Anthony de Mello Quotes
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A Jesuit once wrote a note to Father Arrupe, his superior general, asking him about the relative value of communism, socialism and capitalism. Father Arrupe gave him a lovely reply. He said, 'A system is about as good or as bad as the people who use it.' People with golden hearts would make capitalism or communism or socialism work beautifully.
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Whatever is truly alive must die. Look at the flowers; only plastic flowers never die.
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A writer arrived at the monastery to write a book about the Master. 'People say you are a genius. Are you?' he asked. 'You might say so.' said the Master, none too modestly. 'And what makes one a genius?' 'The ability to recognize.' 'Recognize what?' 'The butterfly in a caterpillar: the eagle in an egg; the saint in a selfish human being.'
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There is no salvation till they have seen their basic prejudice.
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Any time you are with anyone or think of anyone you must say to yourself: I am dying and this person too is dying, attempting the while to experience the truth of the words you are saying. If every one of you agrees to practise this, bitterness will die out, harmony will arise.
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Step by step, let whatever happens happen. Real change will come when it is brought about, not by your ego, but by reality. Awareness releases reality to change you.
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My commitment is not to consistency but to the Truth.
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'What, concretely, is Enlightenment?' 'Seeing Reality as it is,' said the Master. 'Doesn't everyone see Reality as it is?' 'Oh, no! Most people see it as they believe it is.' 'What's the difference?' 'The difference between thinking you are drowning in a stormy sea and knowing you cannot drown because there isn't any water in sight for miles around.'
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Before creation Love was. After creation love is made. When love is consummated, creation will cease to be, and Love will be forever.
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'Help us to find God.' 'No one can help you there.' 'Why not?' 'For the same reason that no one can help the fish to find the ocean.'
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The master never let a statement about God go unchallenged. All God statements were poetic or symbolic expressions of the Unknowable; people, however, foolishly took them as literal descriptions of the divine.
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'What is the work of a Master?' said a solemn-faced visitor. 'To teach people to laugh,' said the Master gravely.
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The sun and its light, the ocean and the wave, the singer and his song - not one. Not two.
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Is there life before death? - that is the question!
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All I did was sit on the riverbank handing out river water. After I'm gone, I trust you will notice the river.
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When you come to see you are not as wise today as you thought you were yesterday, you are wiser today.
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People who want to rise above a well-cooked meal and a well-tailored garment, are out of their spiritual minds.
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The important thing is not to know who 'I' is or what 'I' is. You'll never succeed. There are no words for it. The important thing is to drop the labels.
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The Master persistently warned against the attempt to encompass Reality in a concept or a name. A scholar in mysticism once asked, 'When you speak of BEING, sir, is it eternal, transcendent being you speak of, or transient, contingent being?' The Master closed his eyes in thought. Then he opened them, put on his most disarming expression, and said, 'Yes!'
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'What is love?' 'The total absence of fear,' said the Master. 'What is it we fear?' 'Love,' said the Master.
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A thought is a screen, not a mirror; that is why you live in a thought envelope, untouched by Reality.
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Understand the obstructions you are putting in the way of love, freedom, and happiness and they will drop. Turn on the light of awareness and the darkness will disappear. Happiness is not something you acquire; love is not something you produce; love is not something you have; love is something that has you.
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Charity is really self-interest masquerading under the form of altruism.
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To a visitor who described himself as a seeker after Truth the Master said, 'If what you seek is Truth, there is one thing you must have above all else.' 'I know. An overwhelming passion for it.' 'No. An unremitting readiness to admit you may be wrong.'