Athena, You came into our lives in a small way and then grew in importance. Early on we loved you, because you were beautiful. A human is designed to see beauty, you were, and so we loved you. It did not hurt that you demanded little and gave so much. You returned affection and our veneration, dear Athena, with warmth. We did not know then, what we know now, that you would protect us from the vermin that fill our... Read more
Imagine reading a great work and deciding you are a hero. This will not go well. John Wilkes Booth played Mark Antony in Julius Caeser. Antony gets the best speech defending the murdered Caesar against the assassin: Brutus. Booth killed a man he thought a tyrant, our greatest President: Abraham Lincoln. He shot the Emancipator in the back of the head and leapt to the stage and shouted his practiced line: Sic semper tyrannis. Booth broke his leg and was left... Read more
Most of us are just good enough to be John Wilkes Booth, but a few are good enough to be Brutus. That man is dangerous to liberty, because he has a soul noble enough to love his country, freedom, and the glories of the past, but not great enough to face the trouble of his day openly. Christianity has no place for the conspirator. God help us, but many of us Tweet like Patrick Henry, but act like Judas. We... Read more
Barbara Bush was (so far as I can tell) a very good wife, mother, grandmother, and friend. She was not (mostly) a power in politics. In so far as she was political, her instincts were a mixture of good and bad. Her main focus was on literacy and there may be someone out there opposed to literacy, but they certainly are not Christian. We are people of a Book! There is a good custom that we honor the dead for... Read more
As a writer, Philip Glass is a great composer. I will try to defend this slight momentarily, but first let me glory in a splendid music of Philip Glass leaving aside the words that go with some of his music. We were lucky enough to hear the Pacific Chorale and Orchestra sing and play The Passion of Ramakrishna at Carnegie Hall, a work the Chorale and Orchastra commissioned years ago on the West coast. The forty-five minutes of this piece could... Read more
This is not about the President, but about what I saw and heard when part of my family visited Trump Tower.* We are a family of political junkies and never miss the chance to go to a political library or home of a President (even Nixon) when we can. If you visit from childhood (thanks to like minded parents), then you see and hear a good bit. Nothing is better than being a youngling and meeting a guide who knows... Read more
The Agony of the Delayed Flight I think the person in despair, because of our delayed flight, ranting, and careening, attempting to do something, was wasting his life. He would “scratch his way” to the front and so he did. What to do instead? Let’s glory in the Union, fight hard for our beliefs, relax a bit as well, and be thankful. Perhaps, we should thank God as well for living in a good time. We can let the fear... Read more
Last week we ate some feast food, literally (lamb!) and spiritually. The Holy Week and Paschal services are intense, hard, and full of wonder. Today I got some plain cooking: pinto beans and cornbread. It was right good. On a trip to California this week, a hardworking man asked if I was a Christian. I am and told him so. He began to share about his life and what Jesus had done for him. He was a bit older than... Read more
Some fears are rational, eating sushi from a street vendor in Charleston, and some, fear of flying, are not. Yet as I can attest, while knowledge and thought can control irrational fears, some do not go away altogether. I do not like to fly, despite how safe it is, and recently as I was about to board, the television in the airport started flashing news that my airline had just had an accident. Ideally, my first thought would been concern for... Read more
As I try to understand our mess on race here in the United States, I have been reading about a man who thought he could hold back justice: John Wilkes Booth. He was very bright, a splendid actor, and brave. He was a keen investor, made massive amounts of money when he wished on stage, but decided his job was to decapitate the government in Washington. He shot and killed Abraham Lincoln. Booth was a mix of hubris, racism, and... Read more
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