For my weekly writing spot on this site, see the One-Minute Mystic, with a new meditation posted every Monday. Also see The Village, the story of Misty Longings, England's most beautiful village, posted episode by episode earlier this year.       My fellow guest on the radio was caught out. Performing effortlessly, a radio natural, she was suddenly asked to comment on something she hadn't previously considered. She said: "I don't have a soundbite to hand, I'm afraid." No soundbite, no comment. The fortunes of both Tories and Labour have been amply blessed by soundbites. The famous picture of a very long dole queue, with the soundbite, "Labour isn't working", brilliantly caught the mood of despair in the country after the industrial troubles of the 70s. It was key in the Conservatives' election success. Nearly as effective was Tony Blair's "Education, education, education". As the wheels finally fell off the Tory wagon, leaving it in a mire of disrepute, here were bright young words to catch the nation's mood of aspiration for something altogether more wholesome. Both soundbites have gone on to sound a little hollow of course, but that's only to be expected. These soundbites seek only the brief conquest of your mood – not your consideration. The Church has always had its own share of Bitemeisters – those who make religion quick and easy to remember. Most of these attempts are deeply disreputable, and if everyone of them were written down, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written. But here are one or two of my least favourite things: "If you feel far from God, its not God who's moved." Not true. No one has moved. But internal splintering can deceive, as with the abandoned cries of Jesus on the cross. Or how about: "Those who pray together, stay together." Nice ring to it, but again not true, and a lie which serves only to promote guilt in the guiltless. "Christians are good news people." We have a problem here. It's like saying: "All shirts are pink with green stripes" – not true often enough to be worth saying. The best soundbites contain both dreams and nightmares, the dissonance of truth. They say one thing, and they also say the opposite, leaving us adventurers of the in-between. The ancient mariner contemplates "Water, water everywhere nor any drop to drink". Is there a better description of the familiar human state of famine amid plenty? Or another old favourite: "I'd love to help you out. Which way did you come in?" – a soundbite along the fault line between our longing for care, and the fact that we ourselves don't care that much. The beatitudes of Jesus are perfect soundbites of dissonant truth – happy are the sad, and all that. Though maybe my favourite New Testament soundbite comes from the mouth of a Roman centurion: "I believe. Forgive my unbelief." "Life breaks us all. But some are made strong at the broken places." Hemingway also knew how to make soundbites wonderfully. More writings © Simon Parke