Scripture is something God had ‘let be,’ and so it is at once God’s creation and the creation of the dozens of people and communities and cultures who produced it.

It's not about the church meeting your needs; it's about joining the mission of God's people to meet the world's needs.

To be a Christian in a generously orthodox way is not to claim to have the truth captured, stuffed, and mounted on the wall

When any sector of the Church stops learning, God simply overflows the structures that are in the way and works outside them with those willing to learn.

We need not a new set of beliefs, but a new way of believing, not simply new answers to the same old questions, but a new set of questions.

I had to face the possibility that the art of living in the way of Jesus was no longer carried on in a holistic way by any single tradition.

I’m sure I am wrong about many things, although I’m not sure exactly which things I’m wrong about. I’m even sure I’m wrong about what I think I’m right about in at least some cases.

Too often we see the Bible through whatever lens we get from our culture.

... why are so many religious people arguing about the origin of the species but so few concerned about the extinction of the species?

Ultimately, I hope Jesus will save Buddhism, Islam and every other religion, including the Christian religion, which often seems to need saving about as much as any other religion does.

The Christian faith, I am proposing, should become (in the name of Jesus Christ) a welcome friend to other religions of the world, not a threat

Success is a state of mind. If you want success, start thinking of yourself as a success.

If the second dinosaur to the left of the tall cycad tree had not happened to sneeze and thereby fail to catch the tiny, shrew-like ancestor of all the mammals, we should none of us be here.

I have a lot of faith in the power of joking to make something thoughtful.

However important the struggle is and however much misery and poverty and degradation exist, we know that it cannot be more important than one human life.

Ilene Weiss and I went to Girls High together.

You're much better than fireworks. They're all over in a moment, and you're going to stay for a fortnight. Besides, fireworks are noisy, and they make too much smoke.

When I'm writing in long hand, it just goes on and on and on. When I was in the saloon business, I would just greet people and talk to them and avoid taxes, and getting behind the bar. What else.

What do you do when you're no longer the hero of your own story?

I was very shy. I'm still shy.

Financial leverage is the advantage the rich have over the poor and middle class.