Barack Obama Quotes About Understanding

• The study of geography is about more than just memorizing places on a map. It's about understanding the complexity of our world, appreciating the diversity of cultures that exists across continents. And in the end, it's about using all that knowledge to help bridge divides and bring people together.

  Barack Obama

  Our World, Bridges, People

  "Obama asks geography bee question" by Byron Tau, www.politico.com. May 24, 2012.

• We think of faith as a source of comfort and understanding but find our expressions of faith sowing division; we believe ourselves to be a tolerant people even as racial, religious, and cultural tensions roil the landscape. And instead of resolving these tensions or mediating these conflicts, our politics fans them, exploits them,and drives us further apart.

  Barack Obama

  Faith, Religious, Believe

  Barack Obama (2007). “The Audacity of Hope: Thoughts on Reclaiming the American Dream”, p.23, Canongate Books

• If you don't have good people, and you don't have a good process and you don't have, at some level, the basic reverence for [presidential] office, and an understanding of the incredible responsibilities and obligations, then, I think you can get into trouble.

  Barack Obama

  Responsibility, Thinking, People

  Source: abcnews.go.com

• So I came to my Christian faith later in life, and it was because the precepts of Jesus Christ spoke to me in terms of the kind of life that I would want to lead. Jesus Christ dying for my sins spoke to the humility we all have to have as human beings, that we're sinful and we're flawed and we make mistakes, and that we achieve salvation through the grace of God.

  Barack Obama

  Christian, Jesus, Brother

  "Obama: 'A Christian by Choice'" by Kristin Brown, www.foxnews.com. September 28, 2010.

• ...I believe deeply that we canot solve the challenges of your time unless we solve them together - unless we perfect our union by understanding that we may have differnt stories, but we hold common hopes; that we may not look the same and we may not have come from the same place, but we all want to move in the same direction - towards a better future for our children and our grandchildren. This belief comes from my unyielding faith in the decency and generosity of the American people.

  Barack Obama

  Hope, Children, Believe

• I think it's very important to remember that so much of the work that gets done between countries is not done at the level of presidents, but is done within various agencies, whether it's law enforcement or economic ministries. And when they establish relationships and systems of communications and shared projects and shared visions, those structures continue even after any particular president is gone. It builds trust and understanding between countries that are critically important.

  Barack Obama

  Country, Communication, Thinking

  Source: time.com

• I have been to this point unwilling to sign on to same-sex marriage primarily because of my understandings of the traditional definitions of marriage. But I also think you're right that attitudes evolve, including mine.

  Barack Obama

  Sex, Attitude, Gay

  "Obama on Marriage: 'Attitudes Evolve, Including Mine'". Interview with Joe Sudbay, www.advocate.com. October 27, 2010.

• On my recent trip to Israel, I had the opportunity to visit Yad Vashem, Israel's national Holocaust memorial, and reaffirm our collective responsibility to confront anti-Semitism, prejudice, and intolerance across the world. On this Yom Hashoah, we must accept the full responsibility of remembrance, as nations and as individuals-not simply to pledge "never again," but to commit ourselves to the understanding, empathy and compassion that is the foundation of peace and human dignity.

  Barack Obama

  Responsibility, Opportunity, Compassion

  Statement from the President on Yom Hashoah, obamawhitehouse.archives.gov. April 08, 2013.

• How you staff, particularly the chief of staff, the national security adviser, your White House counsel, how you set up a process in the system to surface information and generate options for a president, understanding that ultimately the president is going to be the final decision-maker. That's something that has to be attended to right away.

  Barack Obama

  White, House, Decision

  Source: time.com

• Let's remember that our leadership is defined not just by our defense against threats, but by the enormous opportunities to do good and promote understanding around the globe – to forge greater cooperation, to expand new markets, to free people from fear and want. And no one is better positioned to take advantage of those opportunities than America.

  Barack Obama

  Opportunity, America, People

  Fifth Presidential State of the Union, delivered 28 January 2014

• The amount of interaction, the amount of understanding that exists in your generation among people of different races and different creeds and different colors is unprecedented. And by the way, that goes - that cuts across party lines, that cuts across partisan lines.

  Barack Obama

  Party, Cutting, Race

  Source: www.realclearpolitics.com

• I'm suspicious of too much certainty in the pursuit of understanding just because I think people are limited in their understanding.

  Barack Obama

  Thinking, People, Understanding

  "Transcript: Barack Obama and The God Factor Interview" by Cathleen Falsani, sojo.net. February 21, 2012.

• One of the thing about being President - that can't be taught, you have to experience, is - there is the sheer weight of decision making. And when I make a decision to send 17,000 young Americans to Afghanistan - you can understand that intellectually. But understanding what that means for those families, for those young people - when you end up sitting at your desk, signing - a condolence letter to one of the family members of a fallen hero - you're reminded each and every day, at every moment, that - the decisions you make count.

  Barack Obama

  Hero, Condolences, Mean

  Source: www.cbsnews.com

• Let's remember that our leadership is defined not just by our defence against threats, but by the enormous opportunities to do good and promote understanding.

  Barack Obama

  Opportunity, Understanding, Remember

• Ours is a nation of laws: of citizens who live under them and for the citizens who enforce them. So, to a community in Ferguson that is rightly hurting and looking for answers, let me call once again for us to seek some understanding rather than simply holler at each other. Let's seek to heal rather than to wound each other.

  Barack Obama

  Hurt, Law, Community

  Barack Obama's remarks on Ferguson, Mo. and Iraq at the White House in Washington, D.C., www.washingtonpost.com. August 18, 2014.

You May Also Like:

Donald Trump

Hillary Clinton

Michelle Obama

Ann Dunham

William J. Clinton

George W. Bush

Maya Soetoro-Ng