Words of Comfort, Words of Hope

Choose a section from the list below:

Strength & Blessings For the Victims and the Rescuers Peace Hope Forgiveness & Unity



Do not be afraid, for I have redeemed you:
I have called you by your name, you are mine.
Should you pass through the sea, I will be there with you;
or through rivers, they will not swallow you up.
Should you walk through fire, you will not be scorched
and the flames will not burn you...
Do not be afraid, for I am with you.
—Isaiah 43

 

***

For God hath not given us the spirit of fear, but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
—2 Timothy 1

 

***

May the pain of every living being
Be completely cleared away.
May I be the doctor and the medicine
And may I be the nurse
For all sick beings in the world
Until everyone is healed...
May the frightened cease to be afraid
And those bound be freed...
--from the Prayer for World Peace by Geshe Acharya Thubten Loden

 

***

Saint Michael the Archangel, protect us! Our Lady of Guadalupe, Patroness of the Americas, pray for us. Saint Katharine Drexel and Saint Elizabeth Ann Seton, pray for us. Saint Thomas More, Patron of Politicians, pray for us. Saint Joseph, Patron Saint of Canada, pray for us. Immaculate Mary, Patroness of the United States, pray for us. Jesus Christ, King of Kings, have mercy on us!
—Catholic prayer posted by member worksferme

 

***

May all sentient beings have happiness and the cause of happiness
May all sentient beings be free from suffering and the causes of suffering;
May all sentient beings never be separated from the happiness that knows no suffering;
May all sentient beings abide in equanimity, free from attachments and anger, which hold some close and others distant.
—Buddha

 

***

O Thou kind Lord! ...Let this American democracy become glorious in spiritual degrees even as it has aspired to material degrees and render this just government victorious. Confirm this revered nation to upraise the standard of the oneness of humanity, to promulgate the Most Great Peace, to become thereby most glorious and praiseworthy among all the nations of the world. O God! This American nation of worthy of Thy favors and is deserving of Thy mercy. Make it precious and near to Thee through Thy bounty and bestowal.
—Prayer for America by Abdul'l-Baha

Mother and Father of us all, ...I do not pray for the dead, for they are beyond our reach and in your arms. I pray for those still alive in the rubble, that they may find the strength to survive until rescue comes. ...I pray for the rescuers. Sharpen their sight and hearing, so that they can find. Strengthen their arms so that they can move and lift and heal and quench. Soothe their hearts and minds, who face a horror unimaginable to the rest of us... I pray for the Muslim community, ...that they may not become further victims. I pray for justice. But let it be justice, not vengeance. More than anything, I pray for the families. For those who are waiting to hear (myself included), and those who have already heard. Hold us all in your endless arms of love.
—posted by member Stephanie Bowker

 

***

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends.
—John 15

 

***

Death is nothing at all.
I have only slipped away
into the next room.
I am I and you are you.
Whatever we were to each other, that we are still.
Call me by my old familiar name,
speak to me in the easy way which you always used.
Put no difference into your tone;
wear no false air of solemnity or sorrow.
Laugh as we always laughed
at the little jokes we enjoyed together.
Play, smile, think of me, pray for me.
Let my name be ever the household word that it always was.
...I am but waiting for you, for an interval,
somewhere very near just around the corner. All is well.
—Henry Scott Holland, English clergyman and theologian

 

***

And now I bid unto all, farewell. I soon go to rest in the paradise of God, until my spirit and body shall again reunite, and I am brought forth triumphant through the air, to meet you before the pleasing bar of the great Jehovah, the Eternal Judge of both quick and dead.
—Book of Mormon

 

***

Any man's death diminishes me, because I am involved in Mankind; And therefore never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee.
—John Donne

 

***

For those who made their lives an offering,
Who have laid down their bodies that others may taste life
You have become like the Sun whose radiance sustains us.
You have become like the grain cut down to feed us.
May you rise as the buried seed rises...
—Prayer from Pagan memorial service, by member pele007

 

***

Death is not extinguishing the light.
It is putting out the lamp because the Dawn has come.
—Rabindranath Tagore

Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled, and do not let them be afraid.
—John 14

***

Send Thy peace, O Lord, which is perfect and everlasting that our souls, may radiate peace.
Send Thy peace, O Lord, that amidst our worldly strife we may enjoy Thy bliss
Send Thy peace, O Lord, that we may endure all, tolerate all in the thought of Thy grace and mercy.
Send Thy peace, O Lord, our Father and Mother, That we Thy children on earth may all unite in one family.
—from a prayer by Hazrat Inayat Khan

 

***

Break every weapon forged in fires of hate,
Turn back the foes that would assail Thy gate;
Where fields of strife lie desolate and bare
Take Thy sweet flow'rs of peace and plant them there.
—Methodist hymnal

 

***

All we are saying is give peace a chance.
—John Lennon

 

***

Lord make me an instrument of thy peace
Where there is hatred let me sow love
Where there is injury, pardon
Where there is discord, union
Where there is doubt, faith
Where there is despair, hope
Where there is darkness, light.
Oh divine master grant that I may not so much
seek to be consoled as to console
To be understood as to understand
To be loved as to love

Where there is despair, hope
Where there is sadness, joy
For it is in giving that we receive
It is in pardoning that we are pardoned
And it is in dying that we are
born to eternal life
—Prayer of St. Francis

 

***

Deep peace of the running wave to you,
Deep peace of the flowing air to you,
Deep peace of the quiet earth to you,
Deep peace of the shining stars to you,
Deep peace of the gentle night to you,
Moon and stars pour their healing light on you,
Deep peace of Christ, of Christ the light of the world to you,
Deep peace of Christ to you.
—Gaelic blessing

Nothing is hopeless, we must hope for everything.
-Madeleine L'Engle

***

It's really a wonder that I haven't dropped all my ideals, because they seem so absurd and impossible to carry out. Yet I keep them, because in spite of everything I still believe that people are really good at heart. I simply can't build my hopes on a foundation consisting of confusion, misery and death.
-Diary of Anne Frank

***

The most difficult thing but an essential one
Is to love Life,
to love it even while one suffers,
because Life is All.
Life is God--
and to love Life means to love God.
-Leo Tolstoy

***

Corn and Grain, Corn and Grain, all that falls shall rise again.
-Pagan chant

***

In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groans that words cannot express. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints in accordance with God's will. And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love Him...I am convinced that
neither death nor life,
niether angels nor demons,
neither the present nor the future,
nor any powers,
neither height nor depth,
nor anything else in all creation will able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus.
-Romans 8

***

There is no place where earth's sorrows
are more felt than up in heaven;
There is no place where earth's failings
have such kindly judgement given.
There is plentiful redemption
in the blood that has been shed;
There is joy for all the members
in the sorrows of the Head.
-Protestant Hymn

***

Hope is the thing with feathers--
that perches in the soul--
and sings the tune without words--
and never stops--at all--
-Emily Dickinson

***

Come, come ye saints, no toil nor labor fear,
But with joy, wend your way.
Though hard to you, this journey may appear,
Grace shall be as your day!
-Anthem from the Mormon Pioneers

***

When God created us, God gave Adam a secret--and that secret was not how to begin, but how to begin again. In other words, it is not given to us to begin; that privilege is God's alone. But it is given to us to begin again--and we do every time we choose to defy death and side with the living.
-Elie Wiesel

***

All shall be well, and all shall be well,
and all manner of thing shall be well.
-Julian of Norwich

***

The world breaks everyone and afterward many are strong at the broken places.
-Ernest Hemingway

Father, forgive them; for they know not what they do.
-Luke 23

***

If you efface and overlook and forgive, then lo! God is forgiving, merciful.
-Qur'an 64

***

We will not resort to violence, we will not degrade ourselves with hatred. We will return good for evil, we will love our enemies...Christ showed us the way and Gandhi in India showed it could work.
-Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

***

I don't feel hate, because the last words from my husband were not ones of hate.
-a wife of a victim

***

Hatred is never appeased by hatred in this world. By non-hatred alone is hatred appeased. This is a law eternal.
-The Buddha

***

All humanity is one undivided and indivisible family, and each one of us is responsible for the misdeeds of all the others. I cannot detach myself from the wickedest soul...You must not lose faith in humanity. Humanity is an ocean; if a few drops of the ocean are dirty, the ocean does not become dirty.
-Gandhi

***

I was standing on the highest mountain of them all, and round about beneath me was the whole hoop of the world. And while I stood there I saw more than I can tell and I understood more than I saw; for I was seeing in a sacred manner the shapes of all things in the spirit, and the shape of all shapes as they must live together like one being. And I saw that the sacred hoop of my people was one of many hoops that made one circle, wide as daylight and as starlight, and in the center grew one mighty flowering tree to shelter all children of one mother and one father. And I saw that it was holy...but anywhere is the center of the world.
-Black Elk

***

We are each of us angels with one wing and we can only fly by embracing one another.
-posted by member oneman38

***

You may say I'm a dreamer, but I'm not the only one. I hope someday you will join us, and the world will be as one.
-John Lennon

***

This we know: the earth does not belong to man,
man belongs to the earth.
All things are connected like blood that unites us all.
Man did not weave the web of life,
he is merely a strand in it.
Whatever he does to the web,
he does to himself.
-Chief Seattle

***

The best way of avenging thyself is not to become like the wrongdoer.
-Marcus Aurelius

***

Bless my enemies, O Lord.
Even I bless them and do not curse them.
They, rather than I, have confessed my sins before the world.
They have punished me, whenever I have hesitated to punish myself.
They have tormented me, whenever I have tried to flee torments.
They have scolded me, whenever I have flattered myself.
They have spat upon me, whenever I have filled myself with arrogance.
-Prayer of St. Nicolai Velimirovich

***

An eye for and eye and soon the whole world is blind.
-Ghandi

***

Where there is forgiveness, there is God Himself.
-Sikh Sloka

***

Who takes vengeance or bears a grudge acts like one who, having cut one hand while handling a knife, avenges himself by stabbing the other hand.
-Jerusalem Talmud

***

Man must evolve for all human conflict a method which rejects revenge, aggression and retaliation. The foundation of such a method is love.
-Martin Luther King, Jr.