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" Gang members aren't frightened into acceptable behavior by increased penalties, enhanced punishments, and the promise of new detention facilities. "

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" God seems to be an unwilling participant in our efforts to pigeonhole Him. "

" Metro police can't infuse hope into those for whom hope is foreign. The algorithm does not exist that can heal the traumatized. Data-driven predictions won't result in the delivery of mental health services. "

" Most employers just aren't willing to look beyond the dumbest or worst thing someone has done. "

" Redemption is possible, and it is the measure of a civilized society. "

" Anyone who knows gangs knows that lawmakers cannot conceive of a law that would lead a hard-core gang member to 'think twice.' "

" God can get tiny if we're not careful. "

" I think not everything that works helps, and not everything that helps works. "

" I'm not opposed to success. "

" Kids are different from adults. They are not as developed as far as brain science, controlling impulses, and maturity, and fall prey to all kinds of pressures. "

" Homeboy Bakery is an alternative to kids who have found themselves, regrettably, in gangs and want to redirect their lives. "

" Like the suffering child, gang members act out of their despair, and their actions are all the more alarming now for our not having heeded their cry long ago. The shortsighted neglect that keeps us locked up in our outrage has also kept us from viable solutions. "

" As a society, we come up lacking in many of the marks of compassion and wisdom by which we measure ourselves as civilized. "

" No kid is seeking anything when he joins a gang; he's always fleeing something. He's not being pulled; he's being pushed by the circumstances in which he finds himself. "

" Does God feel like that same-sex marriage could happen? I don't think anybody who has a connection to God and God's understanding and depth of compassion who's gonna say 'no.' "

" I don't save people. God saves people. I can point them in the right direction. I can say, 'There's that door. I think if you walked through it, you'd be happier than you are.' "

" We are less than honest and commit a grave error if we insist that what happened to Rodney G. King was isolated and an exceptional case. The poor know better. "

" I have a lot of people in my life, and I think there's something key: the thing that leads to intimacy and relationship and connection is tenderness. "

" Gangs are bastions of conditional love, and one of the ways to counteract it is to offer community, which will always trump gang, and that's what happens at Homeboy Industries. "

" What is ultimately compelling for our children in helping them conjure images of a future for themselves is our willingness to walk with them as they do it. "

" Businesses have come and gone at Homeboy Industries. We have had starts and stops, but anything worth doing is worth failing at. We started Homeboy Plumbing. That didn't go so well. Who knew? People didn't want gang members in their homes. I just didn't see that coming. "

" The arms of God reach to embrace, and somehow you feel yourself just outside God's fingertips. "

" The wrong idea has taken root in the world. And the idea is this: there just might be lives out there that matter less than other lives. "

" The idea that any law enforcement agency or person would ever know these gang members better than Homeboy Industries is impossible. "

" I have never seen a hopeful person join a gang. "

" The highest hallmark of a civilized society is not the rapidity by which it exacts vengeance, but its ability to hold victim and victimizer in its compassionate heart. "

" Most citizens viewing the tape of Rodney G. King being beaten by police officers were stunned and uncomprehending. Most citizens, that is, but the urban poor. "

Police Officers

" You don't really get Jesus saying very often there'll be pie in the sky when you die. He's really talking about now and today, and it's supposed to be like that. You're supposed to delight in what's right in front of you. "

" I spent the summers of 1984 and 1985 as an associate pastor at Dolores Mission Church, the poorest parish in the Los Angeles archdiocese. In 1986, I became pastor of the church. "

" I want to be prophetic and take stands and stand with those on the margins, and I want to laugh as much as I can. "

" The draconian spirit that seeks to enhance penalties and to lower the age at which juveniles will be tries as adults, is part of the 'whole cloth' of three strikes. Our failure to address the depair of our inner-city youth is only delayed by our over-confidence in a stance that is 'tougher than thou.' "