332 Quotes by Shane Claiborne

We have to use our discontentment to engage rather than disengage – our hope has to be more powerful than our cynicism.

That is part of our critique of some of the charity and service work is that we can still keep relationships at a distance by creating programs that offer services but we don’t really create a reconciled community.

But as I pursued that dream of upward mobility preparing for college, things just didn’t fit together. As I read Scriptures about how the last will be first, I started wondering why I was working so hard to be first.

We really do see the pattern Jesus warns us about: “Pick up the sword and you will die by the sword.” Not only do innocent children suffer as collateral damage, but the one who picks up the sword also suffers. We’ve learned that lesson all too well. We are not made to kill. So when we do, it kills a part of us.

As brother Cornel West says, “Justice is what love looks like in public.” Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.

Dance until they kill you, and then we’ll dance some more.

You can’t really learn God’s hope like you learn the logic of an argument or the details of a story. It’s more like learning to belly laugh. You catch hope from someone who has it down in their gut.

It is the church’s responsibility, the government’s responsibility, and the personal responsibility of every one of us to love.

Jesus was Jewish. He went to synagogue “as was his tradition” and celebrated holy days such as Passover. But Jesus also healed on the Sabbath. Jesus points us to a God who is able to work within institutions and order, a God who is too big to be confined. God is constantly coloring outside the lines. Jesus challenges the structures that oppress and exclude, and busts through any traditions that put limitations on love. Love cannot be harnessed.