We're not here to prove we're right; we're here to help people.

Many people get what they need from church attendance because the Word is preached, and the rituals are carried on, and God works, but it's drift more than anything else. And that's why the churches keep reaching for some programmatic formula that will make people come and give money. It's just really very sad.

Human beings are at their core defined by what they worship rather than primarily by what they think, know, or believe. That is bound up with the central Augustinian claim that we are what we love.

In the story of the good Samaritan, Jesus not only teaches us to help people in need; more deeply, he teaches us that we cannot identify who “has it”, who is “in” with God, who is “blessed”, by looking at exteriors of any sort. That is a matter of the heart. There alone the kingdom of the heavens and human kingdoms great and small are knit together. Draw any cultural or social line you wish, and God will find his way beyond it.

It's very difficult to be right about something without hurting someone with it.

As we reach out to God, we get another source of strength.

When we are formed inwardly, outer issues do become much more manageable.