I believe with the best of who I am in God, but I sometimes think if anybody would watch me and [they] didn't believe a damn thing, they would have a very hard time deciding which of us is which.

the story of any one of us is in some measure the story of us all

To be commanded to love God at all, let alone in the wilderness, is like being commanded to be well when we are sick, to sing for joy when we are dying of thirst, to run when our legs are broken. But this is the first and great commandment nonetheless. Even in the wilderness - especially in the wilderness - you shall love him.

Almost nothing that makes any real difference can be proved.

He [Jesus] speaks in parables, and though we have approached these parables reverentially all these many years and have heard them expounded as grave and reverent vehicles of holy truth, I suspect that many if not all of them were originally not grave at all but were antic, comic, often more than just a little shocking.

What gets me back to church, I think, is thinking maybe this time that question "Is it true?" will be answered, not just in terms of somebody saying, "Yes, it's true," but something will happen in a sermon or maybe shuffling up to the Eucharist, or in the old lady who's sitting beside me with a Bible - maybe something will happen which will show me that it's true. So I go back thinking, maybe this time I'll be lucky.

Life is grace. Sleep is forgiveness. The night absolves. Darkness wipes the slate clean, not spotless to be sure, but clean enough for another day's chalking.