“It’s a beautiful religion and I wish I understood it more. No, I don’t want to understand it all. It’s beautiful because it’s always a mystery.”

Books became her friends, and there was one for every mood.

She was surprised at how tiny it seemed now. She supposed the school was just as big as it had ever been only her eyes had grown used to looking at bigger things.

Brooklyn was a dream. All the things that happened there just couldn’t happen. It was all dream stuff. Or was it all real and true and was it that she, Francie, was the dreamer?

Look at everything always as though you were seeing it either for the first or last time: Thus is your time on earth filled with glory.

She liked the combined smell of worn leather bindings, library past and freshly inked stamping pads better than she liked the smell of burning incense at high mass.

I’ll have a desk like this in my parlor and white walls and a clean green blotter every Saturday night and a row of shining yellow pencils always sharpened for writing and a golden-brown bowl with a flower or some leaves or berries always in it and books . . . books . . . books. . . .

I tried my best to kill that man in the hallway. Then one sunny day, they walk out in all innocence and they walk right into the grief that you’d give your life to spare them from.

She must start out believing in things not of this world. Then when the world becomes too ugly for living in, the child can reach back and live in her imagination.

She told Papa about it. He made her stick out her tongue and he felt her wrist. He shook his head sadly and said, “You have a bad case, a very bad case.” “Of what?” “Growing up.

Dear God,’ she prayed, ‘let me be something every minute of every hour of my life.’

New York! I’ve always wanted to see it and now I’ve see it. It’s true what they say– it’s the most wonderful city in the world.

The world was hers for the reading.

I can never give a ‘yes’ or a ‘no.’ I don’t believe everything in life can be settled by a monosyllable.

From that moment on, the world was hers for the reading. She would never be lonely again.

I hate all those flirty-birty games that women make up. Life’s too short. If you ever find a man you love, don’t waste time hanging your head and simpering. Go right up to him and say, ‘I love you. How about getting married?

She had had the pain; it had been like being boiled alive in scalding oil and not being able to die to get free of it

The real game of Bigger and Better that Jesus is playing with us usually isn’t about money or possessions or even our hopes. It’s about our pride.

Learn much of the Lord Jesus. For every look at yourself take ten looks at Christ. He is altogether lovely . . . .

Just as chalk can be removed from a chalkboard, with sincere repentance, the effects of our transgression can be erased through the atonement of Jesus Christ.

FCA is a place where young people, many of whom are unchurched, can come and hear the gospel of Jesus Christ.

Your faith will help you realize that it is Jesus Himself Who is present in the Blessed Sacrament, waiting for you and calling you to spend one special specific hour with Him each week.

I am and always will be a sinner. But that’s the beautiful thing about Jesus. I’ll always try to be a better person in the eyes of God. But I’m not all of a sudden stepping up on a pedestal and saying I’m holier than thou, ’cause I’m not!

May Mary, who in the freedom of her ‘Fiat’ and her presence at the foot of the cross, offered to the world, Jesus, the Liberator, help us to find him in the Sacrament of the altar

Prayer is the risen Jesus coming in with His resurrection power, given free rein in our lives, and then using His authority to enter any situation and change things.