39 Inspiring Quotes About Fathers

Fathers hold a unique place in our hearts and lives, embodying strength, wisdom, and unconditional love. They are the silent heroes who guide us through every twist and turn with patience and understanding. Whether through words of encouragement or a comforting presence during challenging times, fathers play an irreplaceable role. In this post, we bring you a curated collection of 39 inspiring quotes that celebrate the essence of fatherhood. These quotes capture the profound impact of a father’s love and provide not only a source of inspiration but also a reminder of the invaluable bonds we share with them. Prepare to be moved and inspired as we explore words that honor the wonderful fathers in our lives.

1. “He knew only that his child was his warrant. He said: If he is not the word of God God never spoke.” - Cormac McCarthy

2. “The referee told me this league has never had a brawl of that magnitude," said Mr. Penderwick after a long, painful silence. "Of course, at the time I was pretending to be a casual passerby and not a father at all.” - Jeanne Birdsall

3. “No one is ever quite ready; everyone is always caught off guard. Parenthood chooses you. And you open your eyes, look at what you've got, say "Oh, my gosh," and recognize that of all the balls there ever were, this is the one you should not drop. It's not a question of choice.” - Marisa de los Santos

4. “I suddenly remember being very little and being embraced by my father. I would try to put my arms around my father's waist, hug him back. I could never reach the whole way around the equator of his body; he was that much larger than life. Then one day, I could do it. I held him, instead of him holding me, and all I wanted at that moment was to have it back the other way.” - Jodi Picoult

5. “When I was little I bragged about my firefighting father: my father would go to heaven, because if he went to hell he would put out all the fires” - Jodi Picoult

6. “I knew he was unreliable, but he was fun to be with. He was a child’s ideal companion, full of surprises and happy animal energy. He enjoyed food and drink. He liked to try new things. He brought home coconuts, papayas, mangoes, and urged them on our reluctant conservative selves. On Sundays he liked to discover new places, take us on endless bus or trolley rides to some new park or beach he knew about. He always counseled daring, in whatever situation, the courage to test the unknown, an instruction that was thematically in opposition to my mother’s.” - E.L. Doctorow

7. “They'd listen silenty, with grave faces: but once they'd turn to each other they'd smile cruelly. He couldn't have it both ways. He'd put himself outside and outside they'd make him stay. Neither brutality nor complaining could force a way in.” - John McGahern

8. “Acheron kissed her lightly on the cheek. "Rest. We'll be back when he needs you." He watched herclimb into bed before he took his nephew down to his room."Well, it appears to be just the two of us, little one. What say you we get naked, drunk and find us somewenches?"The baby actually smiled up at him as if he understood.Acheron nodded. "So that's it, eh? Barely a month old and you're already lecherous. You are your father's son.” - Sherrilyn Kenyon

9. “I know it. I know I shall make beastly mistakes, Father-""The world does not forgive mistakes so quickly, my girl." He sounds bitter and sad."If the world will not forgive me," I say softly, "I shall have to learn to forgive myself."He nods in understanding."And how will you marry? Or do you intend to marry?"I think of Kartik, and tears threaten. "I shall meet someone one day, as Mother found you.” - Libba Bray

10. “Just take me with you. Please.I cant.Please, Papa.I cant. I cant hold my son dead in my arms. I thought I could but I cant.” - Cormac McCarthy

11. “But I got through the review, for all their Latin and French; I did, and if you doubt me, you just look at the end of the great ledger, turn it upside down, and you'll find I've copied out all the fine words they said of you: "careful observer," "strong nervous English," "rising philosopher."Oh! I can nearly say it all off by heart, for many a time when I am frabbed by bad debts, or Osborne's bills, or moidered with accounts, I turn the ledger wrong way up, and smoke a pipe over it, while I read those pieces out of the review which speak about you, lad!” - Elizabeth Gaskell

12. “I've only just arrived, Kate. It may surprise you to learn that you were my top priority.” - Trenton Lee Stewart

13. “Pytałem przed chwilą co to jest ojciec i zawołałem, że to słowo wielkie, miano drogocenne. Ale słowa trzeba, panowie, używać uczciwie (...) „ojcowie, nie rozgoryczajcie dzieci waszych”! Albowiem wypełnijmy najpierw sami wolę Chrystusową, a wtedy dopiero stawiajmy wymagania dzieciom naszym. Inaczej nie ojcami, ale wrogami dzieci naszych jesteśmy, one zaś nie dziećmi naszymi, ale wrogami, których samiśmy sobie uczynili! „Jaką miarką mierzycie, taką będzie wam odmierzone” – już nie ja to mówię, lecz Ewangelia – jakże więc obwiniać dzieci, że nam naszą miarką odmierzają? (...) ten, co zrodził, nie jest jeszcze ojcem – ojcem bowiem jest ten, co i zrodził, i zasłużył sobie na miano ojca.” - Fyodor Dostoevsky

14. “Her father sat her down and spoke to her with great seriousness. "You are not a witch, Katerina. There is magic in the world, and some of it is wholesome, and some of it is not, but it is a thing that is in the blood, and it is not in yours."The foolish will always treat you badly, because they think you are not beautiful," he said, and she knew this was true. Plain Kate. She was a plain as a stick and thin as a stick and flat as a stick. Her nose was too long and her brows too strong. Her father kissed her twice, once above each brow. "We cannot help what fools think. But understand, it is your skill with a blade that draws this talk. If you want to give up your carving, you have my blessing.""I will never give it up," she answered.” - Erin Bow

15. “If I marry: He must be so tall that when he is on his knees, as one has said he reaches all the way to heaven. His shoulders must be broad enough to bear the burden of a family. His lips must be strong enough to smile, firm enough to say no, and tender enough to kiss. Love must be so deep that it takes its stand in Christ and so wide that it takes the whole lost world in. He must be active enough to save souls. He must be big enough to be gentle and great enough to be thoughtful. His arms must be strong enough to carry a little child.” - Ruth Bell

16. “When a father gives to his son, both laugh; when a son gives to his father, both cry.” - Yiddish Proverb

17. “Listen to God with a broken heart. He is not only the doctor who mends it, but also the father who wipes away the tears.” - Criss Jami

18. “When I wasn’t in the barn garden, helping out, sorting seeds or checking hoses I’d spend time alone, usually in the bathroom adjacent to Joel’s room, staring into the shattered mirror as my hand gently caressed my baby bump.More often than not I would cry. Not because my pregnancy upset me, or that my hormones were getting the better of me, but because I missed Joel, my baby’s father. That the baby would grow up without a dad made me anxious. Then again, if he had survived, what irreparable damage would he have suffered and how would his pain translate to his child? Jesus, I was studying myself in the very mirror he’d smashed the night he chose to take his own life.The bump had grown slowly in the last couple of months. With these limited resources, I didn’t have the privilege of eating whatever I craved. Had that been the case, I was sure I would have been bigger by now. Still, I tried to eat as well and as often as I could and the size of my belly had proven that my attempts at proper nutrition were at least growing something in there.Nothing made me happier than feeling my baby move. It was a constant source of relief for me. In our present circumstances, with no vitamins and barely any meat products save the recent stash of jerky Earl had found in an abandoned trailer, my diet consisted of berries, lettuce, and canned beans for the most part. Feeling the baby move inside me was an experience I often enjoyed alone. I would think of Joel then as well. Imagining his hand on my belly, with mine guiding his to the kicks and punches.” - Michael Poeltl

19. “Now you look here. All your father ever dreamed of for you was to do something you loved in life. He didn't care about fancy qualifications or fancy clothes or cars, just that you were both happy and fulfilled. He was so excited about your dreams for a career.” - Hazel Gaynor

20. “Look at that," he said. "How the ink bleeds." He loved the way it looked, to write on a thick pillow of the pad, the way the thicker width of paper underneath was softer and allowed for a more cushiony interface between pen and surface, which meant more time the two would be in contact for any given point, allowing the fiber of the paper to pull, through capillary action, more ink from the pen, more ink, which meant more evenness of ink, a thicker, more even line, a line with character, with solidity. The pad, all those ninety-nine sheets underneath him, the hundred, the even number, ten to the second power, the exponent, the clean block of planes, the space-time, really, represented by that pad, all of the possible drawings, graphs, curves, relationships, all of the answers, questions, mysteries, all of the problems solvable in that space, in those sheets, in those squares.” - Charles Yu

21. “I am haunted by the ghost of my father, I think that should allow me to quote Hamlet as much as I please.” - Erin Morgenstern

22. “It's rally bad when dads cry.” - Sarah Ockler

23. “An almost perfect relationship with his father was the earthly root of all his wisdom. From his own father, he said, he first learned that Fatherhood must be at the core of the universe. [speaking of George MacDonald]” - C.S. Lewis

24. “My father gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another person, he believed in me.” - Jim Valvano

25. “Father, in those moments of utter exasperation, help me to want You as much as I need You!” - Evinda Lepins

26. “It's the things you do that you don't have to do that always determine the difference when it is too late to do anything about it.” - Timothy Michael McDougall

27. “Xavier, you have given me more grey hairs than all my sons put together.’ Saul frowned, then corrected himself. ‘To be fair, you and Zed. Just try not to add to them tonight.” - Joss Stirling

28. “Because the truth was, and we both knew it, he'd gone long, long ago. I'd just made him stick around when he really wanted to be somewhere else. In his own weird way, he was another victim of the shooting, One of the ones who couldn't get away. "Are you mad?" he asked, which I thought was a really strange question. "Yes," I said. And I was. It's just that I wasn't so sure I was mad at him. But I don't think he needed to hear that part. I don't think he wanted to hear that part. I think it was important to him to hear that I cared enough to be angry."Will you ever forgive me?" he asked."Will you ever forgive me?" I shot back, leveling my gaze directly into his eyes.He stared into them for a few moments then got up silently and headed for the door. He didn't turn around when he reached it. Just grabbed the doorknob and held it. "No," he said without facing me. "Maybe that makes me a bad parent, but I don't know if I can. No matter what the police found, you were involved in that shooting, Valerie. You wrote those names on that list. You wrote my name on that list. You had a good life here. You might not have pulled the trigger, but you helped cause the tragedy."He opened the door."I'm sorry. I really am." He stepped out into the hallway. "I'll leave my new address and phone number with your mother," he said before walking slowly out of my sight.” - Jennifer Brown

29. “I think one of the biggest reasons people have difficulty believing in God is because they do not understand Him. I often hear doubting comments like “if there is a God then why this and why that?” and “how could He allow…?” Perhaps if people were to invest true effort getting to know Him, they would discover a mindful Father who remains with us every step of the way through trials and tribulations that, though painful, are crucial experiences meant to teach and mold His children for a higher purpose.” - Richelle E. Goodrich

30. “A warm feeling fell over the boy. A mix of security and comfort, as if a blanket were wrapping its soft layers around his heart and nuzzling him snuggly. Gavin loved his mother, and he would be forever grateful to his father for protecting her. The whole mystery behind it made him itch with curiosity, however.” - Richelle E. Goodrich

31. “Esta es una buena imagen suya que nos quedó muy grabada en la memoria: la imagen de alguien que nunca le tuvo miedo a la vida, y es por eso que le sacó tanto provecho; es por eso, que a mis ojos, su vida se coronó con tantos éxitos.” - Claudio Bogantes Zamora

32. “But in the end I'd marry her to the one she herself loved. To a father, the man his daughter falls in love with herself always seems the worst. That's how it is.” - Fyodor Dostoevksy

33. “The typical atheist rebels against God as a teenager rebels against his parents. When his own desires or standards are not fulfilled in the way that he sees fit, he, in revolt, storms out of the house in denial of the Word of God and in scrutiny of a great deal of those who stand by the Word of God. The epithet 'Heavenly Father' is a grand reflection, a relation to that of human nature.” - Criss Jami

34. “But sometimes I wanted to feel like a child, to know that he would stand in front of me while waves crashed towards us or arrows come at us.” - Belinda Jeffrey

35. “Behind every great man is a man greater, his father.” - Habeeb Akande

36. “It was not the Fall of Adam, therefore, that set God’s agenda; it was the decision to share the great dance with us through Jesus. Adam’s plunge certainly threatened God’s dreams for us, but that threat had been anticipated and already strategically overcome in the predestination of the incarnation. Jesus Christ did not become human to fix the fall; he became human to accomplish the eternal purpose of our adoption, and in order to bring our adoption to pass, the Fall had to be called to a halt and undone….Jesus is not a footnote to Adam and his Fall; the Fall, and indeed creation itself, is a footnote to the purpose of God in Jesus Christ.” - C. Baxter Kruger

37. “Judgment, then, is not an impersonal, legalistic process. It is a matter of love, and it is something we choose for ourselves. Nor is punishment a vindictive act. God's "curses" are not expressions of hatred, but of fatherly love and discipline. Like medicinal ointment, they hurt in order to heal. They impose suffering that is remedial, restorative, and redemptive. God's wrath is an expression of His love for His wayward children.” - Scott Hahn

38. “Will you remember this day, Gogol?" his father had asked, turning back to look at him, his hands pressed like earmuffs to either side of his head. "How long do I have to remember it?" Over the rise and fall of the wind, he could hear his father's laughter. He was standing there, waiting for Gogol to catch up, putting out a hand as Gogol drew near. "Try to remember it always," he said once Gogol reached him, leading him slowly back across the breakwater, to where his mother and Sonia stood waiting. "Remember that you and I made this journey, that we went together to a place where there was nowhere left to go.” - Jhumpa Lahiri

39. “Judith Rey watches the young woman. Once upon a time, I had a baby daughter. I dressed her in frilly frocks, enrolled her for ballet classes, and sent her to horse-riding camp five summers in a row. But look at her. She turned into Lester anyway. She kisses Luisa’s forehead. Luisa frowns, suspiciously, like a teenager. “What?” - David Mitchell