Quotes about End

We make provisions for this life as if it were never to have an end, and for the other life as though it were never to have a beginning.

As long ago as Pythagoras, man was taught that all things were in a state of flux, without end as without beginning, and must we still, after more than two thousand years, pretend to regard the universe as some gigantic toy manufactured in six days by a Superhuman Artisan, who is presently to destroy it at his pleasure?

Our fears have typically already decided that the worst is about to happen. Catastrophe is upon us and there is no hope. But "Don't be afraid," when spoken by the Lord, is a promise that the end will be different from what we predict.

The concern was about getting the beginning right, and then life and eternity would take care of themselves. We have been preoccupied with getting the end right, for some reason.

Trusting in God is not a passive dependency, a handing over of responsibility: "Okay, God, you can do it." Faith in God is primarily an active virtue. Faith does not necessarily mean an expectation that God will intervene. Faith is an end in itself. Faith is an active empowering of the other to be everything he or she can be for you.

For Scotus, as for Bonaventure, the Trinity is the absolute beginning point—and ending point too. Outpouring Love is the inherent shape of the universe, and when we love, only then do we fully exist in this universe. We do not need to "understand" what is happening, or who God is, before we can live in love. The will to love precedes any need to fully understand what we are doing, the Franciscan School would say.

There is never a beginning, there is never an end, to the inexplicable continuity of this web of God, but always circular power returning into itself.

It is God to whom and with whom we travel, and while He is the end of our journey, He is also at every stopping place.

When life's flight is over, and we unload our cargo at the other end, the fellow who got rid of unnecessary weight will have the most valuable cargo to present to the Lord.

In the end, it is not by knowledge that we make our journeys but by hope and faith: hope that our walk will be worthy of our steps and faith that we are going somewhere. And only when we come to the end of our journeys do we truly understand that every step of the way we were walking on water.

If a problem has a solution, to worry is no use, for in the end it will be solved. If a problem has no solution, there is no reason to worry, because it cannot be solved.

It's at the end of ourselves that new futures open up.