I think if you're convinced that you're evil, and that God has had to rescue you, then the best you can be is grateful. But nobody ever loves the person they have to be perpetually grateful to. That's just not the way it works in humanity. You need to be set free. You need to be loved just as you are so that you can become all that you can be. That's the direction we have to turn the Christian message; when we do, it becomes universal.

...death is ultimately a dimension of life through which we journey into timelessness.

If you begin to give people hope that there is a brighter future, there is a new tomorrow, then the people who were yesterday's terrorists become tomorrow's elected officials and they're part of the system.

We live in a very pluralistic society today. There are Buddhists, Hindus, Jews, atheists, Roman Catholics, Evangelical Christians, and Christians like me. There are a wide variety of religious expressions in this country. I think they all must be treated with respect and none of them must be given priority in the public arena.

What happened in the Western world was that Plato ceased to be the way people thought. Aristotle was rediscovered, and the modern, educated world moved toward Aristotelian thinking.

It's just not easy enough to say that I pray and God will accomplish.

The Hebrew scriptures say it's okay to enslave anybody except your fellow Jews. It says you should enslave only your neighbors. I say to people that means Mexicans and Canadians are a bit at risk if we want to be literal about the Bible.