In Louisville, at the corner of Fourth and Walnut, in the center of the shopping district, I was suddenly overwhelmed with the realization that I loved all those people, that they were mine and I theirs, that we could not be alien to one another even though we were total strangers. It was like waking from a dream of separateness, of spurious self-isolation in a special world, the world of renunciation and supposed holiness.… This sense of liberation from an illusory difference was such a relief and such a joy to me that I almost laughed out loud.… I have the immense joy of being a member of a race in which God became incarnate.… There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.
—Thomas Merton
I dare say anything can be made holy by being sincerely worshiped.
—Iris Murdoch
Because they know the name of what I am looking for, they think they know what I am looking for!
—Antonio Porchia
I'm a holy man minus the holiness.
—E. M. Forster