Tuesday, January 7, 2020

I don't want to talk yet

"I turned to Mark, then one and a half, and asked, 'Mark, why don't you talk yet?'  As we expected, he said nothing.  But later that evening, while I was giving him a bath, and he was maneuvering plastic boats and small floating dinosaurs, he suddenly stopped, looked at me, and said, 'I don't want to talk yet.'  Astonished, since I'd never heard him speak a complete sentence, I burst out laughing, then sang him a song from the Mikado, about a bird that didn't want to talk" (p. 73).
Why Religion? : A Personal Story ~ by Elaine Pagels, 2018, memoir
Why does religion still exist in the twenty-first century?  Why do so many continue to argue about the questions it raises?  What purpose does it serve in our lives?  In the wake of great personal tragedy, Pagels reflects on the persistence and nature of belief and why religion matters.
I'm "teasing" you with a bit of a paragraph from the book I'm reading.  Her little boy has a mind of his own!