often lukewarm commitment of those who value honesty, illustrating a troubling imbalance in conviction in contemporary society.
In practice
Using this quote in a debate about the importance of taking stands on social justice issues.
Show me your hands. Do they have scars from giving? Show me your feet. Are they wounded in service? Show me your heart. Have you left a place for divine love?
A woman gets angry when a man denies his faults, because she knew them all along. His lying mocks her affection; it is the deceit that angers her more than the faults.
Many married women who have deliberately spurned the "hour" of childbearing are unhappy and frustrated. They never discovered the joys of marriage because they refused to surrender to the obligation of their state. In saving themselves, they lost themselves!
No one has ever laughed at a pun who did not see in the one word a twofold meaning. To materialists this world is opaque like a curtain; nothing can be seen through it. A mountain is just a mountain, a sunset just a sunset; but to poets, artists, and saints, the world is transparent like a window pane - it tells of something beyond....a mountain tells of the Power of God, the sunset of His Beauty, and the snowflake of His Purity.
The big print giveth, and the fine print taketh away.
Hearing nuns' confessions is like being stoned to death with popcorn.
Secrecy is for losers. . . . It is time to dismantle government secrecy, this most persuasive of Cold War-era regulations. It is time to begin building the supports for the era of openness that is already upon us.
Fare forward, travellers! not escaping from the past_x000D_ _x000D_ Into different lives, or into any future;_x000D_ _x000D_ You are not the same people who left that station_x000D_ _x000D_ Or who will arrive at any terminus,_x000D_ _x000D_ While the narrowing rails slide together behind you.
War is the province of danger.
A man, after he has brushed off the dust and chips of his life, will have left only the hard, clean question: Was it good or was it evil? Have I done well - or ill?
There is no subjection so perfect as that which keeps the appearance of freedom.
The master's tools will never dismantle the master's house.
Subscribe for the occasional hand-picked quote. No noise.