I have tried to devote my life - with all my husband failures, father failures, pastor failures, friend failures, any other possible failures I'm sure I've done them - to the God-centeredness of God and my aspiring, yearning to join Him in that activity. God is passionate about hallowing the name of God.
Let me be clear. 'The Good Father' isn't a handbook on how to assassinate the president.
My father was a member of the Teamsters Union in California, where he helped to organize better health care for workers. My mother worked for more than 20 years on an assembly line.
My father is Italian, and I never met my paternal grandparents. The family name was 'Caroselli' and it was changed in the mid '50s. I think they wanted to assimilate, which was pretty common, although I love the name 'Caroselli.'
When we reach out to assist the least of Heavenly Father's children, we do it unto Him. That is the essence of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
I was born in Bangkok in 1968 and grew up in Southeast Asia with my Thai mom and my American father, who first came to the region to fight in Vietnam and stayed to work assisting refugees.
The only person who ever called me Paul was my father, so I always associate it with doing something wrong, you know. So, you know, occasionally, people will come up to me on the street and try to, you know, ingratiate themselves and call me Paul. I don't like it, actually.
My father was a research scientist in tropical medicine, so I always assumed I would be a scientist, too. I felt that medicine was too vague and inexact, so I chose physics.
I'd seen my father. He was a poor man, and I watched him do astonishing things.
My father believed in astrology. His astrologer had predicted that his daughter would become a writer someday. My father would nag me, but I didn't write a word till he passed away. I wish he could see me now.
The Lord has redeemed all of us, all of us, with the blood of Christ: all of us, not just Catholics. Everyone! 'Father, the atheists?' Even the atheists. Everyone!
My father worked every day; my brother and sister had to travel many hours to study, so Atletico were for people like us.
The first ATM in Hong Kong was actually at the foot of the bank. I remember my father using it. And I find it absolutely terrifying that - something about the way the machine just kind of coughed up money with no difficulty.
When I became a novice monk, I lived in a temple where the atmosphere was quite like in a family. The abbot is like a father and other monks are like your big brothers, your small, younger brothers. It is a kind of family.
My father was a negative person. He actually taught me to be negative, if that makes any sense. I remember him saying: 'You know there's no point in expecting anything good to happen because it won't.' I grew up in such a negative atmosphere.
I was having a conversation with my father and he was talking about this thing - strangeness and charm. It's actually the name of the two smallest particles that there are when you split the atom, so I wrote a song around it. I even managed to fit the word 'hydrogen' in there. Isn't that a nice thing for scientists to call them though?
God our Heavenly Father knows us by name. Jesus Christ lives; He is the Messiah. He loves us. The Atonement of Jesus Christ is real; it brings immortality to all and opens the door to eternal life.
One thing I will say about my father is that he was very much out in the forefront talking about his beliefs about being a complete fighter and attaching a philosophy to that and teaching it.
Black men and women were not allowed to register to vote. My own mother, my own father, my grandfather and my uncles and aunts could not register to vote because each time they attempted to register to vote, they were told they could not pass the literacy test.
I'm not a great reader, believe it or not. It's not the vocabulary - my father made me read the dictionary when I was little - but my attention span is poor. Takes me months to read one book.
