“It’s annoying, but justice and equality are mates. Aren’t they? Justice always wants to hang out with equality. And equality is a real pain.”

It’s a privilege to serve the poor, to be servants of noble Africans, but I better belong in the rehearsal room or in the studio with my band. That’s where I want to be and I still wake up in the morning with melodies in my head.

If I ever reach heaven I expect to find three wonders there: first, to meet some I had not thought to see there; second, to miss some I had expected to see there; and third, the greatest wonder of all, to find myself there.

Hockey is a tough game.

It’s stasis that kills you off in the end, not ambition.

As a musician and a songwriter it is an act of the ego to believe that other people might be interested in your point of view. But it is usually an empathetic nature that gets you going in the first place. Music keeps the heart porous in many ways.

Everyone’s got one but some are blacker and wider than others. It’s a feeling of being abandoned,cut adrift in space and time-sometimes following the loss of a loved one.

It is impossible to meet God without abandon, without exposing yourself, being raw.

My understanding of the Scriptures has been made simple by the person of Christ.

You see, idealism detached from action is just a dream. But idealism allied with pragmatism, with rolling up your sleeves and making the world bend a bit, is very exciting. It’s very real. It’s very strong.

But more than anything else, for the British folks Irish people were all terrorists. So when we went to Britain, it was always a lot of resistance to U2. And that’s why we came to America.

There’s no retirement for an artist,its your way of living so theres no end to it.

I truly believe that when the history books are written, our age will be remembered for three things: the war on terror, the digital revolution, and what we did – or did not do – to put the fire out in Africa. History, like God, is watching what we do.

You don’t become an ‘artist’ unless you’ve got something missing somewhere. Blaise Pascal called it a God-shaped hole.

Religion can be the enemy of God. It’s often what happens when God, like Elvis, has left the building.

Distance does not decide who is your brother and who is not. The church is going to have to become the conscience of the free market if it’s to have any meaning in this world – and stop being its apologist.

It’s much easier to be successful than it is to be relevant. The tricks won’t keep you relevant. Tricks might keep you popular for a while, but in all honesty,

When I began to dare to be clear, because I think clarity is the real risk in poetry because you are exposed. You’re out in the open field. You’re actually saying things that are comprehensible, and it’s easy to criticize something you can understand.

Columbus real achievement was managing to cross the ocean successfully in both directions. Though an accomplished enough mariner, he was not terribly good at a great deal else, especially geography, the skill that would seem most vital in an explorer.

The poem is not, as someone put it, deflective of entry. But the real question is, ‘What happens to the reader once he or she gets inside the poem?’

I know real people, whose names I could tell you, people I know who have said “I’ve stopped buying the New York Times.” Why? Because their editorial position has filtered, has leached into the news pages.

When all material advancements utilized in spiritual need that is the real advancement of human civilization.

When I started out, everyone seemed to be adopting these names… Johnny Rotten, Sid Vicious. I wasn’t really Rotten or Vicious or Nasty, so I wanted something a bit more funny – yet something that seemed real rock ‘n’ roll… something that acknowledged my ambition.

The backslider likes the preaching that wouldn’t hit the side of a house, while the real disciple is delighted when the truth brings him to his knees.

But anything that you hear about Japan is nothing like what you see when you actually go over there and see it, you know, in a real situation.