No one is climbing the spiritual ladder. We don't continually improve until we are so spiritual we no longer need God. We die and are made new, but that's different from spiritual self-improvement.

I cared about Ben, but I was never in love with him. I was in love with what it said about me that I had a boyfriend like Ben, and that's just different.

Every time we draw a line between us and others, Jesus is always on the other side of it.

Maybe the Good Friday story is about how God would rather die than be in our sin-accounting business anymore.

This was the bonus to liberal Christianity: I could use my reason and believe at the same time.

There's not enough wrong with it to leave and there's just enough wrong with it to stay, " Matthew later told me. "Fight to change it.

We are half awake and semi conscious.

How could he possibly bow deeply enough to honor a thousand-year-old samurai queen?

As we go from Abraham Lincoln to Theodore Roosevelt to Mitt Romney, I now understand why the Republicans don't believe in evolution.

The love of freedom is actually an aberration.

It's impossible to satisfy everyone, and I suggest we all stop trying.

I believe that eating simple food in a healthy body with a clean conscience is more pleasurable, and infinitely more satisfying, then eating decadent food that makes you and your world ill.

I don’t write this letter to put bitterness into your heart, but to pluck it out of mine. For my own sake I must forgive you.

Goodness knows she is too fierce for you Goodness knows she has eyes for a lord Goodness knows she yet will prove untrue Her cheek's blush is as false as her word

Superstition is great enemy of man but bigotry is worse.

My parents' parents were regular working-class people. I ended up speaking in a certain way, and one gets sidelined into doing certain parts. I think that is really quite narrow-minded.