Summary: The protagonist of Greene’s “The Power and the Glory,” known as the whisky priest, struggles with his flaws and fears while seeking love and redemption. Despite his imperfections, he finds strength in his wounds and the love he has for others. Ultimately, the story illustrates that the path to being a saint lies in embracing our brokenness and acting with love.
“The wound, which causes us to suffer now, will be revealed to us later as the place where God intimated his new creation.” —Henri Nouwen (View Highlight)
Hemingway famously wrote that even though the world breaks everyone, some survivors are stronger for their brokenness (View Highlight)
And saints? These are fully alive humans who manage to transfigure their wounds, their own experiences of deep suffering—and yes, even their sins—into acts of compassion, love, and kindness (View Highlight)
a person without any faults has no soul to examine (View Highlight)
What this requires is that we risk the wound of love that opens our eyes to our own shortcomings and makes us vulnerable in a world that too often discounts love as a weakness to be taken advantage of (View Highlight)
Both the shortcomings and the vulnerability can be openings through which grace flows to make us new creations. (View Highlight)
But to love even one person with a full heart is to love well, and loving well always overflows its intended object. God knows this, even if we don’t. (View Highlight)