The service we render to others is really the rent we pay for our room on this earth. It is obvious that man is himself a traveler; that the purpose of this world is not 'to have and to hold' but "to give and serve."
Interpretation
Our contributions to others' lives are essential for our existence.
Wilfred Grenfell's quote highlights the importance of service and selflessness in our lives. It suggests that our time on Earth is meaningful when we focus on giving to others rather than merely accumulating wealth or possessions, underscoring the transient nature of life and the importance of fostering connections through acts of kindness and service.
In practice
This quote can be used during a community service event to inspire participants.
The English language started out as a distortion in my life, but nothing remains the same, and so the distortion is now just normal. That is one of the things that will happen to all distortions: They become normal and turn into something else.
You could grow up in Germany in the postwar years without ever meeting a Jewish person. There were small communities in Frankfurt or Berlin, but in a provincial town in south Germany, Jewish people didn't exist.
A man may stand for the justice of God, but a woman stands for His Mercy.
Death is not a foe, but an inevitable adventure.
The time has come to educate people, to cease all quarrels in the name of religion, culture, countries, different political or economic systems. Fighting is useless. Suicide.
We live in an age of reproduction. Most of what makes up our personal picture of the world we have never seen with our own eyes--or rather, we've seen it with our own eyes, but not on the spot: our knowledge comes to us from a distance, we are televiewers, telehearers, teleknowers.
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