Can You Guess Who Said It? (Answers follow the quotes)

Just read these and see if you can figure out who said or wrote them. You may have to recall some of your history lessons or call to mind some of your Bible study sessions or some current news; but give it a go! Challenge yourself and don’t be shy about being incorrect. Mostly my hope is that while you read them and reflect upon them, you let them resonate with you. I believe you will find them valuable words to contemplate.

1.     And when you work with love you bind yourself to yourself, and to one another, and to God. And what is it to work with love? It is to weave the cloth with threads drawn from your heart, even as if your beloved were to wear that cloth. It is to build a house with affection, even as if your beloved were to dwell in that house. It is to sow seeds with tenderness and reap the harvest with joy, even as if your beloved were to eat the fruit…Work is love made visible.

2.     That is why, at this moment when the human race is undergoing so deep a transformation, women imbued with a spirit of the Gospel can do so much to aid humanity in not falling.

3.     Knowing that intercessory prayer is our mightiest weapon and the supreme call for all Christians today, I pleadingly urge our people everywhere to pray. Believing that prayer is the greatest contribution that our people can make in this critical hour, I humbly urge that we take time to pray—to really pray. Let there be prayer at sunup, at noonday, at sundown, at midnight—all through the day. Let us pray for our children, our youth, our aged, our pastors, our homes. Let us pray for the churches.

4.     To the kindly influence of Christianity we owe that degree of civil freedom, and political and social happiness which mankind now enjoys. In proportion as the genuine effects of Christianity are diminished in any nation, either through disbelief or the corruption of its doctrines, or the neglect of its institutions; in the same proportion will the people of that nation recede from the blessings of genuine freedom and approximate the miseries of complete despotism.

5.     Have mercy on me, God, for I am treated harshly; attackers press me all the day. My foes treat me harshly all the day; yes, many are my attackers. O Most High, when I am afraid in you I place my trust.

6.     The important thing today is to see that God exists, that God matters to us, and that he answers us. And, conversely, that if he is omitted, everything else might be as cleaver as can be—yet man then loses his dignity and this authentic humanity and, thus, the essential thing breaks down.

7.     No country upon earth ever had it more in its power to attain these blessings than United America. Wondrously strange then, and much to be regretted indeed would it be, were we to neglect the means, and to depart from the road which Providence has pointed us, so plainly; I cannot believe it will ever come to pass…By folly and improper conduct, proceeding from a variety of causes, we may now and then get bewildered, but I hope and trust that there is good sense and virtue enough left to recover the right path before we shall be entirely lost.

8.     The bearers of Jesus’ word receive a final word of promise for their work. They are now Christ’s fellow-workers, and will be like him in all things. Thus they are to meet those to whom they are sent as if they were Christ himself. When they are welcomed into a house, Christ enters with them. They are bearers of his presence.

 answers:

1. Kahlil Gibran The Prophet
2. John Paul II Mulieris Dignitatem
3. General Robert E. Lee, 1863
4. Jedediah Morse, 1799
5. David, Psalm 56
6. Benedict XVI Light of the World
7. George Washington, 1788
8. Dietrich Bonhoeffer, The Cost of Discipleship

So, how'd you do?