The Givenness Of Things

by Marilynne Robinson

the spirit of the times is one of joyless urgency,

There are so many works of the mind, so much humanity, that to disburden ourselves of ourselves is an understandable temptation.

the continuously variable inward weather in which we live

When I say Calvinism has faded, I am speaking of the uncoerced abandonment by the so-called mainline churches of their own origins, theology, culture, and tradition.

The learned and uncantankerous traditions seem, as I have said, to have fallen silent, to have retreated within their walls to dabble in feckless innovation and to watch their numbers dwindle.

The Sabbath has a way of doing just what it was meant to do, sheltering one day in seven from the demands of economics. Its benefits cannot be commercialized. Leisure, by way of contrast, is highly commercialized. But leisure is seldom more than a bit of time ransomed from habitual stress. Sabbath is a way of life, one long since gone from this country, of course, due to secularizing trends, which are really economic pressures that have excluded rest as an option, first of all from those most in need of it.

And the belief that is constantly urged on us is that if we are not desperate we are not paying attention.

Einstein said that the most incomprehensible thing about the universe is that it is comprehensible.