"But don't you see, can't you see, that you have been in conversation with the sacred your entire life. In your personal romances, successes, and failures; in your hungover despair; in your nocturnal wonder; alone in crisp, brisk skies God is calling you and God is listening to the same call." Russell Brand

"I also know that theology can be mobilized by any scoundrel who can get their mitts on a Bible. I've heard the gospels used to underwrite everything from veganism to homosexuality (neither of which require hermeneutic backup, in my view, by the way)." Russell Brand

"If you need to walk a mile in a person's shoes to know them how can I know myself when the ground beneath my feet and the shoes I wear on them are constantly changing?" Russell Brand

"Some things are worth more than money, but all around the world in our streets and in our oceans are the signs that we've forgotten that. I pray we can remember together before it's too late." Russell Brand

"There is no less holiness at this time- as you are reading this- than there was on the day the Red Sea parted, or that day in the 30th year, in the 4th month, on the 5th day of the month as Ezekiel was a captive by the river Cheban, when the heavens opened and he saw visions of god. There is no whit less enlightenment under the tree at the end of your street than there was under Buddha’s bo tree.... In any instant the sacred may wipe you with its finger. In any instant the bush may flare, your feet may rise, or you may see a bunch of souls in trees." Annie Dillard

"Shame is the most self destructive of vices." Alexis Hall

"It is probably true that not all questions can be answered by the scientific method....In such cases, humility is what is called for, not faith." John Halstead

"We will teach you about our God and you will teach us about yours, and together we will find the God that exists behind them." Sue Monk Kidd

"Perfection is a flaw in itself." TJ Klune

"This is the dilemma of theology.... We want so very much to understand our gods, to know them intimately, to see how they work in our lives. It is tempting to dissect, to analyze, to categorize. And sometimes, it is necessary, even beneficial. We are categorizing creatures, we human beings. We pick out patterns as a mater of survival. When it comes to our gods, we reach for them not only with our prayers and offerings, but with our reason and our intellects--we would know them with our whole selves, in all their parts, in part so that we might know our own selves better in all our parts. The challenge is to delve into theology without killing its subject, to try our hand at analysis and critical thinking without pretending that the numinous vine is a dead thing that will hold still beneath our careful knife es. Theology is not dissection. It is much more gruesome than that; it is vivisection." Alison Leigh Lilly

"My house, made from the same star dust I am, is alive, too. By tending to the orderliness and cleanliness of it, I show respect and affection, thus building relationship. Do I imagine my house has an unseen 'soul' or incorporeal entity residing within its 'body'? No,... I perceive consciousness as inhabiting all of the universe. How that Mind moves through and within all things is a Great Mystery." Traci Laird

"most of us have periods of feast and famine in our lives, and increasingly we spend the feast years paying off the debts of the famine." Katherine May

"Some say people who join cults are 'lost.' But all human beings are lost to some degree. Life is disorderly and confusing for absolutely everyone. A more thoughtful way to think about how people find themselves in precariously cultish scenarios is that these folks are actively searching to be found, and--because of variations in genes and life experiences and all the complicated factors that make up human personalities--they're more open than the average person to finding themselves in unusual places. To stay safe requires just the right combination of fact-checking, cross checking, and amenability to the idea that spiritual fulfillment may very well come from unexpected sources." Amanda Montell

"one's out-of-the-box beliefs, experiences, and allegiances are less a mark of individual foolishness and more a reflection of the fact that human beings are (to their advantage and their detriment) psychologically built to be more mystical and communal than I knew." Amanda Montell

"It's in our DNA to want to believe in something, to feel something, alongside other people seeking the same, I'm confident there's a healthy way to do that. Part of me thinks it's actually by becoming a part of several 'cults' at once... That way, we're free to chant, to hashtag, to talk of manifesting and blessings, to use glossolalia even...... all the while staying tethered to reality." Amanda Montell

"If you can imagine spaceships, if you can imagine time-travel, if you can conjure entire languages and alien races out of the wet space behind your eyes, you shouldn't have a problem imagining a society beyond patriarchy. A feminist future may be inconceivable - but it is coming nonetheless." Laurie Penny

"bit by bit I am getting to consider that madness is just a disease like any other." Vincent VanGogh

"It is not blasphemy to see God in the skyline." Clementine Von Radics

"I'm not sure what to say about struggle except that it feels like a long, dark tunnel with no light at the end. You never notice until it's over the ways it has changed your and there is no going back. we struggled a lot this year. For everyone who picked a fight with life and got the shit kicked out of them: I'm proud of you for surviving." from This Year by Clementine Von Radics

"Today I woke and believed in nothing. A grief at once intimate and unfelt, like the death of a good friend's dog." Christian Wiman

"Some would say, 'The Moon cannot be heard.' Alas, honestly, it cannot be heard. Yet something at its centre may enlighten its listeners. Therefore, the Moon can be listened to." Wáng Zhēnyí