GREG BOYLE

Ours is a God who waits. So who are we not to?

God can get tiny if we're not careful.

Jesus did not only serve the needs of the people, but truly hoped that the people and Jesus would be one.

The business of second chances is everybody's business.

The arms of God reach to embrace, and somehow you feel yourself just outside God's fingertips.

I don't save people. God saves people. I can point them in the right direction. I can say, 'There's that door. I think if you walked through it, you'd be happier than you are.'

W a gang member, and especially in a Latino gang, gets jumped in, and then he's given a name, and he has that name forever, but it's not so much the name as being called by name.

You are so much more than the worst thing you've ever done.

Homeboy Industries has chosen to stand with the 'demonized' so that the demonizing will stop; it stands with the 'disposable' so that the day will come when we stop throwing people away.

The desire of God's heart is immeasurably larger than our imaginations can conjure.

I feel called to be faithful.

We ought not to demonize a single gang member, and we ought not to romanticize a single gang.

If you are paying attention, then the day is going to be pretty joyful, and a lot of delight will fill it.

I work with gang members, and I feel a kind of affinity and gift, even. But who would've thunk it, you know? I mean, I didn't anticipate it.

We need the disruption of categories that lead us to abandon the difficult, the disagreeable, and the least likely to go very far.

In Los Angeles, the gang capital of the world, we have 1,100 gangs and 120,000 gang members so it is a daunting, complex social dilemma.

People have started to see that 'smart on crime' rather than 'tough on crime' makes sense.

At its best, an injunction creates a kind of vigilant heat that moves kids toward the light.

I kinda don't do guilt. I gave it up for Lent years ago.

I always have a funny story at communion time that underscores that no one is perfect, and that communion is not for perfect people but for hungry people.

I have never seen a hopeful person join a gang.

I know two L.A.s. Half my life was around the house my folks had for 46 years at 3rd and Norton. The other half was in Boyle Heights on the Eastside, working with gang members.

I want to be prophetic and take stands and stand with those on the margins, and I want to laugh as much as I can.

Redemption is possible, and it is the measure of a civilized society.

You don't really get Jesus saying very often there'll be pie in the sky when you die. He's really talking about now and today, and it's supposed to be like that. You're supposed to delight in what's right in front of you.