William Sloane Coffin

"Dream the impossible dream and the world will not grind you under, it will lift you up."

"Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend."

"The purpose of life is not to be happy. It is to be useful, to be honorable, to be compassionate."

"Faith is not belief without proof, but trust without reservation."

"Pay mind to your own life, your own health, and your own happiness first."

"Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the assessment that something else is more important than fear."

"The hardest thing in the world is to live in it."

"We are dying from overthinking. We are slowly killing ourselves by drowning in our thoughts."

"I truly believe that we should not only stop killing each other over religion, but we should also stop killing each other over politics."

"Forgiveness is not an occasional act; it is a constant attitude."

"The great enemy of clear language is insincerity."

"Love and justice must never be separated."

"Hope is not the same as optimism. Hope is an orientation of the spirit."

"The problem with American democracy is that it's being poisoned by money."

"I would rather be a man of conviction than a man of success."

"We can't choose how we feel, but we can choose what we do about it."

"God is not a homophobe, so I would not be either."

"Education is for improving the lives of others and for leaving your community better than you found it."

"The real religion of the world comes from women much more than from men."

"Never let your failures define you, let them guide you."

"A true professional does not waste his client's time by talking unnecessarily."

"Peace is not the product of terror or fear. Peace is not the silence of oppression."

"You need not cry very loud; he is nearer to us than we think."

"The only real lapse in a person's life is moral lapse."

"Sometimes I think that the main reason we fall is so we know what it means to stand."

"Life is a sexually transmitted disease and it is 100 percent fatal."

"The church has no right to ordain anybody without that person going through a very rigorous process."

"I really have been a serious student of world politics for many years."

"Complacency is a far greater threat to our vitality than either age or anonymity."

"The purpose of religion is to transform people, not to comfort them."