Tabitha

“To make things that don’t exist yet—and don’t need to exist, because that is the very definition of art—and to send them out into the world is wildly, impractically, gorgeously hopeful.

“This is my way of saying there is no creativity without hope. Creativity is inherently hopeful, and the reverse is also true: Hope is inherently creative. Hope is

“Eighty percent of any meeting or gathering might be stupid and beneath you, but the other twenty percent will save you: it will open up your brain and expand your life and give you connection, a place in the family of man.”

— Anne Lamott, Somehow (121)

“But rationalizing what God does involves the risk of losing its difficulty and otherness to human expectations. His great forgiveness of the first criminal offends people’s sense of justice, unless they can find a way to read vengefulness into the tale. We are instead to learn that mercy is nearer than justice to Godliness, and that mercy can

“One of the most pervasive myths about writing is that specificity is limiting. It’s just the opposite. You might think that a poem about love or truth or freedom—a large abstraction—would reach more people if it were written with universality in mind. But if your goal is to speak to everyone, and to remove particulars from the piece because others