Activist

Real education should consist of drawing the goodness and the best out of our own students. What better books can there be than the book of humanity?

We need to help students and parents cherish and preserve the ethnic and cultural diversity that nourishes and strengthens this community - and this nation.

You are never strong enough that you don't need help.

It is my deepest belief that only by giving our lives do we find life. I am convinced that the truest act of courage, the strongest act of manliness is to sacrifice ourselves for others in a totally non-violent struggle for justice.

From the depth of need and despair, people can work together, can organize themselves to solve their own problems and fill their own needs with dignity and strength.

There is no substitute for hard work, 23 or 24 hours a day. And there is no substitute for patience and acceptance.

Without a union, the people are always cheated, and they are so innocent.

The burdens of generations of poverty and powerlessness lie heavy in the fields of America. If we fail, there are those who will see violence as the shortcut to change.

If you really want to make a friend, go to someone's house and eat with him... the people who give you their food give you their heart.

Students must have initiative; they should not be mere imitators. They must learn to think and act for themselves - and be free.

Since the Church is to be servant to the poor, it is our fault if that wealth is not channeled to help the poor in our world.

There is no such thing as defeat in non-violence.

It is possible to become discouraged about the injustice we see everywhere. But God did not promise us that the world would be humane and just. He gives us the gift of life and allows us to choose the way we will use our limited time on earth. It is an awesome opportunity.

We learned many years ago that the rich may have money, but the poor have time.

We draw our strength from the very despair in which we have been forced to live. We shall endure.

In some cases non-violence requires more militancy than violence.

The end of all knowledge should be service to others.

Preservation of one's own culture does not require contempt or disrespect for other cultures.

Though many of the poor have come to see the affluent middle class as its enemy, that class actually stands between the poor and the real powers in this society - the administrative octopus with its head in Washington, the conglomerates, the military complex.

We cannot seek achievement for ourselves and forget about progress and prosperity for our community... Our ambitions must be broad enough to include the aspirations and needs of others, for their sakes and for our own.