Now she could smell what the jaguar could smell, odors deeper and richer than anything she had experienced before, layers of smell she could read like Fray Tomás had read the words in her father’s book: the wet decay of leaves, the death fear of a...
Watching someone you love… die? There are no words for how broken that makes a person. It’s like waking up from a bad dream only to find out that it’s you reality, it’s like watching sunlight fade from the sky, like watching death suck the on...
Somehow we American pastors, without really noticing what was happening, got our vocations redefined in the terms of American careerism. We quit thinking of the parish as a location for pastoral spirituality and started thinking of it as an opportuni...
He was like one of those pictures full of small errors, the kind you could only pick out by searching the image from every angle, and even then, a few always slipped by. On the surface, Eli seemed perfectly normal, but now and then Victor would catch...
Whatever the cause, I could not meet his sunshine with cloud. If this were my last moment with him, I would not waste it in forced, unnatural distance. I loved him well - too well not to smite out of my path even Jealousy herself, when she would have...
Failure to use tax money to finance things not liked by the taxpaying public is routinely called ‘censorship.’ If such terminology were used consistently, virtually all of life would be just one long, unending censorship, as individuals choose wh...
When we truly fear God, our fear of other things and other people begins to wane. Big fears make little fears go away. We can spend our days worrying about a host of daily challenges, but let the word cancer be mentioned in the same sentence with our...
Principles are what people have instead of God. To be a Christian means among other things to be willing if necessary to sacrifice even your highest principles for God's or your neighbour's sake the way a Christian pacifist must be willing to pick up...
You cannot explain, with the limitations of language and inexperience, why your body can cause such a sudden, fumbling response in someone else, nor can you put into exact words what you feel about your body, explain the thrum it feels in proximity t...
One year I went as a pirate, but from then on I went as a hobo. It's a word you don't hear anymore. Along with 'tramp,' it's been replaced by 'homeless person,' which isn't the same thing. Unlike someone who was evicted or lost his house in a fire, t...
Solitude is used to teach us how to live with other people. Rage is used to show us the infinite value of peace. Boredom is used to underline the importance of adventure & spontaneity. Silence is used to teach us to use words responsibly. Tiredness i...
I had lines inside me, a string of guiding lights. I had language. Fiction and poetry are doses, medicines. What they heal is the rupture reality makes on the imagination. I had been damaged, and a very important part of me had been destroyed - that ...
Part of the problem with the word 'disabilities' is that it immediately suggests an inability to see or hear or walk or do other things that many of us take for granted. But what of people who can't feel? Or talk about their feelings? Or manage their...
It might be a little silly for someone getting to be my age to put this into words, but I just want to make sure I get the facts down clearly : I'm the kind of person who likes to be by himself. To put a finer point on it, I'm the type of person who ...
She was enfolded in the great wings of Mrs. Whatsit and she felt comfort and strength pouring through her. Mrs. Whatsit was not speaking aloud, and yet through the wings Meg understood words. "My child, do not despair. Do you think we would have brou...
The woman who first gives life, light, and form to our shadowy conceptions of beauty, fills a void in our spiritual nature that has remained unknown to us till she appeared. Sympathies that lie too deep for words, too deep almost for thoughts, are to...
This is an extremely difficult matter for modern readers of the gospels to grasp, but Luke never meant for his story about Jesus's birth at Bethlehem to be understood as historical fact. Luke would have had no idea what we in the modern world even me...
Dear Beloved woman, Time… so much time has passed since my love wrote his last words for me. And yet I remember it as if it were yesterday. I remember writing back and for the first time since I had left home I told my love what kind of darkness su...
Or one meaning of here is “in this world, in this life, on earth. In this place or position, indicating the presence of,” or in other words, I am here. It also means to hand something to somebody—Here you are. Here, he said to her. Here both re...
The routines of almost all famous writers, from Charles Darwin to John Grisham, similarly emphasise specific starting times, or number of hours worked, or words written. Such rituals provide a structure to work in, whether or not the feeling of motiv...
Who are you not to be great? You, with the imagination of a brilliant child and the powers of an ancient god. Who are you to be ordinary? You, who can resend life or raise the dead. Who are you to be afraid? You, who can serve as judge and jury while...
