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

by Amy Hollingsworth

the first question I had already decided to ask him was why he so often emphasized slowing the pace and taking time to reflect. Why was that so important for his audience? He paused, of course, before answering. “I think, for me, I need to be myself.”

“It seems to me, though,” Fred continued in response to my question, “that our world needs more time to wonder and to reflect about what is inside, and if we take time we can often go much deeper as far as our spiritual life is concerned than we can if there’s constant distraction.

if we accept ourselves we are better equipped to accept our neighbor. So accepting ourselves is always the starting point to something greater—a deeper maturity, a deeper walk with the Lord, and ultimately, a greater acceptance and understanding of our neighbor. This is the first of the toast sticks for the eyes: How we see ourselves affects how we see others.

“To be able to be accepted for who we are and to be able to grow from there is one of the great treasures of life.”

When he was a boy and he was frightened by some news he had heard, his mother would say, “Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.”

a quote from Antoine de Saint-Exupéry’s The Little Prince, in its original French. It read: “L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.” What is essential is invisible to the eye.

Sometimes when people speak, the impact of their words is so strong and goes so deep that they seem to have a quality of eternity about them. Thomas Moore, The Soul’s Religion

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.

inheritance is nothing we ask for or earn or deserve. It is something we are given by the testator, and we can either accept or betray the responsibility. Madeleine L’Engle, The Irrational Season

“Adventure can be scary and unpredictable, but the more you continue in it, the more you lose that sense of fear and doubt (and the less you care about being late for dinner). You begin to gather up your internal resources with confidence.”