“Was he willing to blend into the life of another human being for the rest of his days, and have hers blend into his? That, of course, was the Bible’s bottom line on marriage: one flesh. Not separate entities, not two autonomous beings merely coming together at dinnertime or brushing past one another in the hallway, holding on to their singleness, guarding against invasion. One flesh!" (p. 207).”

“In his bachelor's heart of hearts, he loved pie with an intensity that alarmed him. Yet, when he was offered seconds, he usually refused. "Wouldn't you like another piece of this nice coconut pie, Father?" he might be asked. "No, I don't believe I'd care for anymore," he'd say. An outright lie!”

“He was praying the Psalms, as he'd done in times past, with the enemies of King David translated into his own enemies of fear and remorse and self-loathing, which, in their legions, had become as armies of darkness.”

“He remembered the gravestone of a woman parishioner in the churchyard of St. John's in the Grove. DEMURE AT LAST, it read. He thought that the single most definitive and amusing epitaph he'd ever come across.”

“He liked being in a place where everything from forgetfulness to homicide might be blamed on the heat.”

“Sorrow and joy, he thought, so inextricably entwined that he could scarcely tell where one left off and the other began.”

“Are you reading your Bible?"Ah, well...I was."And then you quit."You got it."Then, you can expect to be weak on one of your flanks, and that's precisely where the Enemy will come after you with a vengeance.”