Quotes About Belief

La fe […] comienza con los movimientos del infinito, y sólo más tarde pasa a los de lo infinito.

he who loves God without faith reflects upon himself he who loves God believingly reflects upon God.

But in Christendom we play at believing, play at being Christians; as far as possible from any breach with what we love, we remain at home, in the parlor, in the old grooves of finiteness – and then we go and twaddle with one another, or let the pastor twaddle to us, about all the promises which are found in the New Testament, that no one shall harm us, that the gates of hell shall not prevail against us, against the Church, etc.

Abraham was greater than all, great by reason of his power whose strength is impotence, great by reason of his wisdom whose secret is foolishness, great by reason of his hope whose form is madness, great by reason of the love which is hatred of oneself.

La alternativa que se nos presenta es la siguiente: o bien corremos un velo sobre la historia de Abraham, o bien aprendemos a espantarnos ante la inaudita paradoja que da sentido a su vida

Søren Kierkegaard

How then did Abraham exist? He believed. This is the paradox which keeps him upon the sheer edge and which he cannot make clear to any other person, for the paradox is that he as the individual puts himself in an absolute relation to the Absolute.

Once you have ventured the decisive act, you are at odds with the life of this world. You come into collision with it, and because of this you will gradually be brought into such tension that you will then be able to become certain of what Christ taught. You will begin to understand that you cannot endure this world without having recourse to Christ. What else can one expect from following the truth?

It takes a talent to doubt, it requires no talent at all to despair (pp515)

A Panegyric upon Abraham

those who possess faith should take care to set up certain criteria so that one might distinguish the paradox from a temptation (Anfechtung).

Why then did Abraham do it ? For God's sake, and (in complete identity with this) for his own sake. He did it for God's sake because God required this proof of his faith ; for his own sake he did it in order that he might furnish the proof.

By my own strength I am able to give up the princess, and I shall not become a grumbler, but shall find joy and repose in my pain ; but by my own strength I am not able to get her again, for I am employing all my strength to be resigned. But by faith, says that marvellous knight, by faith I shall get her in virtue of the absurd.

For when faith is eliminated by becoming null or nothing, then there only remains the crude fact that Abraham wanted to murder Isaac – which is easy enough for anyone to imitate who has not faith, the faith, that is to say, which makes it hard for him. 1

Abraham believed. He did not believe that some day he would be blessed in the beyond, but that he would be happy here in the world.

la fe resulta ser por un lado la expresión más alta del egoísmo (lleva a cabo lo terrible por amor a sí mismo), y por otro, la más absoluta expresión de la entrega, pues lleva a cabo la acción por amor a Dios. La fe nunca puede mediar en lo general; de hacerlo quedaría anulada. La fe consiste en esa paradoja, y el Particular no logrará nunca que otro le comprenda.

Ningún caballero de la fe puede ayudar a otro. O bien se convierte el mismo Particular en caballero de la fe, pues cargó con la paradoja, o bien no llega nunca a serlo. En esa esfera resulta impensable cualquier compañerismo.

It's not like I got caught masturbating, for chrissake; she doesn't know me, why the hell would she care if I'm superstitious? - Karen

Over time, she'd come to believe that the only true emotional infirmity was denial; once a thing was accepted, it could be met without fear. She wished she could tell him that it was no weakness

He was of the Old Religion, like nearly all Mackenzies, and wouldn't object to a Catholic ceremony - his faith taught that all paths to the Divine were valid. Christians tended to be a little more exclusive.

His grandmother had said to him once, smiling slightly, that if you compelled people to behave as if they believed something eventually all but the strongest-willed really did start to believe it, because it was easier on their pride than admitting every moment in the privacy of their soul that they were pretending.

He wasn't afraid a pipe now and then would kill him. As far as he could tell, a lot of the old Americans had been quivering daisies who thought they'd live forever if only they were careful enough, as if life was worth living that way. Some of them had believed eating butter was bad for you, of all things.

No one in life can ever match fiction

I love you, Minerva. I love that you believe in me no matter what. I love how you take whatever you see and distill it into your books. I love your clever mind and your generous heart and every inch of your beautiful body. I love you even when you give me heart failure, by risking your life before my very eyes. He smiled tenderly. I only hope in time I can prove worthy of your love.