On the wire

I thought of something Karl Wallenda, the father of the Flying Wallendas, had once said.  It was the day immediately following the worst tragedy that had ever befallen the famous circus high-wire act.  Less than twenty-four hours earlier, three members of his family had fallen to their deaths before thousands of horror-stricken onlookers when the seven-man pyramid had collapsed.  Reporters had asked Wallenda how he could go back out on the wire so soon after the accident.  ”Life,” replied Wallenda, “is always on the wire.” 
                Kinky Friedman, The Love Song of J. Edgar Hoover

For something

For something have we been brought here.

And if we hold firm, those who peopled our earth

need not be ashamed, when the reckoning comes,

to say, we worked with all we had been given;

and for one another.

                                   Dorothy Dunnett

Saved

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; 

therefore we must be saved by hope. 

Nothing which is true or beautiful or good 

makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; 

therefore we must be saved by faith. 

Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; 

therefore we are saved by love. 

No virtuous act is quite as virtuous 

from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint.  

Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.

                     Reinhold Niebuhr, The Irony of American History