My darling girl, when are you going to realize that being normal is not necessarily a virtue? It rather denotes a lack of courage." - Aunt Frances

And real nobility (that of the heart) is based on scorn, courage, and profound indifference.

If a man is devout, we accuse him of hypocrisy; if he is not, of impiety; if he is humble, we look on his humility as a weakness; if he is generous, we call his courage pride.

Every man has his own courage and is betrayed because he seeks in himself the courage of other persons.

God does not seem impressed by size or power or wealth. Faith is what he wants, and the heroes who emerge are heroes of faith, not strength or wealth.

prayer, and only prayer, restores my vision to one that more resembles God's. i awake from blindness to see that wealth lurks as a terrible danger, not a goal worth striving for; that value depends not on race or status but on the image of God every person bears; that no amount of effort to improve physical beauty has much relevance for the world beyond.

Jesus tended to honor the losers of this world, not the winners. Our modern culture extravagantly rewards beauty, athletic skill, wealth, and artistic achievement, qualities which seemed to impress Jesus not at all.

Don't judge Christ by those of us who imperfectly bear his name.

Lord, if you can't make me thin, then make my friends look fat," humorist Erma Bombeck once prayed.

He learned, like every good novelist, that human behaviour can neither be explained nor predicted, only rendered.

Throughout the Bible, in fact, God shows a marked preference for "real" people over "good" people.

some of the most inspiring stories of faith come from those often considered "losers" by the rest of the world.