An A–Zlife profoundly, and he said, “By thinking on it continually.”
And I keep thinking about that phrase and think that if I keep
thinking on things continually ... you never know what will
happen.’
F – is about Facts
In his essay, ‘The Decay of Lying’, Oscar Wilde decries what he
calls the ‘monstrous worship of facts’: ‘There is something truly
monstrous about scientifi c curiosity because it seems to extend
to facts something they do not deserve. Facts must be respected
but never worshipped.’
G – is a prayer to God
Dear God,
Of all the many paradoxes about writing about you – given
that you’re there at all – the oddest must be that you know
what I’m going to write before I’ve penned a word; before I’ve
even thought it. That must be even more dreary for you than
knowing you have read it all before.
However, we humans must write and talk. Maybe in your gra-
ciousness that’s why there are stories of you writing and talking
too, at least through intermediaries. Though I have to confess
that I wish some of your followers could accept that human
words are inevitably a pale refl ection of your own words, and
that we are forced to use metaphors and the like. You’d think
no Christian could make the mistake of treating them as infal-
lible, and would realise they must seek the Word behind the
words – or maybe you wouldn’t be so foolish as to have such a
hope. As the Good Book itself suggests, you are used to casting
your pearls before swine.
I’m particularly fond of what happened to Thomas Aquinas –
you know, on 6 December 1273 – when he surprised his breth-
ren, though not you, and told his friend Reginald that he would
not write any more. What I love about this moment is that it