Desmond Tutu Quotes
"Be nice to whites, they need you to rediscover their humanity."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Humanity)
"My humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Humanity)
"In the land of my birth I cannot vote, whereas a young person of eighteen can vote. And why? Because he or she possesses that wonderful biological attribute - a white skin."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Land, Skin, Vote)
"If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Injustice, Mouse, Neutrality, Will)
"I am not interested in picking up crumbs of compassion thrown from the table of someone who considers himself my master. I want the full menu of rights."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Compassion, Rights, Want)
"I am a leader by default, only because nature does not allow a vacuum."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Nature, Leader)
"For goodness sake, will they hear, will white people hear what we are trying to say? Please, all we are asking you to do is to recognize that we are humans, too."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: People, Goodness, Trying, Will)
"Children are a wonderful gift. They have an extraordinary capacity to see into the heart of things and to expose sham and humbug for what they are."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Heart, Children)
"Be nice to the whites, they need you to rediscover their humanity."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Humanity)
"A person is a person because he recognizes others as persons."
- Desmond Tutu
"You must show the world that you abhor fighting."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Fighting, World)
"You don't choose your family. They are God's gift to you, as you are to them."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: God, Family)
"Do your little bit of good where you are; its those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: World)
"When the missionaries came to Africa they had the Bible and we had the land. They said "Let us pray." We closed our eyes. When we opened them we had the Bible and they had the land."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Bible, Eyes, Land, Missionaries)
"When a pile of cups is tottering on the edge of the table and you warn that they will crash to the ground, in South Africa you are blamed when that happens."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Will)
"What is black empowerment when it seems to benefit not the vast majority but an elite that tends to be recycled?"
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Empowerment, Majority)
"We would like to see you departing peacefully."
- Desmond Tutu
"We may be surprised at the people we find in heaven. God has a soft spot for sinners. His standards are quite low."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: God, People, Heaven, May)
"Those who invest in South Africa should not think they are doing us a favor; they are here for what they get out of our cheap and abundant labor, and they should know that they are buttressing one of the most vicious systems."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Labor)
"Without forgiveness, there's no future."
- Desmond Tutu
(Related: Forgiveness, Future)