The Little Liar

by Mitch Albom

He believed working beside the enemy would protect him from their wrath. Silly thought. Would a lamb be protected from a wolf simply by walking alongside it?

But a lie comes in many disguises; sometimes, it looks like safety.

“If you hate that one so much, why not just kill him?” an officer once asked. “Killing the flesh is easy,” Udo said. “Killing the spirit is a challenge.”

When the Wolf stirred his followers in the 1930s, it worked not because Germans were inclined to hate Jews, but because all humans are inclined to hate others if they believe they are the cause of their unhappiness. The trick is to convince them.

At that moment, with his heartbeat slowing, it occurred to Nico how nice it was that the three of them were all together again, like the time they climbed the White Tower by the gulf. And as everything he had done in his life—all the lies, and all the efforts to make amends—came rushing past in a final blur, Nico realized his grandfather had been right about that prisoner, who kept painting and painting until the tower was white enough to cleanse his sins. A man, to be forgiven, will do anything.

Humans are broken. Susceptible to sin. They were created with minds to explore, but they often choose to explore their own power. They lie. And those lies let them think they are God. Truth is the only thing that stops them.