“Many of us feel a chronic discomfort in American society, much like what young George Fox felt in his time and place. It is a sense of alienation, born of living among people who apparently feel ‘whole and at ease in that condition that was my misery.’ But that misery is the fruit of our own alienation from the witness of God in us. Living closer to that source, we can sense more easily the discomfort of others, whatever appearances they (and we) maintain.”
“Katherine Evans, Margaret Killam, and Elizabeth Hooton were emotional, and the intensity of their public voices, which hostile contemporaries described as shouting or screaming, may well have held a residue of personal frustration or exultation; more importantly, it was an expression of the prophet’s ritually expressed anguish over the nation, mediated through the conventional language and behavior of biblical figures.”
“Even in the wicked, God has a witness which is pure, which checks them often, though they do not regard it.”
“We are the most powerful generation that has ever lived on the earth. The decisions we make today will ripple forward and affect future generations in a way that decisions that previous generations made did not. How can we be the best guardians for future generations that we can possibly be? This is the work we are charged to do.”
“We seek a world free of war and the threat of war. / We seek a society with equity and justice for all. / We seek a community where every person’s potential may be fulfilled. / We seek an earth restored.”
“I think I have wasted a great deal of my life waiting to be called to some great mission which would change the world. I have looked for important social movements. I have wanted to make a big and important contribution to the causes I believe in. I think I have been too ready to reject the genuine leadings I have been given as being matters of little consequence. It has taken me a long time to learn that obedience means doing what we are called to do even if it seems pointless or unimportant or even silly.”
“The prophets’ great contribution to humanity was the discovery of the evil of indifference. One may be decent and sinister, pious and sinful.
The prophet is a person who suffers the harms done to others. Wherever a crime is committed, it is as if the prophet were the victim and the prey. The prophet’s angry words cry. The wrath of God is a lamentation. All prophecy is one great exclamation: God is not indifferent to evil! He is always concerned, He is personally affected by what man does to man. He is a God of pathos.”
“Stand up ye prophets of the Lord, for the truth upon the earth; quench not your prophecy, neither heed them that despise it; but in that stand which brings you through to the end. Heed not the eyes of the world, ye prophets of the Lord, but answer that in them all, which they have closed their eye to.”
“In our world today, it is entirely too easy to witness all kinds of brutality and alienation, and yet not to bear witness. We can watch the news reports… but if all we do is watch, how is that different from voyeurism? The voyeur’s eyes are not soft, for they look in expectation of titillation, of being stimulated, of gaining something for oneself; and once that is satisfied, they look away. The eyes of a witness see the hard things and do not look away.”
“We need both a deeper spirituality and a more outspoken witness. If our spirituality can reach the depths of authentic prayer, our lives will become an authentic witness for justice, peace and the integrity of creation, a witness which becomes the context for our prayer. Out of the depths of authentic prayer comes a longing for peace and a passion for justice. And our response to violence and injustice is to pray more deeply, because only God can show us the way out of the mess that the world is in. And only God gives us the strength to follow that Way.”
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