God, please help us remember that all the darkness in the world cannot snuff out the light of one little candle. Help us to keep lighting our little candles until a mighty torch of justice sweeps our nation and the world.

Democracy is not a spectator sport.

I try to act out of faith.

When I started out as an activist, the issues were much clearer. There's advantage to the new media, but on the other hand, you miss the ability to frame an issue that you had when there were just three TV networks: CBS, NBC, and ABC. So the whole world could see the same police dogs. The same Bull Connor and his white tank. Now you've got narrow-casting. The media is all fragmented. It's so hard to get people to focus in a sustained way.

Don't just dream about grandiose acts of doing good. Every day do small ones, that add up over time to positive patterns.

The crisis of children having children has been eclipsed by the greater crisis of children killing children.

You didn't have a choice about the parents you inherited, but you do have a choice about the kind of parent you will be.