Was it not enough punishment and suffering in history that we were uprooted and made helpless slaves not only in new colonial outposts but also domestically.

We could not guard every water pipeline from being blown up and every tree from being uprooted. We could not prevent every murder of a worker in an orchard or a family in their beds.

Faith is not uprooted by dialectic proof; it must already be deeply shaken by other causes to be unable to withstand the shock of argument.

The church must suffer for speaking the truth, for pointing out sin, for uprooting sin. No one wants to have a sore spot touched, and therefore a society with so many sores twitches when someone has the courage to touch it and say: "You have to treat that. You have to get rid of that. Believe in Christ. Be converted.

"The same wind that uproots trees

And the past held only this wisdom: that love was a damaging mistake, and its accomplice, hope, a treacherous illusion. And whenever those twin poisonous flowers began to sprout in the parched land of that field, Mariam uprooted them. She uprooted them and ditched them before they took hold.

Was it not enough punishment and suffering in history that we were uprooted and made helpless slaves not only in new colonial outposts but also domestically.

I understand what it's like to come with your family and to uproot yourself and come to another culture. You need a lot of support. People say 'She's got her daughter she's got her husband.' Yeah but she hasn't got anyone else.

I do not come bearing a party label on my sleeve - or a quick fix in my back pocket. I do not come with a rigid ideology in my heart - or a soul that tells me to go it alone. I do not come to uproot tradition - or to be imprisoned by it.