“[T]he pied beauty of humanity should not be carved into acceptable and unacceptable based on things that simply make us who we are.”

“Where subtlety fails us we must simply make do with cream pies.”

“A personalized God can be a mere idol carved in our own image- a projection of our limited needs, fears, and desires. We can assume that he loves what we love and hates what we hate, endorsing our prejudices instead of compelling us to transcend them. When he seems to fail to prevent a catastrophe or seems even to desire a tragedy, he can seem callous and cruel. A facile belief that a disaster is the will of God can make us accept things that are fundamentally unacceptable. The very fact, as a person, God has a gender is also limiting: It means that the sexuality of half the human race is sacralized at the expense of the female and can lead to neurotic and inadequate imbalance in human sexual mores. A personal God can be dangerous, therefore. Instead of pulling us beyond our limitations, “he” can encourage us to remain complacently within them; “he” can make us cruel, callous, self-satisfied and partial as “he” seems to be. Instead of inspiring the compassion that should characterize all advanced religions, “he” can encourage us to judge, condemn, and marginalize.”

“Perfection is overrated, boring. It's the imperfections--the vulnerabilities, the weaknesses, the human elements--that make us who we are, that make us real, beautiful . . . necessary.”

“Our flaws are what makes us human. If we can accept them as part of who we are, they really don't even have to be an issue.”

“He was of that generation of men who simply accepted the mystery of womanhood, who made no effort to try to understand their wives, but simply accepted that there were things that women said and did that they would never understand.”