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“hope like mad” is a quote from Jack Caputo from his book On Religion. He wrestles with the question from Augustine “What do I love when I love my God?”

I love this question in no small part because it assumes that anybody worth their salt loves God. If you do not love God what good are you? You are too caught up in the meanness of self-love and self-gratification to be worth a thinker’s damn. Your soul soars only with a spike in the Dow-Jones Industrial average; your heart leaps only at the prospect of a new tax break. The devil take you. He already has. Religion is for lovers, for men and women of passion, for real people who believe in something, who HOPE LIKE MAD in something, who love something with a love that surpasses understanding. Faith, hope and love, and of these three the best is love… But what do they love? What do I love when I love my God? That is their question. That is my question.