Quote

You can will an act of service but you cannot will love.

Anthony de Mello

Change background

T
T
T

Change font

TAGS & TOPICS

Anthony de Mello
Age: 55 †
Born: 1931
Born: September 4
Died: 1987
Died: June 2
Philosopher
Priest
Psychologist
Theologian
Writer
Bombay
Service
Cannot
Love

More quotes by Anthony de Mello

Image
There comes a point in your life when you become stark raving insane, commit suicide or become a mystic.
Anthony de Mello
Image
Another illusion is that external events have the power to hurt you, that other people have the power to hurt you. They don't. It's you who give this power to them.
Anthony de Mello
Image
You have within yourself the answer to every question you propose - if you only knew how to look for it. In the Land of the spirit, you cannot walk by the light of someone else's lamp. You want to borrow mine. I'd rather teach you how to make your own.
Anthony de Mello
Image
A newly married couple said, What shall we do to make our love endure? Said the Master, Love other things together.
Anthony de Mello
Image
The Master was exceedingly gracious to university dons who visited him, but he would never reply to their questions or be drawn into their theological speculations. To his disciples, who marveled at this, he said, Can one talk about the ocean to a frog in a well or about the divine to people who are restricted by their concepts?
Anthony de Mello
Image
Loneliness is not cured by human company. Loneliness is cured by contact with reality.
Anthony de Mello
Image
Understand your darkness and it will vanish then you will know what light is. Understand your nightmare for what it is and it will stop then you will wake up to reality. Understand your false beliefs and they will drop then you will know the taste of happiness.
Anthony de Mello
Image
God in heaven holds each person by a string. When you sin, you cut the string. Then God ties it up again. Making a knot, bringing you a little closer to Him. Again and again your sins cut the string and with each knot God keeps drawing you closer and closer.
Anthony de Mello
Image
What is love? The total absence of fear, said the Master What is it we fear? Love, said the Master.
Anthony de Mello
Image
The Rose does not preen herself to catch my eye. She blooms because she blooms. A saint is a saint until he knows he is one.
Anthony de Mello
Image
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 practice this, bitterness will die out, harmony will arise.
Anthony de Mello
Image
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.
Anthony de Mello
Image
To fight evil with activity is like fighting darkness with one's hands. So what you need is light, not fit.
Anthony de Mello
Image
The way to really live is to die. The passport to living is to imagine yourself in your grave. Imagine you're lying in your coffin....Now look at your problems from that viewpoint. Changes everything, doesn't it?
Anthony de Mello
Image
People who want a cure, provided they can have it without pain, are like those who favour progress, provided they can have it without change.
Anthony de Mello
Image
My former master taught me to accept birth and death. Then what have you come to me for? asked the master. To learn to accept what lies in between.
Anthony de Mello
Image
Extend your arms in welcome to the future. The best is yet to come!
Anthony de Mello
Image
Name one practical, down-to-earth effect of spirituality, said the skeptic who was ready for an argument. Here's one, said the Master. When someone offends you, you can raise your spirits to heights where offenses cannot reach.
Anthony de Mello
Image
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.
Anthony de Mello
Image
We're crazy, We're living on crazy ideas about love, about relationships, about happiness, about joy, about everything.
Anthony de Mello