A love of nature is a consolation against failure.
Maybe it's our sins that give God consolation when he finally has to give us cancer.
There are so many people who don't know small towns exist. When I write, I want to give my readers two things: one is a sense of consolation, and two, I want to make them laugh.
On the 11th anniversary of 9/11, it is some consolation that the man most responsible for that terrible morning will not be smiling smugly to himself as satellite TV brings to the leafy boulevards of Abbottabad the somber images of New Yorkers commemorating those who perished in the Twin Towers.
I have sympathy for anyone who finds consolation anywhere we can. And many people do find it in religious tradition as it has been. I mean, I love much of that tradition. But somehow, that just didn't speak to me in the way that it does to some.
The universe doesn't owe us condolence or consolation; it doesn't owe us a nice warm feeling inside.
I think art is a consolation regardless of its content. It has the power to move and make you feel like you're not.
I don't go to church any more, but I think that Catholicism is rather like the brand they use on cattle: I feel so formed in that Catholic mould that I don't think I could adopt any other form of spirituality. I still get feelings of consolation about churches.
