The Relational Soul Quotes

“God is seeking to change the posture of our hearts from mistrust to trust. God is transforming us from a heart curved inward on itself to a heart that is more open to God and others.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“He had suffered many losses but still had an indomitable spirit. Years of deep and regular communion with God enabled him to live well with his significant limitations. He had learned to die daily to his false self, and as a result was amazingly gracious and openhearted, direct and wise. And he could laugh. He was someone I wanted to be around, so we began to meet a couple times a month. With me he minored in advice and double-majored in encouragement and perspective. At his stage in life he wasn’t trying to prove something. He just loved me.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“Even if we were blessed with parents who developed well our capacity to trust, we still must learn to place our trust in the triune God. This is why God provided the community of faith. In it we learn what it means to trust as we experience the church trusting God and each other.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“Scripture tells the story of a loving God taking the initiative to restore our capacity for intimacy. It is the story of God overcoming our self-absorbed mistrust.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“3 It is in the concrete, particular and daily putting to death of the self-absorbed grandiosity embedded in our false self that we find a new, resurrected life.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“Thomas Merton speaks plainly and honestly when he writes, “We learn to live by living together with others, and by living like them—a process which has disadvantages as well as blessings.”1”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection

“Sadly, some have had a very different experience in community. Rather than a transformation of soul, they have experienced a deformation of soul. They entered a community hoping to find a home of unconditional love. What they found was a self-righteous, self-protective, self-promoting reality. If this has been your experience, we are truly sorry. But the fact that communities often fail to live into what the gospel makes possible is no reason to reject community. The emergence of our true self depends on the community life we live in. It is critical that we all find a good church so that our true self can flourish.”
― Richard Plass, The Relational Soul: Moving from False Self to Deep Connection