A Quote by Henri Nouwen

Theological formation is the gradual and often painful discovery of God's incomprehensibility. You can be competent in many things, but you cannot be competent in God.

Henri Nouwen

Quote Topics

Cannot Competent Discovery Formation God Gradual Many Often Painful Theological Things

Quote Author

Henri Nouwen
Dutch - Priest
January 24, 1932 - September 21, 1996

What is competent? Who is it that can adjudicate what is competent or not competent? If the guys that are running the most important banks in our country aren't competent enough, well then, who is competent enough?

Edward Conard

If I could be really competent, that goes such a long way toward things, because the majority of things are not competent. If I can be competent, and have moments of originality, that's all I would ask for.

Jon Stewart

The law of God, as quite plainly expressed in woman's construction is this: There shall be no limit put upon your intercourse with the other sex sexually, at any time of life. The law of God, as quite plainly expressed in man's construction is this: During your entire life you shall be under inflexible limits and restrictions, sexually. During twenty-three days in every month (in absence of pregnancy) from the time a woman is seven years old till she dies of old age, she is ready for action, and competent. As competent as the candlestick is to receive the candle. Competent every day, competent every night. Also she wants that candle - yearns for it, longs for it, hankers after it, as commanded by the law of God in her heart.

Mark Twain

Indeed there are many competent people who are plagued by a sense of inefficacy, and many less competent ones who remain unperturbed by impending threats because they are self-assured of their coping capabilities

Albert Bandura

Often the desire to appear competent impedes our ability to become competent, because we more anxious to display our knowledge than to learn what we do not know.

Madeleine de Souvre, marquise de Sable

Christian hope is not a ghost and it does not deceive. It is a theological virtue and therefore, ultimately, a gift from God that cannot be reduced to optimism, which is only human. God does not mislead hope; God cannot deny himself. God is all promise.

Pope Francis

One may have a right to be unconventional and even eccentric, so long as one is fully competent and a decent person; but one's ideal as a professor should be to conduct oneself as an admirable human being: just, kind, tolerant, competent, committed, and good-humored.

Robert Audi

The acid test for any theology is this: Is the God presented one that can be loved, heart, soul, mind, and strength? ... If it fails to set a lovable God--a radiant, happy, friendly, accessible, and totally competent being--before ordinary people, we have gone wrong

Dallas Willard

Photography is the easiest medium with which to be merely competent. Almost anybody can be competent. It's the hardest medium in which to have some sort of personal vision and to have a signature style.

Chuck Close

But in this country, while you have to be competent to pull off a terrorist attack, you don't have to be competent to cause terror. All you need to do is start plotting an attack and - regardless of whether or not you have a viable plan, weapons or even the faintest clue - the media will aid you in terrorizing the entire population.

Bruce Schneier

When you have some skills but don't fully understand your environment, there is no way you can be a plus one. At best, you can be a zero. But a zero isn't a bad thing to be. You're competent enough not to create problems or make more work for everyone else. And you have to be competent, and prove to others that you are, before you can be extraordinary. There are no short-cuts, unfortunately.

Chris Hadfield

Socialists believe otherwise - a man is not competent enough to make decision should he use seatbelt, should he buy insurance, and the same man is competent enough to elect president and government.

Janusz Korwin-Mikke

The analyses ... often become too competent to be comprehensible.

Avinash Dixit

In the garden of the soul, the virtues of faith, hope, and love form the centerpiece. Traditionally called theological virtues, they come as free gifts from God and draw us to God. We cannot earn these virtues; God has already freely planted them in our soul.