I don't try to be completely calculating in everything I say and do, but there's no way I'm going to talk. There's no reason to. And that's why I'm such a boring interview, because I don't go for the shock value, or smartass answers.
Living is like working out a long addition sum, and if you make a mistake in the first two totals you will never find the right answer. It means involving oneself in a complicated chain of circumstances.
I have spent too long being able to manipulate the answers I want from market research to rely upon its findings any more than I do weather forecasts.
The concept of virginity is a social construct. If you’re wondering if my commercial value, self-respect, and/or quality of my immortal soul has been affected by things that have gone in or out of my vagina the answer is no.
So we shall let the reader answer this question for himself: who is the happier man, he who has braved the storm of life and lived or he who has stayed securely on shore and merely existed?
In America, they are paranoid about ruining the reputations of people once they are dead and cannot answer back. They have this fascination which to me seems cruel and morbid. I do not want any part of it.
'How do you know so much about everything?' was asked of a very wise and intelligent man; and the answer was 'By never being afraid or ashamed to ask questions as to anything of which I was ignorant.'
Well if you were asking my personal opinion on that I think the answer can only be yes but it was missed. Much as I know I'm responsible for a lot of things, I can't wear any responsibility for that.
The American public's a lot more sophisticated than we all give them credit for. And on complicated issues, I'm going to give them straight answers. And if it takes more than three minutes, I'm going to do it.
If for every well-intended prayer uttered in hopes of making the world a better place, there was instead a good deed accomplished, the world might look as though those prayers had been answered.
We can all afford to do a little soul-searching about the choices we make and the way we live our lives, but sometimes searching one's soul doesn't provide the answers we seek.
I've done a lot of talk shows where you can tell that the host is just thinking about what he wants to say next while you're answering him and that's really uncomfortable.
When I have been asked during these last weeks who caused the riots and the killing in L.A., my answer has been direct and simple: Who is to blame for the riots? The rioters are to blame. Who is to blame for the killings? The killers are to blame.
Spiritual formation in a Christian tradition answers a specific human question: 'What kind of person am I going to be?' It is the process of establishing the character of Christ in the person. That's all it is.
Others inspire us, information feeds us, practice improves our performance, but we need quiet time to figure things out, to emerge with new discoveries, to unearth original answers.
When your mother asks, "Do you want a piece of advice?" it's a mere formality. It doesn't matter if you answer yes or no. You're going to get it anyway.
My problem with the Emergent Church is not the questions they are bringing up, but the answers they are giving. They are making Christianity milky. They are making it so you can no longer define anything. There is no sound judgment allowed.
I try to take large, general questions that are difficult to resolve and break them down into small, very specific questions that have clear answers.
What can I do, I asked myself, that is so spectacular that no one will be able to say he had seen it before? The answer was perfectly obvious. I would send a midget up to bat.
Actually, I think I come at things a whole different way from most people, and, you know, sometimes political answers are one way to solve the problem, and sometimes there are better ways to do it.
I was unpopular at school just because I was an intellectual. I always answered all the questions off the top of my head but they nevertheless resented because of that.
