Richard Rohr
American Franciscan priest, ecumenical contemplative teacher, and founder (1987) of the Center for Action and Contemplation in Albuquerque — one of the most widely-read contemplative Christian voices of the twenty-first century, with daily meditations reaching more than half a million readers. Born 1943 in Topeka, Kansas, Rohr was ordained Franciscan in 1970 and has become a bridge figure for readers across Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, and secular contemplative streams: drawing on the Desert Mothers and Fathers, Francis of Assisi, Julian of Norwich, Meister Eckhart, Carl Jung, and the perennial tradition. His best-known books — Falling Upward, The Universal Christ, Immortal Diamond, Everything Belongs, Breathing Under Water — reframe Christian doctrine through the lens of contemplative experience and the second half of life.
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Quotes by Richard Rohr
116 quotes“The first half of life is discovering the script, and the second half is actually writing it and owning it.”
“Sooner or later, life is going to lead you (as it did Jesus) into the belly of the beast, into a place you can't fix, can't control, and can't explain or understand.”
“That's where transformation most easily happens.”
“What is needed is more wisdom, not more knowledge.”
“The path of descent is the path of transformation.”
“Darkness, failure, relapse, death, and woundedness are our primary teachers, rather than ideas or doctrines.”
“There is a deeper voice of God, which you must learn to hear and obey in the second half of life.”
“Sooner or later, if you are on any classic 'spiritual schedule,' some event, person, death, idea, or relationship will enter your life that you simply cannot deal with using your present skill set, your acquired knowledge, or your strong willpower.”
“Spiritually speaking, you will be, you must be, led to the edge of your own private resources.”
“At that point you will stumble over a necessary stumbling stone.”
“You will and must 'lose' at something. This is the only way that Life-Fate-God-Grace-Mystery can get you to change, let go of your egocentric preoccupations, and go on the further and larger journey.”
“You will get larger as you grow older. You will not get smaller.”
“Faith for me is not so much intellectual or doctrinal certainty.”
“Christ is much bigger than Jesus.”
“Christ is the eternal amalgam of matter and spirit as one.”
“Christ is everywhere. Yet our religion has succeeded in objectifying Christ to a small, exclusive group.”
“God loves things by becoming them.”
“This is the central message of the gospel.”
“It is more like trust in love itself.”
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