What Do We Owe All the Valjeans?

January 17, 2013 By 29 Comments
valjean bishop

Since Les Mis seems to prompt endless reprises on this blog, you won't be surprised to find I'm over at First Things today talking about Valjean, Javert, and what we owe to the prisoners in our criminal justice system. When Jean Valjean appears for the first time in the stage musical Les Misérables, he is in the process of being paroled, and he is in an argument with his former jailer. When Inspector Javert barks out “You are a thief,” Valjean replies, “I stole a loaf of bread.” For … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Morality in Practice Tagged With: , , 29 Comments

Help Me Keep A New Year’s Resolution

January 1, 2013 By 22 Comments
dnd character sheet

New Year's is a time for cached thoughts.   When people ask about resolutions, my first thoughts are "Should I be not eating something?  Or doing cardio?"  We tend to run down the list of cliche resolutions and decide which we should take on.  The standard resolutions may not be particularly well-tailored to you, but it's about as hard to ignore the defaults as to not think of an elephant. So, I have a wacky workaround.  Instead of thinking of disciplines to take on (we tend to grade New … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Morality in Practice Tagged With: 22 Comments

How do you finish being angry?

December 30, 2012 By 21 Comments
bruce banner hulk

This review of Lawrence Cunningham's The Seven Deadly Sins: A Visitor's Guide is part of the Patheos Book Club, and my copy was free. My college debate group had many aphorisms, one of which was, "All sins are pride."  So I read The Seven Deadly Sins: A Visitor's Guide waiting to see what Cunningham had to say about my sin.  I didn't expect to be caught by his meditation on anger/wrath, which I've always thought of as the most boring sin. Coming from a background of stoicism, I just … [Read more...]

Filed Under: Reviews/Recommendations Tagged With: , 21 Comments