Genuine tolerance does not mean ignoring differences as if differences made no difference. Genuine tolerance means engaging differences within a bond of civility and respect.

Respect for the dignity of others includes treating them as rational creatures capable of being persuadad by rational argument, even in the face of frequent evidence to the contrary.

Whatever else the religious Right may be, it is a bonanza for its opponents... Reports of the great terror that is upon us are raising millions of dollars in fund appeals by Planned Parenthood, the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Organization for Women, Norman Lear's People for the American Way, and others who claim to believe that the religious Right is the greatest peril to American democracy since Joe McCarthy.

In legal parlance, that is called 'the rational person test,' ... That's where somebody else says, 'Even though we have no idea what this person would want in this circumstance in which they cannot themselves tell us what they want, a 'rational' person - meaning, myself - in that circumstance would want to die.' So you move very quickly from so-called voluntary euthanasia to involuntary euthanasia. These legal and medical developments are not simply hypothetical They're in the courts right now.

If a church offers no truth that is not available in the general culture - in, for instance, the editorials of the New York Times or, for that matter, of National Review - there is not much reason to pay it attention.

One would like to believe that people who think of themselves as devout Christians would also behave in a manner that is in according with Christian ethics. But pastorally and existentially, I know that this is not the case, and never has been.

One must never underestimate the profound bigotry and anti-intellectualism and intolerance and illiberality of liberalism.