Fathers
Quotes - Christianity is a religion built around a father
“Stepfathers
have been vilified for ages. Books and movies have always depicted stepfathers
as this clog in the family system, not to be accepted. Children are programmed
to hate a stepfather from the get-go and they do so with a passion. It doesn’t
matter if the child’s father is in the picture or not.”
―
Thabo Katlholo, Blame Less: A Grim Journey Into the Life of a Chronic Blamer
“It
may seem easy and convenient to blame your absentee father for our unhappiness,
but in the long run you lose out, as indulging in blame costs you the authority
to be in charge.
We
miss the profound potential which can be unleashed once we take total
responsibility for our life experience, and preside proactively over the
purposeful direction of our lives.
To
take full ownership of your life, your choices and happiness takes a lot of
accountability.”
―
Thabo Katlholo, Blame Less: A Grim Journey Into the Life of a Chronic Blamer
“Oliver
shook his head again. "It's inconceivable that he'd come here for no
reason. Think, Alice. You're looking over something wildly obvious."
"What's
that?" She asked.
"You."
"Me?"
"Yes,"
said Oliver. "You're underestimating how much your father loves you.”
―
Tahereh Mafi, Furthermore
“Men
like his father avoided hard feelings. They buried themselves in their work and
their drink.”
―
J.R. Potts, The Heist of Dunstan Manor
“Girls
without their fathers were also at risk. I didn't learn this from the fairy
tales of my youth, because in those stories the fathers were present in the
castles and in the cottages. The fairy-tale fathers, however, were unforgivably
weak and always thinking with their groins. These men would rather sacrifice
their daughters than risk harm to themselves. Rapunzel's father loved her
mother so much that he stole for the woman. When he was caught, he was a
coward, and instead of paying with his own life he promised away their unborn
child. Gretel was very much alive, as was her brother, Hansel, when their
father tried to do away with them. Three times he tried. ("Abandonment in
the forest" was a bloodless euphemism for attempted murder.) Of course,
there was Beauty. Was she not the poster child for daughters of men who dodged
their responsibilities and used their female offspring as human shields?
Fairy-tale
fathers were also criminally negligent. Where was Cinderella's father when she
was being verbally abused and physically demeaned by her stepmother and
stepsisters? Perhaps he was so besotted, his wits so dulled by his nightly
copulation with his new wife, that he failed to notice the degraded condition
of his daughter. Snow White's father, a king no less, was equally negligent and
plainly without any power within his own domestic realm. Under his very roof,
his new wife plotted the murder of his child, coerced one of his own huntsmen
to carry out the deed, then ate what she thought was the girl's heart. This
king was no king. He was a fool who left his daughter woefully unprotected.
When
I first heard these stories, I assigned to these men no blame because they
worry the solemn and adored mantle of "father." I understood them to
be, like my own father, men who went to work every day, who returned home
exhausted and taciturn, and who fell asleep in their easy chairs while reading
the newspaper. I assumed that they, like my father, would have protected their
daughters if only they had known of the dangers their girls faced during those
dark hours after school and before dinner.”
―
Monique Truong, Bitter in the Mouth
“It
occurred to me that maybe it wasn't so much that my father on Earth was like my
Father in Heaven, but that my Father in Heaven was like my father on Earth.
That maybe if God gave you a test that He thought you could pass, He got really
pissed off if you failed—not because you failed, but because He didn't like
being wrong. And maybe when God got pissed off, He made his way downstairs to
Earth, kicked in the door to your world, and threatened to break your goddamn
arms. Or your goddamn heart. Or whatever else he could get His goddamn hands
on.”
―
Shalom Auslander, Foreskin's Lament
“Christianity
is a religion built around a father
Who
does not rescue his son. It is the story
Of a
son whose father is a ghost.”
―
Terrance Hayes, American Sonnets for My Past and Future Assassin
“Have
you ever noticed? In cartoons, fathers are often useless loafs, incapable of
even the least bit of kindness. Even though there's no more tender meat than a
father's heart!”
―
Zidrou, The Adoption
“When
you have kids, you're responsible for their mistakes. Their mistakes, their
heartaches, their happiness... you take everything on yourself!”
―
Zidrou, The Adoption
“Abdul-Rahim
has been so lonely trying to avoid stories about the past that Almira wonders
whether she knows anything about him at all. She knows his tastes and habits,
the cinnamon apple car air fresheners, the roll-on applicator for under-eye
puffiness and the economy-size package of antihistamines, his lucky shirt,
serious shirt, the birthday and funeral shirts, his illegible signature and
small handwriting; but she has no idea how to talk to her father, how to
outgrow his air of total secrecy.”
―
Gianni Skaragas, The Lady of Ro
“Omar
went to the funeral, but watched from afar. So distant that his brother, who
hadn’t even come, seemed closer to his father’s final departure. Yaqub ordered
a wreath to be delivered, along with an epitaph. “Fond memories of my father,
who even from a distance, was always present.”
―
Fábio Moon, Two Brothers
“She
had just…just…started to come to terms with her father being someone who wasn’t
only her father. He was also a human with human failings. She was only starting
to figure out how she could love him and judge him and accept him all at the
same time.”
―
Liz Braswell, Disney Twisted Tales: A Whole New World / As Old As Time / Once
Upon A Dream
“There
would never been an end to all the things I wished I'd asked my father. After
so many years I thought less about his unwillingness to disclose and more about
how stupid I'd been not to try harder.”
―
Ann Patchett, The Dutch House
“There
would never been an end to all the things I wished I'd asked my father.”
―
Ann Patchett, The Dutch House
“I
shadowed my father a million times before, watching him sneak off to the
outskirts, but it never occurred to me to follow my mother—that she would have
a life of her own.”
―
Kim Liggett, The Grace Year
“At
the gambling table, there are no fathers and sons.”
―
Chinese Proverb
“His
love wrote the first chapters of my life and is the reason I never had to
wonder if I was adored.”
―
Melanie Shankle, Church of the Small Things: The Million Little Pieces That
Make Up a Life
“The
quality of a father can be seen in the goals, dreams and aspirations he sets
not only for himself, but for his family.”
―
Reed B Markham
“A
child looks up at the stars and wonders. A great father puts a child on his
shoulders and helps them to grab a star.”
―
Reed B Markham
“Adult
men. Fucking adult men. Nutters, all of them. Can’t be trusted. Fucking sickos.
Freaks. Killers. What was this man’s road to becoming Batman on a side street
of inner-city Brisbane? How much good was in him? How much bad? Who was his
father? What did his father do? What did his father not do? In what ways did
other adult men fuck his life up?”
―
Trent Dalton, Boy Swallows Universe
