A book is good company. It is full of conversation without loquacity. It comes to your longing with full instruction but pursues you never.

It seems to me we can never give up longing and wishing while we are thoroughly alive. There are certain things we feel to be beautiful and good and we must hunger after them.

Every year we celebrate the holy season of Advent O God. Every year we pray those beautiful prayers of longing and waiting and sing those lovely songs of hope and promise.

An expectation is a future object recognised as belonging to me.

I am involved in a freedom ride protesting the loss of the minority rights belonging to the few remaining earthbound stars. All we demanded was our right to twinkle.

We are driven by five genetic needs: survival love and belonging power freedom and fun.

Yet it ought to be obvious that good music generally occupies a higher plane that mere politics. Great writers can express moods through melody and capture experiences we share most powerfully - love lust longing joy rage fear triumph yearning and confusion.

Positive feelings come from being honest about yourself and accepting your personality and physical characteristics warts and all and from belonging to a family that accepts you without question.

I realized that my truest passion was for helping people change through faith in a higher power. That meant for me belonging to the church. Using my abilities to bring Christian doctrine to a postmodern world.

In thinking about religion and society in the 21st century we should broaden the conversation about faith from doctrinal debates to the larger question of how it might inspire us to strengthen the bonds of belonging that redeem us from our solitude helping us to construct together a gracious and generous social order.