I have my own religious bond with the God in my own head.

My father could have been deported because on his immigration application he said that he was a printer, obviously because he didn't want them to be checking his writings.

I was a militant smoker, and in my case, I think I particularly used smoking because what I felt was a kind of politically correct big brother assault on smoking.

I had read too many memoirs that were written after the writer or the director was past his or her prime.

I have my own religious bond with the God in my own head.

There are no crowds out there demanding to see smoking scenes in movies.

I just wanted to make sure that what I write is what appears on screen, to not have some idiot change it on its way to the screen.

From what I've been able to determine, many of our big stars are addicted to tobacco. They want to smoke in movies for the same reason I smoked as I wrote, which is that they think their performance is going to be better.

The terrible, diabolic thing with this disease is that you are always looking behind your shoulder every couple months with the most recent checkup to see whether there is any sign of it, and I thank God to say at this point there is not.

I have only one loyalty - to my writing. I never wanted to be the head of a studio or a producer.

Fact is we went on to do other things. But we still wanted to do our success like rock'n'roll stars.

Meanwhile, politics is about getting a candidate in front of the public as a star, politics as rock'n'roll, politics as a movie.

I was six when we came to this country. When I was 14 or so, I still had a lot of trouble with it.

Every time I flicked channels, there I was, talking. I was talking too much and writing too little. So Naomi and I went to Hawaii. The phone was cut off and we lost touch. This gave me the chance to have a good think about my life.

And the inner dynamics of Hollywood are like politics. Say you give a script to a group of executives - they all sit around, afraid to voice an opinion, saying nothing, waiting to know what the consensus is. Just like focus groups, opinion polls or a cabinet.

I worry that we are approaching a time when that which is shocking is squeezed out by the Stalinism of political correctness.

I have always been fascinated by the corruption of power.

The studios have been taken over by marketing people and accountants.

I always wanted to be a rock'n'roll star.

From a writing point of view, you now have teams of screenwriters working with a director. What's lost in the process is the power of that one heart, brain, gut and soul that makes something an original piece of writing.

Cigarettes are not a part of human behaviour, they are a habit.

That's sort of what I felt... I miss drinking, I thought bars were truly holy places.

Politics has become entertainment.

Now on a personal level with things like the California Tax Commission... I really think if people started banding together and saying no to this it could snowball and that could really help.

Songwriting is my gift from God.

This is God's work. Therefore it must be triumphant. There is no place for misgiving or despondency.

Many are needed to plant and water what has been planted now that the faith has spread so far and there are so many people... No matter who plants or waters, God gives no harvest unless what is planted is the faith of Peter and unless he agrees to his teachings.

God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.

I frankly don't care if you agree with my stand on abortion. I take that stand because no other stand is consistent with decent principles, and no other standard is consistent with the will of God.

The robe of flesh wears thin, and with the years God shines through all things.

The good poet sticks to his real loves, those within the realm of possibility. He never tries to hold hands with God or the human race.

Humanity is the sin of God.

Fight the good fight of faith, and God will give you spiritual mercies.

We are all gifted, but we have to discover the gift, uncover the gift, nurture and develop the gift and use it for the Glory of God and for the liberation struggle of our people.

This subsistence, or manner of being of God is his one essence so far as it has personal properties.

When you focus on being a blessing, God makes sure that you are always blessed in abundance.

Two days after moving we recommended ourselves to God, Our Lord, and fled, hoping that, although it was late in the season and the fruits of the tunas were giving out, by remaining in the field we might still get over a good portion of the land.

When I see children, I see the face of God. That's why I love them so much. That's what I see.

'Thou shalt not get found out' is not one of God's commandments; and no man can be saved by trying to keep it.

Forgetfulness - a gift of God bestowed upon debtors in compensation for their destitution of conscience.

There is one thing higher than Royalty: and that is religion, which causes us to leave the world, and seek God.

The Christian must trust in a withdrawing God.

Disney had such a hold on the mind of America-they were Adolf Hitler. The whole country thought Disney was some sort of god and that animation was some sort of pure thing for children.

Into every soul, however purged and fenced, evil appears to have as much freedom of entrance as God Himself.

Learn about the world, the way it works, any kind of science and anthropology, it's really an interesting place we live in. Evolution is a really fantastic idea, even more than the idea of God I think.

All men are by nature equal, made all of the same earth by one Workman; and however we deceive ourselves, as dear unto God is the poor peasant as the mighty prince.

Classical philosophical theism maintained the ontological distinction between God and creative world that is necessary for any genuine theism by conceiving them to be of different substances, with particular attributes predicated of each.

To judge between good or bad, between successful and unsuccessful would take the eye of a God.

The very contradictions in my life are in some ways signs of God's mercy to me.