Death is contagious; it is contracted the moment we are conceived.
Interpretation
This quote suggests that the awareness of mortality begins at the moment of life itself.
Madeleine L'Engle's quote touches on the profound idea that the concept of death is integral to life. From the very moment of conception, we are aware, even if unconsciously, of the inevitability of our mortality. This existential awareness shapes our experiences, influences our choices, and adds depth to our understanding of life and its fleeting nature.
In practice
In a reflective conversation about life and mortality at a family reunion, this quote could spark a deeper discussion about the human experience.
Truth is what is true, and it's not necessarily factual. Truth and fact are not the same thing. Truth does not contradict or deny facts, but it goes through and beyond facts. This is something that it is very difficult for some people to understand. Truth can be dangerous.
George MacDonald gives me renewed strength during times of trouble--times when I have seen people tempted to deny God--when he says, "The Son of God suffered unto death, not that men might not suffer, but that their sufferings might be like his.
If you don't recount your family history, it will be lost. Honor your own stories and tell them too. The tales may not seem very important, but they are what binds families and makes each of us who we are.
I never want to lose the story-loving child within me, or the adolescent, or the young woman, or the middle-aged one, because all together they help me to be fully alive on this journey, and show me that I must be willing to go where it takes me, even through the valley of the shadow.
The minute we begin to think we have all the answers, we forget the questions.
When we believe in the impossible, it becomes possible, and we can do all kinds of extraordinary things.
But the perception of life as an organic unity is a slow achievement, and depends for its growth on a people's entry into the main current of world-events.
We are all as much extraordinary phenomena of nature as trees, clouds, the patterns in running water, the flickering of fire, the arrangement of the stars and the form of a galaxy.
What shall I say, O Muslims, I know not myself, I am neither a Christian, nor a Jew, nor a Zoroastrian, nor a Muslim.
I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.
It takes time for the absent to assume their true shape in our thoughts.
What good would politics be, if it didnβt give everyone the opportunity to make moral compromises.
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