History viewed from the inside is always a dark, digestive mess, far different from the easily recognizable cow viewed from afar by historians.

I despair at the rise of modern violence. I truly give in to despair at times, that deep, futureless pit of despair.... I watch the American slaughterhouse, the casual attacks on popes, presidents, and uncounted others, and I wonder if there are many more out there with the Ability or if butchery has simply become the modern way of life.

Love was as hardwired into the structure of the universe as gravity and matter.

Its hard to die. Harder to live

Religion seems to have always offered us that false duality ... the silences of infinite space or the cozy comfort of inner certainty.

There were reprints of American editorials. Liberals saw it as a resurgence of social protest and decried the discrimination, poverty, and hunger that had provoked it. Conservative columnists acidly pointed out that hungry people don't steal stereo systems first and called for a crackdown in law enforcement. All of the reasoned editorials sounded hollow in light of the perverse randomness of the event. It was as if only a thin wall of electric lighting protected the great cities of the world from total barbarism.

If everyone could understand the working of a psychopath's mind, we undoubtedly would be closer to insanity ourselves.