One of the great dangers in political engagement is misplaced hope.

As my friend said that when people say the church is full of hypocrites, he says we always have room for more.

I like how someone once said being a Christian is not about having new ideas but having new eyes. This is the ability to have our hearts broken with the things that break the heart of God. That is part of what it means to be a Christian.

The monastic folks have the spirit of being in the world but not of the world, sort of peculiar people who have gone to the desert to live on the margins of the empire.

There's something beautiful about that Scripture that says, "Your young men will see visions, your old men will dream dreams" (Acts 2:17). We need each other. There is power when the old and young dream together.

The greatest sin of political imagination: Thinking there is no other way except the filthy rotten system we have today.

And I think that's what our world is desperately in need of - lovers, people who are building deep, genuine relationships with fellow strugglers along the way, and who actually know the faces of the people behind the issues they are concerned about.