Quotes from Madeleine L'Engle

I found myself earnestly explaining to the young minister that I did not believe in God, 'but I've discovered that I can't live as though I didn't believe in him. As long as I don't need to say any more than that I try to live as though I believe in God, I would very much like to come to church--if you'll let me.

The minute anybody starts telling you what God thinks, or exactly why he does such and such, beware.

It's a good thing to have all the props pulled out from under us occasionally. It gives us some sense of what is rock under our feet, and what is sand. It stops us from taking anything for granted. It has also taught me about living in the immediate moment.

Because of the very nature of the world as it is today, our children receive in school a heavy load of scientific and analytic subjects, so it is in their reading for fun, for pleasure, that they must be guided into creativity. These are forces working in the world as never before in the history of mankind for standardization, for the regimentation of us all, or what I like to call making muffins of us, muffins all like every other muffin in the muffin tin.

Pray all you like, ask anything you want, but don't forget that he never promised he'd say yes. He never guaranteed us anything. Not anything at all. Except one thing. Just one thing . . . . That he cares . . . That is all. Nothing else.

Tell your sister I'm all right," Mrs Whatsit said to Charles. "Tell her my intentions are good." "The road to hell is paved with good intentions," Charles intoned.

It really helped ever so much because it made me mad, and when I'm mad I don't have room to be scared.

If she wanted to write Christian fiction, how was she to go about it? I told her that if she is truly and deeply a Christian, what she writes is going to be Christian, whether she mentions Jesus or not. And if she is not, in the most profound sense, Christian, then what she writes is not going to be Christian, no matter how many times she invokes the name of the Lord.

Active happiness is not a common state. Active unhappiness is better than dull days. Katherine was seldom in an intermediate stage.

I suspect that in every good marriage there are times when love seems to be over. Sometimes these desert lines are simply the only way to the next oasis, which is far more lush and beautiful after the desert crossing than it could possibly have been without it.

You don't know how lucky you are to be loved. Meg said in a startled way, I guess I never thought of that. I guess I just took it for granted.

It is not the vaccinationists but the antivaccinationists who generate zeal. People are zealous for a cause when they are not quite positive that it is true.