Prayer to Start the Day

"This is another day, oh, Lord. I know not what it will bring. But make me ready, Lord, for whatever it may be. If I am to stand up, help me stand bravely. If I am to sit still, help me sit quietly. If I am to be low, help me to be so patiently. And if I am to do nothing, let me do it gallantly. Make these words more than words, and give me the spirit of Jesus. Amen."

Cross-Shattered Christ, Stanley Hauerwas, 2004

"Mystery" suggests that what we believe defies reason and common sense. What we believe does defy reason and common sense; but yet I believe what Christians believe is the most reasonable and commonsense account we can have of the way things are.

A Community of Character, 1981, Stanley Hauerwas

"Christians most important social task is nothing less than to be a community capable of hearing the story of God we find in the scripture and living in a manner that is faithful to that story. The only reason to be Christian is because Christian convictions are true; and the only reason for participation in the church is that it is the community that pledges to form its life by that truth." (1)

"That the church has often failed to be such a polity (concerned with the development of virtue) is without question, but the fact that we have often been less than we were meant to be should never be used as an excuse for shirking the task of being the people of God." "...(trust) in truth and love to banish the fears that create enmity and discord. To be sure, we have often been unfaithful to his story, but that is no reason for us to think it is an unrealistic demand. Rather it means we must challenge ourselves to be the kind of community where such a story can be told and manifested by a people formed in accordance with it..."

Man's maker made man

Man's maker was made man...that Life might die.

Face the facts, don't lie

Face the facts. Don't lie and deny and the truth about yourself and the world. It'll make you a better human being.

Sin, Peace, Truth, Joy, Life, Love

"It is a sin to think that you are capable of naming your own sin. You are only able to know your sin by being told by another." Stanley Hauerwas.

"When we think our brother or sister has sinned against us, such an affront is not against us but against the whole community." 

"It is an unpleasant fact that most of our lives are governed more by our hates and dislikes than by our love. I seldom know what I really want but I know what or whom I deeply dislike or even hate."

"Jesus brings not a peace of rest but a peace of truth. Just as love without truth cannot help but be a curse, so peace without truthfulness cannot help but be deadly." Learning to Love the Enemy, Stanley Hauerwas on Matthew 18.

Are you a Christian? "If you are a Christian you should be joyful in a way that people find attractive. It's not like I go around saying, 'Oh, you got to be like me,' but that people should think, 'Gee I wonder what makes them tick.'"

A Heart that Never Hardens

"Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts." Charles Dickens. 

The "how" of being a Christian

"I do not put much stock in 'believing in God.' (It) is a far too rationalistic account of what it means to be a Christian. I am far more interested in what a declaration of belief entails for how I live my life. ...the 'what' of Christianity is not the problem. It is the 'how.' ...we cannot understand the 'what' of Christianity without knowing the 'how' to be Christian. Yet then I worry about the how of my own life." Stanley Hauerwas, Hannah's Child. A Theologian's Memoir, On Being Stanley Hauerwas.