"Part of the act of creating is in discovering our own kind. They are everywhere. But don't look for them in the wrong places."

"Realizing that our job is to help others find the way is half the job."

Example sheds a genial ray
Of light that men are apt to borrow.
So first improve yourself today.
And then improve your friends tomorrow.

"Ultimately, diversity contributes not just by adding different perspectives to the group but also by making it easier for individuals to say what they really think. […] Independence of opinion is both a crucial ingredient in collectively wise decisions and one of the hardest things to keep intact. Because diversity helps preserve that independence, it’s hard to have a collectively wise group without it."

"There are no nations! There is only humanity. And if we don't come to understand that right soon, there will be no nations, because there will be no humanity."

"What does living come down to but bringing about those changes in ourselves … which can free us to enjoy a richness and closeness with everyone?"

"I think the greatest thing about things is they remind you of people."

"We can disagree and still love each other unless your disagreement is rooted in my oppression and denial of my humanity and right to exist."

"A free public library is a revolutionary notion, and when people don’t have free access to books, then communities are like radios without batteries. You cut people off from essential sources of information — mythical, practical, linguistic, political — and you break them. You render them helpless in the face of political oppression."

"...how vital the community is for how we perceive God. And when they mishandle you [...] it's not just because your social network disintegrates and we all need one, maybe it's because we actually perceive God through each other, it hurts, and it's hard to recover from that. If there's a commercial for the community nature of the Christian faith (not the individualistic nature), that's it."

"Hell is where no one has anything in common with anybody else except the fact that they all hate one another and cannot get away from one another and from themselves."

"One of the greatest blessings conferred on our lives by the Arts is that they are our chief means of breaking bread with the dead, and I think that, without communication with the dead, a fully human life is not possible."

"There is truth and then again there is truth. For all that the world is full of people who go around believing they've got you or your neighbor figured out, there really is no bottom to what is not known. The truth about us is endless. As are the lies."

"The spiritual logic of a community of faith is that they can live a smaller but living version of what they seek for the larger world."

"It has always been assumed that the most important things in the Gospels are the ethical maxims and commandments. But for me the most important thing is that Christ speaks in parables taken from life, that He explains the truth in terms of everyday reality. The idea that underlies this is that communion between mortals is immortal, and that the whole of life is symbolic because it is meaningful."

"A community is the mental and spiritual condition of knowing that the place is shared, and that the people who share the place define and limit the possibilities of each other's lives. It is the knowledge that people have of each other, their concern for each other, their trust in each other, the freedom with which they come and go among themselves."

“What we find in books is like the fire in our hearths. We fetch it from our neighbors, we kindle it at home, we communicate it to others, and it becomes the property of all.”

"Community is the fruit born through shared brokenness, and intimacy is the fruit that grows through touching one another's wounds."

"Each day holds a surprise. But only if we expect it can we see, hear, or feel it when it comes to us. Let's not be afraid to receive each day's surprise, whether it comes to us as sorrow or as joy. It will open a new place in our hearts, a place where we can welcome new friends and celebrate more fully our shared humanity."

"Our society encourages individualism. We are constantly made to believe that everything we think, say, or do, is our personal accomplishment, deserving individual attention. But as people who belong to the communion of saints, we know that anything of spiritual value is not the result of individual accomplishment but the fruit of a communal life.

Whatever we know about God and God's love; whatever we know about Jesus - his life, death, and resurrection - whatever we know about the Church and its ministry, is not the invention of our minds asking for an award. It is the knowledge that has come to us through the ages from the people of Israel and the prophets, from Jesus and the saints, and from all who have played roles in the formation of our hearts. True spiritual knowledge belongs to the communion of saints."