There is a weariness that this delightfully normal summer, God willing, may bring to an end. As a nation we should gain rest in normalcy. Whatever the politics, whatever should have been done in retrospect, things went ajar about one year ago and the academic year never came to a proper end. If one wished to teach, one had to find the room, the means, the methods and keep adapting. Many customs that mark ending never happened and so we entered what... Read more
The up to date are forever dated. The parochial are endlessly shocked by history. If you were in the Church of Holy Wisdom a few years ago, saying prayers, when it was a museum, then you know, just a bit, about the complexities of history. You were, barely, legal. You could pray, but many around you thought you should not be allowed to pray. This great church is now a mosque, again, and that is hard for global Christians. Very... Read more
We need the journalism of Larry Dexter as described by Howard R. Garis. Howard R. Garis was, we are promised in the sales pitch for the books series, a “practiced journalist.” If we read the books we will be given a “. . .true picture of the workings of a great newspaper. Incidents taken from life.” At the very least, we can read the aspirations of an early twenty-first century journalist for his craft. What was an idealized image of... Read more
There was a french horn in our tub and this is a hopeful sign of good things to come. When Hope, bandmaster and brass afficiando, cleans an instrument, there is promise that either she or some disciple is about to play. If you have not heard a College and a kindergarten make music at the same event, you have missed great hope. Making music is a higher pleasure than merely consuming music. Making ancient and new music, played by old and... Read more
Phillip E. Johnson once called from his office at UC Berkley to me in Mongolia and said: “We will advance the Ring so far toward Mount Doom that only a miracle will save us.” He said this, because he knew a miracle would save us. Oddly enough, a miracle has saved Christians, again and again. Why? The good, truth, beauty is greater than our weaknesses. This is the story of Christendom, broken, full of vice, but also containing heroes that pushed... Read more
The false normalcy harkens a change, a certain doom, but the winds of the Spirit are coming to rescue the faithful. The sea was very calm, like a pond, like glass, so the eyewitnesses say, the night the great ship went down. RMS Titanic went down into the depths of The Atlantic Ocean in pacific and frigid sea. The sinking at the time seemed a portent and if any event ever was an outer sign of great changes in the... Read more
There is a horrible idea regarding “critical race theory.” This bad idea has nothing to do with the merits or demerits of critical race theory. What is that bad, no good, very terrible idea? We should not criticize an idea nobody holds. We should not spike the football in a baseball game. Our description of “critical race theory”should be what the person holding “critical race theory” affirms or believes. If not, then our criticism is attacking something, but not “critical race theory” as... Read more
I am tempted by the thought that if a college is not urban with a farm and stock animals, then the eduction is not fit for purpose. This is not (quite) as quirky as it sounds! I have experience and an argument to back up this thought. Here is the experience. Our College and School have sheep at long last. Heidi and Gretchen have joined us and are, slowly, learning to frolic as good sheep should. Stock animals are not toys or... Read more
Hope is inevitably coming. What joy that will be! Nessie the Wonder Dog likes having all her people present. This is possible since two have moved out, though she remembers. Nothing is better for the Wonder Dog than when the missing people return for a visit. Hope and I can only agree! If Hope is gone, the central figure in her life, then she becomes restless. Any sound outside, and our urban-by-choice neighborhood has many sounds, and Nessie will run... Read more
The doves have hatched and we have a window box full of cheeps. Each morning I pass Momma Dove sitting over them: an image of many things to me in a mind getting ready to teach college philosophy. As she feeds, protects, and serves the little cheeps, she is an icon of the good God. One might find a morning devotional there, but I shall refrain. One could wax scientistic like a PBS documentary and tell of the cycle of... Read more
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