The Simple Faith of Mister Rogers: Spiritual Insights from the World's Most Beloved Neighbor

by Amy Hollingsworth

“Just as it takes a tree a long time to begin to grow again once it’s transplanted, so you can give your healthy roots time to find the nourishment of your new soil in your new community.”

Your presence is simply for the asking and our ultimate future is assured by Your unselfish love.

“Give your healthy roots time to find the nourishment of your new soil in your new community,”

“Life is so generous a giver, but we, judging its gifts by their covering, cast them away as ugly or heavy or hard. Remove the covering and you will find beneath it a living splendor, woven of love, by wisdom, with power. Welcome it, grasp it, and you touch the angel’s hand that brings it to you. Everything we call a trial, a sorrow, or a duty, believe me, that angel’s hand is there; the gift is there, and the wonder of an overshadowing presence.”

Well, I would want [those] who were listening somehow to know that they had unique value, that there isn’t anybody in the whole world exactly like them and that there never has been and there never will be. And that they are loved by the Person who created them, in a unique way. If they could know that and really know it and have that behind their eyes, they could look with those eyes on their neighbor and realize, “My neighbor has unique value too; there’s never been anybody in the whole world like my neighbor, and there never will be.” If they could value that person—if they could love that person—in ways that we know that the Eternal loves us, then I would be very grateful.