Each person is a V.S.P. (a Very Special Person) because we are each created in the image of God.

Africans believe in something that is difficult to render in English. We call it ubuntu, botho. It means the essence of being human. You know when it is there and when it is absent. It speaks about humaneness, gentleness, hospitality, putting yourself out on behalf of others, being vulnerable. It embraces compassion and toughness. It recognizes that my humanity is bound up in yours, for we can only be human together.

There are two forms of justice. There is what is called retributive justice and there is restorative justice.

I'm not an optimist. I'm a prisoner of hope.

One of the things we might want to learn when considering the failings of others is not to gloat because someone else has tripped up.

It was Christians, you know, not Pagans, who were responsible for the Holocaust. It was Christians, not Pagans, who lynched people here in the South, who burned people at the stake, frequently in the name of this Jesus Christ.

I pray that politicians, lawmakers and religious leaders have the courage to support the choices terminally ill citizens make in departing Mother Earth with dignity and love.