REFLECTIONS

"Most simply, a metaphor is seeing one thing as something else, pretending 'this' is 'that' because we do not know how to think or talk about 'this,' so we use 'that' as a way of saying something about it... Poets use metaphor all the time because they are constantly speaking about the great unknowns -mortality, love, fear, joy, guilt, hope, and so on. Religious language is deeply Metaphorical for the same reason...

Sallie McFague, Metaphorical Theology, Fortress Press, 1982