Maybe the desert wisdom of the Dakotas can teach us to love anyway, to love what is dying, in the face of death, and not pretend that things are other than they are. The irony and wonder of all of this is that it is the desert's grimness, its stillness and isolation, that brings us back to love.

There are men I could spend eternity with. But not this life.

But in order to have an adult faith, most of us have to outgrow and unlearn much of what we were taught about religion.

But hope has an astonishing resilience and strength. Its very persistence in our hearts indicates that it is not a tonic for wishful thinkers but the ground on which realists stand.

When you come to a place where you have to left or right, go straight ahead.

The ordinary activities I find most compatible with contemplation are walking, baking bread, and doing laundry.

The demon of acedia -- also called the noonday demon -- is the one that causes the most serious trouble of all. . . . He makes it seem that the sun barely moves, if at all, and . . . he instills in the heart of the monk a hatred for the place, a hatred for his very life itself.