I know well what faith really means to people in their daily lives, as there are many people in my family whose lives are permeated by their faith: it dictates the way they behave and sustains them in tough times, of which we've had too many lately.

Sometimes we make assumptions about influence when similarities between two writers' work are so strong, but they're still just assumptions. Some things are sort of zeitgeist-y. There's a collective consciousness and we're all drawing from it.

One of the great things about the Bible, one of the things I think keeps people coming back to it, is that it's nothing if not perpetually topical. You don't have to dig too deeply into today's paper to find slaves and masters, evil authorities.

Don't repackage your fear and try to sell it to me as indifference.

When you're a child - and my understanding of it is very basic - but when you're a very young child, the stimuli around you prompt your brain to form synapses. Once they're there, they're there, but if they don't form by a certain age, they're not going to.

I tend toward the pessimistic end of the spectrum, and unfortunately there's little in human history to convince me that pessimism is unwarranted.

Your life has more blue in it than a James Cameron movie.