After fifty-four years of life, I am convinced that beauty makes us wonder and wondering produces love. Love drives us to seek the beloved and then we find God. This is the love of wisdom and while tools of analytic philosophy are priceless, they are not the love itself. Love moves me. As a result, fear is gone. Here are four rules at fifty-four for my life: This side of Paradise, thank God, the discussion never ends. Keep listening, asking... Read more
Many of the most important events of my life cannot be proven by external evidence. Despite social media, camera phones, and a daily blog, I cannot prove these things happened. You have to take my word for it. Personal events are often, by nature, private events. Try to remember a romantic moment, the loyalty of a friend at a key juncture, or a wise word from a mentor. These events happened, but they were, by nature, intimate. Privacy is often... Read more
Star Wars had me at the moment Luke Skywalker blew up some fighters and Han Solo’s response was “Don’t get cocky, kid.” This was a perfect line because, by that time, I was Luke Skywalker, whirling around shooting fighters with him, and rejoicing in his/our skills. This is the power of great movie making! When Han (Harrison “You Will Soon Be My Summer Movie Hero” Ford) took young Luke down, he was reminding me of something: I had not done much. I was... Read more
We have loved being in Pittsburgh, but we would have come even if the Conference was in Newark, New Jersey. Where were we? We have been meeting with the Association of Classical Christian Schools and if you lack hope, know hope. All my life I have wanted to bring the best possible education to everyone. I have always hated the fact that the rest of us never got the education that elites could take for granted. My job has been academic... Read more
Marriage is a bloodless martyrdom, dying to self, the false self we have constructed so that we can live together as our true selves. That’s a good, hard, joyful process! Over time I have been taught so much by Hope, but a good list must have limits, so here are thirty-one truths for our thirty-one years together. I. Truths of Behavior Hope loves gentle touch and gentle words. Teasing is not pleasing. Don’t do mean things. Discover the way she... Read more
They tell me I do not wish to know how sausages are made. That is fine with me since I wish to eat and not make sausages. If the sausage is sufficiently delicious, then the messiness of the process means little to me. Assuming rudimentary morality in the making, the sausage is the thing that will satisfy the appetite of even a king. This brings me to how we got the collection of books that we now call the Bible.... Read more
“Show me God!” used to be a demand from the reality challenged. This is rather like saying: “Please point out the number one” or “Draw a picture of love.” We can represent immaterial objects, but we cannot show their essence materially. Given infinite red Lego building blocks over infinite time, you will never build a blue number one. Fortunately, most secularists have a better handle on reality and do not ask for material proof for an immaterial object. They also... Read more
I hope I have learned more than one thing from my dad, but here is one lesson for today. Over the course of his life, I have seen my dad “lose” in a power struggle rather than go fully public, fight as hard as he could, and win. Dad is no weakling. He will tell the truth to power or to his employers regardless of the cost. I can remember times when, if you listened to him preach after such... Read more
We are a culture that likes celebrities. Making art is one way to become a celebrity, though not the easiest. Fans gather around writers whose weaker works even find defenders in fandom: see Joss Whedon about Dollhouse. Yet in another way, the artist, even the biography of the artist, is less important than the work. I was blessed enough to study Homer in graduate school after scholars got over their destruction of the text looking for “influences” and searching for an author. Who... Read more
“I would do what you are doing,” the student said to me, “without your errors.” He listed them for me and he was mostly right. So it goes if you start things. We were doing well enough that students forgot it was amazing our program existed at all. They began to worry. One student worried about our timing: what if we had waited longer, planned more, and executed better? I did not want to point out that this meant that he would... Read more
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