Flannery O'Connor Quotes

The stone that was rolled before Christ's tomb might appropriately be called the philosopher's stone because its removal gave not only the pharisees but, now for 1800 years, the philosophers so much to think about.

Flannery O'Connor was a revelation for me. When I read her, I was very young, and I didn't understand what she was doing. I didn't see any of the Catholicism or any of the social stuff.

Southern Gothic is alive and well. It's not just a genre, it is a way of life.

All history is incomprehensible without Christ.

I actually was raised Baptist. I'm from the South, so you definitely know a lot of conservative people.

Biblical myth is as integral to the spirit of the South as the heat and humidity.

Flannery O'Connor was a revelation for me. When I read her, I was very young, and I didn't understand what she was doing. I didn't see the - any of the Catholicism or any of the social stuff.

I was over in Australia during Easter, which was really interesting. You know, they celebrate Easter the exact same way we do, commemorating the death and resurrection of Jesus by telling our children that a giant bunny rabbit left chocolate eggs in the night. Now I wonder why we're f-ked up as a race. I've read the Bible. I can't find the word "bunny" or "chocolate" anywhere in the f-king book.

I am a Jew, but I am enthralled by the luminous figure of the Nazarene….No one can read the Gospels without feeling the actual presence of Jesus.

I'm a Jew. Thirty-three is when Christ died. So though I'm a Jew, in the back of my mind I still think that I gotta get it done before I'm thirty-four because well, I don't know why. He got it done before He was thirty-four.

I was at the Wal-Mart, which is where I think everybody goes eventually. If they die without Christ.

Christ has no velvet crosses.

There's probably a balance between. I believe you have to know Christ. But I think that if you know Christ, if you're a believer in God, you're going to have some good works.

We know nothing of religion here: we only think of Christ.

Hallelujah! Amen! Christianity is so inherent in western story-telling, you can't really get around it. But it wasn't something that drew me to it more or less.

I like Easter. But let's remember that Christ's resurrection is not truer at Easter than at any other time of the year.

Anything that one imagines of God apart from Christ is only useless thinking and vain idolatry.

The Catholic novelist in the South will see many distorted images of Christ, but he will certainly feel that a distorted image of Christ is better than no image at all. I think he will feel a good deal more kinship with backwoods prophets and shouting fundamentalists than he will with those politer elements for whom the supernatural is an embarrassment and for whom religion has become a department of sociology or culture or personality development.

Above all I commend the study of Christ. Let Him be your library.

I used to think I could learn about Jesus by studying Him, but now I know Jesus doesn't want stalkers.

There have been men before who got so interested in proving the existence of God that they came to care nothing for God himself, as if the good Lord had nothing to do but to exist. There have been some who were so preoccupied with spreading Christianity that they never gave a thought to Christ.

I think of the church as this bride of Christ, who is incredibly capable of doing amazing things. And so where we see injustice, we come, not with fists clenched but with palms up.

Christ is much more powerful to save, than Adam was to destroy.

I don't think that comedy is going to affect or change anything. I remember back in 2004 people were like, "How does it feel knowing that you're going to be part of the shifting tide in the political system?" And in the end nothing changed, and we weren't part of anything. And we're not happy anywhere. I think we're kind of hoping, obviously, but it didn't really have a great impact on people.