Top 90 Jean Vanier Quotes

#1. Community is the place where are revealed all the darkness and anger, jealousies and rivalry hidden in our hearts. Community is a place of pain, because it is a place of loss, a place of conflict, and a place of death. But it is also a place of resurrection.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #23629
#2. In community we are called to care for each member of the community. We can. Choose our friends but we do not choose our brothers and sisters' they are given to us, whether in family or in community." Jean

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #43662
#3. A growing community must integrate three elements: a life of silent prayer, a life of service and above all of listening to the poor, and a community life through which all its members can grow in their own gift.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #49716
#4. That is the fundamental question; how to trust that she has a heart and that she can, little by little, receive love, be transformed by love, and then give love.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #67873
#5. Love doesn't mean doing extraordinary or heroic things. It means knowing how to do ordinary things with tenderness.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #72485
#6. Peace cannot he imposed by politicians or Churches. Peace has to grow within each person if it is to endure. Our society can only be healed when each person in it is healed.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #78241
#7. People may come to our communities because they want to serve the poor; they will only stay once they have discovered that they themselves are poor.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #85779
#8. At the heart of the celebration, there are the poor. If [they] are excluded, it is not longer a celebration. [ ... ] A celebration must always be a festival of the poor.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #134689
#9. To love someone is not first of all to do things for them,but to reveal to them their beauty and value, to say to them through our attitude: 'You are beautiful. You are important. I trust you. You can trust yourself.'

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #141666
#10. I believe every act of violence is also a message that needs to be understood. Violence should not be answered just by greater violence but by real understanding. We must ask: 'Where is the violence coming from? What is its meaning?

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #151934
#11. Every human activity can be put at the service of the divine and of love. We should all exercise our gift to build community.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #170178
#12. We have to remind ourselves constantly that we are not saviours. We are simply a tiny sign, among thousands of others, that love is possible, that the world is not condemned to a struggle between oppressors and oppressed, that class and racial warfare is not inevitable.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #188829
#13. The weak and the poor are for us a source of unity. Jesus came into the world to change and transform society from a "pyramid" in which the strong and clever dominate at the top, into a "body", where each member of society has a place, is respected and is important.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #325250
#14. Prayer is like a secret garden made up of silence and rest and inwardness. But there are a thousand and one doors into this garden and we all have to find our own.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #338483
#15. Many people are good at talking about what they are doing, but in fact do little. Others do a lot but don't talk about it; they are the ones who make a community live.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #343504
#16. To reveal someone's beauty is to reveal their value by giving them time, attention, and tenderness. To love is not just to do something for them but to reveal to them their own uniqueness, to tell them that they are special and worthy of attention.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #365146
#17. The word love has been so abused by publicity and advertisements that we no longer know really what it means.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #368411
#18. Wisdom is something that comes, little by little, through a lot of listening.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #380132
#19. Community begins in mystery and ends in administration. Leaders move away from people and into paper.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #410546
#20. This evolution towards a real responsibility for others is sometimes blocked by fear. It is easier to stay on the level of a pleasant way of life in which we keep our freedom and our distance. But that means that we stop growing and shut ourselves up in our own small concerns and pleasures.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #462996
#21. So many in our world today are suffering from isolation, war and oppression. So much money is spent on the construction of armaments. Many, many young people are in despair because of the danger ...

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #493067
#22. He who is or has been deeply hurt has a RIGHT to be sure he is LOVED.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #496536
#23. We can be seduced ... by powerful political groups that promise more wealth and lower taxes. Those with power can use clever, psychological tricks and play upon our weaknesses and brokenness in order to attract us to their way of thinking. We can be manipulated into illusion.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #501610
#24. Our humanity is so beautiful, but it needs to be transformed

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #525963
#25. To be lonely is to feel unwanted and unloved, and therefor unloveable. Loneliness is a taste of death. No wonder some people who are desperately lonely lose themselves in mental illness or violence to forget the inner pain.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #526704
#26. Those we most often exclude from the normal life of society, people with disabilities, have profound lessons to teach us

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #529991
#27. When we judge, we are pushing people away; we are creating a wall, a barrier. When we forgive we are destroying barriers, we come closer to others.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #538589
#28. We discover that we are at the same time very insignificant and very important, because each of our actions is preparing the humanity of tomorrow; it is a tiny contribution to the construction of the huge and glorious final humanity

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #542072
#29. To love someone is to reveal to them their capacities for life, the light that is shining in them.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #560235
#30. The friend of time doesn't spend all day saying: 'I haven't got time.' He doesn't fight with time. He accepts it and cherishes it.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #591133
#31. Community is not an ideal; it is people. It is you and I. In community we are called to love people just as they are with their wounds and their gifts, not as we want them to be.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #600964
#32. True peace can rarely be imposed from the outside; it must be born within and between communities through meetings and dialogue and then carried outward.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #604227
#33. Envy comes from people's ignorance of, or lack of belief, in their own gifts.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #609691
#34. Every act of violence is also a message that needs to be understood. (23-24)

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #663714
#35. When children are loved, they live off trust; their bides and hearts open up to those who respect and love them, who understand and listen to them.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #727240
#36. [Happiness] comes when we choose to be who we are, to be ourselves, at this present moment in our lives.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #760314
#37. It is difficult to make people understand that the ideal doesn't exist, that personal equilibrium and the harmony they dream of come only after years and years of struggle, and that even then they come only as flashes of grace and peace.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #767715
#38. Life is a succession of crises and moments when we have to rediscover who we are and what we really want.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #781563
#39. Every child, every person needs to know that they are a source of joy; every child, every person, needs to be celebrated. Only when all of our weaknesses are accepted as part of our humanity can our negative, broken self-images be transformed.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #781870
#40. A tension or difficulty can signal the approach of a new grace of God. But it has to be looked at wisely and humanly.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #834694
#41. The language of elitism smells bad! It is not healthy to believe that we are the only ones to have captured truth and even less healthy to condemn others.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #869396
#42. We will only stay in community if we have gone through the passage from choosing community to knowing that we have been chosen for community.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #894259
#43. But let us not put our sights too high. We do not have to be saviours of the world! We are simply human beings, enfolded in weakness and in hope, called together to change our world one heart at a time. (163)

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #907157
#44. Put on light-coloured clothes and some perfume, take care of your body and do everything you can to fight against the forces of darkness. It is not an easy struggle, but it is worthwhile.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #911890
#45. 'Going home' is a journey to the heart of who we are, a place where we can be ourselves and welcome the reality of our beauty and our pain. From this acceptance of ourselves, we can accept others as they are and we can see our common humanity.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #926064
#46. It is only when we stand up, with all our failings and sufferings, and try to support others rather than withdraw into ourselves, that we can fully live the life of community.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #932955
#47. Our danger is to think that happiness will come from outside of us, from the things we possess or the power of our group, and not from within us, from the inner sanctuary of our being.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #936545
#48. So we need places, laboratories, the creation of places which could be each one of our homes, where we invite people who are different, and we listen to each other, people of different class groups.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #959509
#49. Growth begins when we begin to accept our own weakness.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #974295
#50. We don't know what to do with our own pain, so what to do with the pain of others? We don't know what to do with our own weakness except hide it or pretend it doesn't exist. So how can we welcome fully the weakness of another if we haven't welcomed our own weakness?

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1031311
#51. Community means caring: caring for people. Dietrich Bonhoeffer says: "He who loves community destroys community; he who loves the brethren builds community." A community is not an abstract ideal.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1047994
#52. There is nothing stronger than a heart which loves and is freely given.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1098990
#53. Look at your own poverty
welcome it
cherish it
don't be afraid
share your death
because thus you will share your love and your life

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1101171
#54. We work for peace every time we exercise authority with wisdom and authentic love.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1134610
#55. Community is a sign that love is possible in a materialistic world where people so often either ignore or fight each other. It is a sign that we don't need a lot of money to be happy
in fact, the opposite.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1135836
#56. Each person is sacred, no matter what his or her culture, religion, handicap, or fragility. Each person is created in God's image; each one has a heart, a capacity to love and to be loved.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1161041
#57. To love someone is to show to them their beauty, their worth and their importance.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1270126
#58. The belly laugh is the best way to evacuate anguish.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1273126
#59. We are not called by God to do extraordinary things, but to do ordinary things with extraordinary love.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1273867
#60. When we love and respect people, revealing to them their value, they can begin to come out from behind the walls that protect them.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1276927
#61. People cannot accept their own evil if they do not at the same time feel loved, respected and trusted.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1323819
#62. People are longing to rediscover true community. We have had enough of loneliness, independence and competition.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1342192
#63. A community which refuses to welcome - whether through fear, weariness, insecurity, a desire to cling to comfort, or just because it is fed up with visitors - is dying spiritually.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1352773
#64. Avoid the poison in your life that brings you turmoil.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1357981
#65. The strong need the weak as much as the weak need the strong

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1366811
#66. Jesus is the starving, the parched, the prisoner, the stranger, the naked, the sick, the dying. Jesus is the oppressed, the poor. To live with Jesus is to live with the poor. To live with the poor is to live with Jesus.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1465068
#67. I am struck by how sharing our weakness and difficulties is more nourishing to others than sharing our qualities and successes.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1471724
#68. Growth begins when we start to accept our own weakness

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1502769
#69. A community that is growing rich and seeks only to defend its goods and its reputation is dying. It has ceased to grow in love. A community is alive when it is poor and its members feel they have to work together and remain united, if only to ensure that they can all eat tomorrow!

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1572819
#70. Power always has a direction. It is always downward, towards the weak but power is often confused with what is right

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1579047
#71. In any case, community is not about perfect people. It is about people who are bonded to each other, each of whom is a mixture of good and bad, darkness and light, love and hate.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1592812
#72. If we are to grow in love, the prisons of our egoism must be unlocked. This implies suffering, constant effort and repeated choices.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1601587
#73. The word "paracleta" means "the one who answers the cry." It is not possible to receive the Spirit unless we cry out, and unless that cry surges up from the consciousness of our own wound, our pain, and our brokenness.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1608153
#74. Weakness, recognized, accepted, and offered, is at the heart of belonging, so it is at the heart of communion with another.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1609380
#75. An ethics of desire is good news for those of us who have become allergic to an ethics of law.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1641355
#76. All of us have a secret desire to be seen as saints, heroes, martyrs. We are afraid to be children, to be ourselves.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1647534
#77. Communion is mutual trust, mutual belonging; it is the to-and-fro movement of love between two people where each one gives and each one receives. Communion is not a fixed state, it is an ...

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1664723
#78. I have discovered the value of psychology and psychiatry, that their teachings can undo knots in us and permit life to flow again and aid us in becoming more truly human.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1722153
#79. It was loneliness and insecurity that had brought Claudia to the chaos of madness. It was community, love, and friendship that finally brought her inner peace. This movement from chaos to inner peace, from self - hate to self - trust, began when Claudia realized that she was loved.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1722631
#80. When we begin to believe that there is greater joy in working with and for others, rather than just for ourselves, then our society will truly become a place of celebration.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1724329
#81. Growth will come as we come closer to people who are different from us and as we learn to welcome and listen even to those who trigger off our pain.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1736850
#82. Peace is the fruit of love, a love that is also justice. But to grow in love requires work
hard work. And it can bring pain because it implies loss
loss of the certitudes, comforts, and hurts that shelter and define us.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1760521
#83. A Christian community should do as Jesus did: propose and not impose. Its attraction must lie in the radiance cast by the love of brothers.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1773595
#84. Every human being is a mixture of light and darkness, trust and fear, love and hate.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1788176
#85. To forgive is a gift of God that permits us to let go of our past hurts.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1798053
#86. To invite others to live with us is a sign that we aren't afraid, that we have a treasure of truth and of peace to share.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1808185
#87. We human beings are all fundamentally the same. We all belong to a common, broken humanity. We all have wounded, vulnerable hearts. Each one of us needs to feel appreciated and understood; we all need help.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1841395
#88. When people say that they can only obey an authority in which they have total confidence, they are looking for an ideal father. . . . If the condition of obedience is emotional trust, the way is open to anarchy and the possible death of the community.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1845621
#89. Stop looking for peace. Give yourselves where you are. Stop looking at yourselves, look instead at your brothers and sisters in need. Ask how you can better love your brothers and sisters. Then you will find peace.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1853640
#90. We cannot grow spiritually if we ignore our humanness, just as we cannot become fully human if we ignore our spirituality.

Jean Vanier

Jean Vanier Quotes #1874391

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