“Our culture has accepted two huge lies. The first is that if you disagree with someone’s lifestyle, you must fear or hate them. The second is that to love someone means you agree with everything they believe or do. Both are nonsense. You don’t have to compromise convictions to be compassionate.”

“Whites, it must frankly be said, are not putting in a similar mass effort to reeducate themselves out of their racial ignorance. It is an aspect of their sense of superiority that the white people of America believe they have so little to learn.”

“Don’t run to the phone, run to the throne.”

“There are advantages to being elected President. The day after I was elected, I had my high school grades classified Top Secret.”

“He that thinketh he leadeth and hath no one following him is only taking a walk.”

“There are only two ways to live your life: as though nothing is a miracle, or as though everything is a miracle.”

“But you see, a rich country like America can perhaps afford to be stupid.”

“Whatever is difficult can be done with regular attention and actions. Stay focused.”

“With his arms outstretched, nailed to the cross, Jesus was saying, “This is how valuable you are to me. I love you this much! I’d rather die than live without you.” You are priceless.”

“We must use time creatively - and forever realize that the time is always hope to do great things.”

“Maybe the critics are right. Maybe there's no escaping our great political divide, an endless clash of armies, and any attempts to alter the rules of engagement are futile. Or maybe the trivialization of politics has reached a point of no return, so that most people see it as just one more diversion, a sport, with politicians our paunch-bellied gladiators and those who bother to pay attention just fans on the sidelines: We paint our faces red or blue and cheer our side and boo their side, and if it takes a late hit or cheap shot to beat the other team, so be it, for winning is all that matters. But I don't think so. They are out there, I think to myself, those ordinary citizens who have grown up in the midst of all the political and cultural battles, but who have found a way-in their own lives, at least- to make peace with their neighbors, and themselves. ...I imagine they are waiting for a politics with the maturity to balance idealism and realism, to distinguish between what can and cannot be compromised, to admit the possibility that the other side might sometimes have a point. They don't always understand the arguments between right and left, conservative and liberal, but they recognize the difference between dogma and common sense, responsibility and irresponsibility, between those things that last and those that are fleeting. They are out there, waiting for Republicans and Democrats to catch up with them.”

“If you have no good drive in you, your life will not be steered through a good direction. It will miss its destined station. Passion or drive is what moves the vehicle of a fulfilled life.”

“And no one ever told me about the laziness of grief. Except at my job--where the machine seems to run on much as usual--I loath the slightest effort. Not only writing but even reading a letter is too much.”

“There's steel in this man that no one has taken the temper out of...”

“It’s not the public opinion of what you are that matters, but the private personality of who you are!”