Basil Hume Quotes

People talk about revelation, and say it has ceased; but what ignorance it bespeaks, when man knows not the least thing on earth without revelation.

No one should ever say that it was my ignorance if I did or showed forth anything however small according to God's good pleasure; but let this be your conclusion and let it so be thought, that - as is the perfect truth - it was the gift of God.

Whoever feels predestined to see and not to believe will find all believers too noisy and pushy: he guards against them.

He must pull out his own eyes, and see no creature, before he can say, he sees no God; He must be no man, and quench his reasonable soul, before he can say to himself, there is no God.

It is impossible to see the angel unless you first have a notion of it.

But man's eyes are blind through sin, and he can discern no part of God's truth till the Spirit opens them. Inner illumination, leading directly as it does to a deep, inescapable conviction, is thus fundamental to the Spirit's work as a teacher.

Man thinks, God directs.

If you're so afraid of your imagination that you stifle it, how are you going to know God? How can you imagine heaven?

The standpoint of the man who relies on religious experience for capturing Reality must always remain individual and incommunicable.

I spend a lot of time in prayer. God doesn't always show up on my time, but he always shows up!

Hearing the word is the devout receiving of the will of God.

Blind people don't decide to see. Jesus says, 'See!' and they see.

I seek the Will of the Spirit of God through, or in connection with, the Word of God. The Spirit and the Word must be combined. If I look to the Spirit alone without the Word, I lay myself open to great delusions also.

The Bible, as a revelation from God, was not designed to give us all the information we might desire, nor to solve all the questions about which the human soul is perplexed, but to impart enough to be a safe guide to the haven of eternal rest.

Bid, then, the tender light of faith to shine By which alone the mortal heart is led Unto the thinking of the thought divine.

Our sin is exactly the presumption that we can know God or ourselves through our own capacities.

Yes, I'm religious. God has shown me things, made certain ways clear to me.

I testify that inspiration can be the spring for every person's hope, guidance, and strength. It is one of the magnified treasures of life. It involves coming to the infinite knowledge of God.

Now, whether my not asking for good things to happen to me is subconsciously intended to win me brownie points with God is something I can't answer. But I do feel the need to give thanks and also not to feel hypocritical by asking for things when I have doubts that God would answer me.

It takes a childlike heart to feel the promptings of the Spirit, to surrender to those commands, and to obey. That is what it takes to be nourished by the good word of God.

Whenever I'm confused about something, I ask God to reveal the answers to my questions, and he does.

The wonderful thing about God is he knows what we need to persuade us.

The Word of God is so much broader than people are giving it credit for. Look at Proverbs, a book written on how to live.

The truths of religion are never so well understood as by those who have lost the power of reason.

Faith is a higher faculty than reason.