I was raised by my parents to believe that you had a moral obligation to try and help save the world.
We're often ashamed of asking for so much help because it seems selfish or petty or narcissistic, but I think, if there's a God - and I believe there is - that God is there to help. That's what God's job is.
I read the same amount of nonfiction and fiction.
Perfectionism is the voice of the oppressor.
If you asked me, parents were supposed to affect the life of their child in such a way that the child grows up to be responsible, able to participate in life and in community.
These days cry out, as never before, for us to pay attention, so we can move through them and get our joy and pride back.
Pay attention to the beauty surrounding you.
I have a very dark sense of humor. I swear. I have a very playful relationship with Jesus.
Your problem is how you are going to spend this one odd and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over people and circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.
My idea of absolute happiness is to be in bed on a rainy day, with my blankie, my cat, and my dog.
I didn't write about my mother much in the third year after she died. I was still trying to get my argument straight: When her friends or our relatives wondered why I was still so hard on her, I could really lay out the case for what it had been like to be raised by someone who had loathed herself, her husband, even her own name.
I've known for years that resentments don't hurt the person we resent, but they do hurt us.
Mothering has been the richest experience of my life, but I am still opposed to Mother's Day. It perpetuates the dangerous idea that all parents are somehow superior to non-parents.
When I was a kid, our family used to watch 'Bonanza.' I really liked having a Sunday night TV ritual.
Mothers are supposed to listen and, afterward, to respond with some wisdom and perspective, but these things were not my mother's strong suit.
Life is really pretty tricky, and there's a lot of loss, and the longer you stay alive, the more people you lose whom you actually couldn't live without.
The first holy truth in God 101 is that men and women of true faith have always had to accept the mystery of God's identity and love and ways. I hate that, but it's the truth.
Summer nearly does me in every year. It's too hot and the light is unforgiving and the days go on way too long.
I used to tell my writing students that they must write the books they wished they could come upon - because then the books they hungered and thirsted for would exist.
I happen to be a Christian, but I know that there is one God. People worshipping goodness and love and kindness and truth are worshipping the same God.