On the Novel as Experience

People without hope not only don't write novels, but what is more to the point, they don't read them. They don't take long looks at anything, because they lack the courage. The way to despair is to refuse to have any kind of experience, and the novel, of course, is a way to have an experience. — Flannery O'Connor

On our Glory and Our Hope

There are moments when we are sure that everything does make sense because everything is in the hands of God, one of whose names is forgiveness, another is love … [Our source of joy is Jesus] because Jesus was the love of God alive among us, and not all the cruelty and blindness of men could kill him . . .. This is our glory and our only hope. And the sound that it makes is the sound of excitement and gladness and laughter that floats through the night air from a great banquet. –Frederick Buechner