In some ways I admire Aunt Helen's unwavering certainty in God's divine plan. It must be comforting, to have faith like that. To believe so concretely that there's someone-something-out there watching guard, keeping us safe, testing us only with what we can handle. I've never believed in anything the way Aunt Helen believes in God.

The longer the trial to which God subjects you, the greater the goodness in comforting you during the time of the trial and in the exaltation after the combat.

It is far more comforting to think God listened and said no, than to think that nobody's out there.

By the middle of the eighteenth century the black slave had sunk, with hushed murmurs, to his place at the bottom of a new economic system, and was unconsciously ripe for a new philosophy of life. Nothing suited his condition then better than the doctrines of passive submission embodied in the newly learned Christianity. Slave masters early realized this, and cheerfully aided religious propaganda within certain bounds. The long system of repression and degradation of the Negro tended to emphasize the elements of his character which made him a valuable chattel: courtesy became humility, moral strength degenerated into submission, and the exquisite native appreciation of the beautiful became an infinite capacity for dumb suffering. The Negro, losing the joy of this world, eagerly seized upon the offered conceptions of the next; the avenging Spirit of the Lord enjoining patience in this world, under sorrow and tribulation until the Great Day when He should lead His dark children home,-this became his comforting dream.

How sweet is the assurance, how comforting is the peace that come from the knowledge that if we marry right and live right, our relationship will continue, notwithstanding the certainty of death and the passage of time. Men may write love songs and sing them. They may yearn and hope and dream. But all of this will be only a romantic longing unless there is an exercise of authority that transcends the powers of time and death.

Hate can be a deeply stimulating emotion. The world becomes easier to understand and much less terrifying if you divide everything and everyone into friends and enemies, we and they, good and evil. The easiest way to unite a group isn't through love, because love is hard, It makes demands. Hate is simple. So the first thing that happens in a conflict is that we choose a side, because that's easier than trying to hold two thoughts in our heads at the same time. The second thing that happens is that we seek out facts that confirm what we want to believe - comforting facts, ones that permit life to go on as normal. The third is that we dehumanize our enemy.

To be loved but not known is comforting but superficial. To be known and not loved is our greatest fear. But to be fully known and truly loved is, well, a lot like being loved by God. It is what we need more than anything. It liberates us from pretense, humbles us out of our self-righteousness, and fortifies us for any difficulty life can throw at us.

Maybe mistakes are what make our fate... without them what would shape our lives? Maybe if we had never veered off course we wouldn't fall in love, have babies, or be who we are. After all, things change, so do cities, people come into your life and they go. But it's comforting to know that the ones you love are always in your heart... and if you're very lucky, a plane ride away

I'm interested in the kind of religion that makes life harder. I'm not so interested in the comforting kind of religion.

We all lose somebody we care about and want to find some comforting way of dealing with it something that will give us a little closure a little peace.

I start really missing London when I go away. I have a little flat but very central. I live above a pub and you'd think it'd be a nightmare but I like hearing the music and it's quite comforting.

I'm pretty horrible at relationships and haven't been in many long-term ones. Leaving and moving on - returning to a familiar sense of self-reliance and autonomy - is what I know that feeling is as comfortable and comforting as it might be for a different kind of person to stay.

Expect trouble as an inevitable part of life and repeat to yourself the most comforting words of all this too shall pass.

I can look at the future with anticipation. And it's comforting to know that someday as Christians we'll be able to look back and have a little more clarity on why certain things in life happened.

I grew up in Austria and for me real comfort food is Wiener Schnitzel. Wiener Schnitzel and mashed potatoes because it reminds me of my youth... It reminds me when I grow up and it feels very comforting.

I have an enormous fondness for delicious food. It's very comforting.

Baking cookies is comforting and cookies are the sweetest little bit of comfort food. They are very bite-sized and personal.

Americans have an abiding belief in their ability to control reality by purely material means... airline insurance replaces the fear of death with the comforting prospect of cash.

There's something about death that is comforting. The thought that you could die tomorrow frees you to appreciate your life now.

I like singer-songwriters and I find sad songs comforting rather than depressing. It makes you realise you're not alone in the world.