The principles that will save Earth's life are the same principles that save the living souls of humans: ineluctable spiritual principles.

Anyone too undisciplined, too self-righteous or too self-centered to live in the world as it is has a tendency to idealize a world which ought to be. But no matter what political or religious direction such idealists choose, their visions always share one telling characteristic: in their utopias, heavens or brave new worlds, their greatest personal weakness suddenly appears to be a strength.

The fundamentalists of every faith remain blind to the truth that the “sigh within the prayer is the same in the heart of the Christian, the Muslim, and the Jew.” I have seen this unity with my eyes, heard it with my ears, felt it with all my being.

The bad thing about falling into pieces is that it hurts. The good thing about it is that once you're lying there in shards you've got nothing left to protect, and so have no reason not to be honest

To me, it's a great day every time I receive a letter from somebody who climbed inside one of my books, inhabited it for a while, learned a little something, and emerged grateful.

Faith of Cranes is a love song to the beauty and worth of the lives we are able to lead in the world just as it is, troubled though it be... The writing is honest, intensely lived, and overflowing with heart: broken, mended, and whole.

Fiction writing feels more honest to me.