From Here to Eternity

Some years ago I had dinner with friends in London. When I was leaving their home I was introduced to the husband’s father, who was busy digging in the garden. Taken by surprise and not knowing what to say I asked a rather stupid question – “And what are you doing?” I said. “I do be digging the garden,” he replied, glancing at his son as if to say – “Who’s your fatuous friend?” Intrigued by his answer I asked a nun who taught Irish in Dublin what was meant by the expression, ‘I do be digging the garden’. She said that it is the English rendering of what is called in Irish – the present continuing tense. It means – “I have been digging the garden, I am digging the garden and when you stop asking the obvious, I will continue to dig the garden!”

There is no such tense in English, but it perfectly expresses the meaning of the Aramaic idiom, as spoken by Jesus, and in this case by St John, when he said, ‘God is Love’. He wasn’t trying to give a definition of what love is in itself, as a Greek Philosopher would do, but he was describing in his own language, that God is ‘Loving’, that’s what he is, and that’s what he does, continually. read on .......