Quotes from Helen LaKelly Hunt

Self-love is born out of love of another.

The Sister Fund supports spiritual women and their organizations, both grassroots activists for justice, and national and international social change agents.

The point of telling our stories, even if only to ourselves, is to help us resurrect the parts we have buried. When we unearth them, even if it's difficult, we can integrate them into our sense of who we are. Often in our buried self our true power lies.

To me, relationship is sacred because the spirit of God is manifest in empathic connection.

A version of the golden rule to do unto others as you would have them do unto you is present in every major religion for a reason. Relationships are the place where the mystical experience can become alive.

By seeing ourselves honestly, we have the capacity to understand others more deeply.

Each holy woman in this book made specific decisions based on her individual feelings, but her decisions represent universal impulses. In this sense, her private life translated into political and cultural statements. Whatever form it took, her mission was to end separation and restore connection. She opened her arms and brought others into the experience of love and belonging. Her actions sent the message that no person is excluded from the human family and the love of God.

Teresa [of Avila]'s story dismantles the common belief that all those chosen for sainthood are flawless in personality and character. Indeed, she would want us to consider her contradictions and struggles as integral to her sainthood.

She traversed the spectrum of human emotion, and found herself to be flawed, but trusted God to accept all of her. Her vulnerability and openness led to her empowerment.

Like oceans, we ebb and flow and are in constant motion. We have a deep desire to keep things as they are, and a contradictory desire to expand beyond our current limits. Times of relative equilibrium allow us to build the strength we need for times of movement. It can be difficult for us to know which stage we are in and whether we are moving forward at all. But underneath our seemingly individual current, we are ultimately being pulled forward toward a connection with the greater whole.

They could not make a deep and powerful connection to the larger world until they were able to connect to themselves. And, in an example of the kind of feedback loops that characterize all living systems, they were not able to connect to themselves until they were in authentic relationship with others.

As a political movement, feminism seeks to transform society by challenging and changing social institutions. Religion, on the other hand, seeks first to transform individuals through a personal relationship with God, which then results in a desire to work for the transformation of society.

The women's movement has not found a way to reconnect comfortably with the religious impulse that was central to its origin.

Authentic religious expression for them was an experience of the soul and made no distinctions of gender. As Lucretia Mott said, "In Christ, there is neither male nor female." Gradually, I have realized the core of what set them apart for me. It is that they lived, more than most of us, from a place of wholeness. They were authentically themselves without amputations or edits.

My deepest wounds and greatest strengths lie in my ability to see the potential for relationship in my life.

Claiming our voice, and our selfhood, is a sacred act.

In the journey to become whole, a woman will be confronted with various forms of these stages [of personal evolution]. In doing the hard work that is required, she learns important lessons about herself and increases her capacity to see the meaning of her actions. She is then able to bring more experience, wisdom, and skill to the next challenge she must face.

Sojourner [Truth]'s life exemplifies the process that occurs within ourselves as we grow to understand that we hold the authority to shape our own lives. This inner authority came when she embraced all of herself, which enabled her to speak from an authentic voice.

When we fracture our potential for united action and divide ourselves along social, political, economic, or religious lines, we diminish our power.

The movement has kept itself from full development by denying, ignoring, and rejecting parts of itself, including its spiritual legacy.

Sojourner [Truth]'s voice was the instrument that enabled her to claim her full self. Once she had done this, she was able to use her instrument and life story to help gain freedom for others.

Life challenges each of us to find those who will help us break our silence, find our voice, and speak our truth.

While we know it is possible to work for justice without being religious, we believe that religious faith presupposes a mandate to write, speak, and act for social justice.

These two revolutions of faith and feminism, though very different, were built upon the same fundamental assumption: every person is intrinsically as valuable and worthy of love as any other.