I’ve talked before about my love of song lyrics and have used a few in my entries in the past year. Another thing that I love, which I don’t think I’ve really used here before, is my love of quotes! As a writer, I am enthralled with the power and beauty of words and the way they work together to create meaning. Poetry, like the lyrics of a song, expresses human emotion on all levels beautifully and creates something that others can deeply connect with. But even non-poetic written prose or spoken language can carry great inspiration, wisdom, and insight about our human experience. In certain cases, the way words work together to carry meaning just rings so true for readers or listeners that those words become “quotable.” These quotes or sayings will then be used in others’ writing and conversation, advice, and humor; or simply savored by a reader for their inspirational quality.

So today, since I have been very busy this week writing an article and have not been able to put much thought into writing my blog entry, I have assembled for your reading pleasure some of my favorites. And since this blog is about “my Catholic marriage,” you can expect most of them to be about love and Christian in theme.

“Tell me who admires and loves you, and I will tell you who you are.” -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

“I have found the paradox, that if you love until it hurts, there can be no more hurt, only more love.” -Mother Teresa

“Every single one of us can do things that no one else can do – can love things that no one else can love. We are like violins. We can be used for doorstops, or we can make music.” -Barbara Sher

“Life has taught us that love does not consist in gazing at each other but in looking outward in the same direction.” -Antoine de Saint-Exupery

“The three ingredients of a successful union between two . . . humor, commitment & undying love.” –Bill Cosby

“Pure love produces pure nonsense.” –Jonathan Klinger

“Smile at each other, smile at your wife, smile at your husband, smile at your children, smile at each other — it doesn’t matter who it is — and that will help you to grow up in greater love for each other.” –Mother Teresa

“As the family goes, so goes the nation and so goes the whole world in which we live.” –Pope John Paul II

“It was only a sunny smile, and little it cost in the giving, but like morning light, it scattered the night, and made the day worth living.” –Anonymous

“To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children…to leave the world a better place…to know even one life has breathed easier because you have lived. This is to have succeeded.” –Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:

O no! it is an ever-fixed mark
That looks on tempests and is never shaken.” –William Shakespeare (Okay, so this one is actually poetry, but I still love it.)

“Who, being loved, is poor?” –Oscar Wilde

“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” –Pope John Paul II

“The years teach much which the days never know” –Ralph Waldo Emerson

“Do not waste time bothering whether you ‘love’ your neighbor; act as if you did. As soon as we do this we find one of the great secrets. When you are behaving as if you loved someone, you will presently come to love him.” –C.S. Lewis

“Love keeps the cold out better than a cloak.” –Henry Wordsworth Longfellow

I always love hearing new good quotes—please share your favorite, or more than one, in a comment!