Life & Wisdom Quote by Rita Mae Brown

A prayer gets flipped into a punchline, and the punchline carries teeth. Rita Mae Brown takes the familiar plea from the Lord's Prayer - a line built on humility and dependence - and turns it into a declaration of competence in vice: don't worry about steering me wrong; I'll manage. The comedy works because it uses a shared cultural script as a trampoline. You hear the original in your head, and the gap between piety and self-awareness does the work.

Brown's intent isn't just to be naughty. It's to puncture the performance of innocence that so often surrounds "temptation", especially for people (women, queer people) historically expected to appear spotless while being judged relentlessly for desire. The speaker isn't begging for protection; she's admitting appetite, agency, and maybe even a fondness for the chase. That sly confidence reads like liberation: the refusal to outsource moral choices to God, society, or any external authority.

Subtext: moral panic is frequently theater. By claiming she can "find the way" herself, the speaker suggests temptation isn't some demonic ambush; it's mapped into everyday life, often by our own curiosity. The line also mocks the idea that virtue is passive, something maintained only if you're kept away from the wrong door. Brown's voice lands as secular, feminist, and irreverent: if we're going to talk about sin, let's at least be honest about who wants it and why.