It is so beautiful I will not use the picture I foolishly took: The David. I am not an artist or an expert and have learned to trust guides, so I will not even say much about Michelangelo’s masterpiece. I only know I do not wish to own it. That was not much to learn, but something. Beauty cannot be owned or even created. Beauty can be discovered the way Michelangelo, a great explorer of beauty, found The David locked in... Read more
Sometimes ideas have consequences: good and bad. Often people who hate an idea will pretend that an idea has consequences, but it does not. An idea might have consequences, just not those consequences. This is an another important thing to know! Here is a common example I often meet in the wilds of social media. Suppose a person, after careful thought, decides she knows an idea to be true: “Heaven exists and knowing Jesus is the only way to go... Read more
Whatever your point of view, Christian or atheist, Republican or Democrat, pointing to “the problem” is easy. The solution is the tricky part where godlings , gurus, and grifters arrive to sell something harmful to solve the problem. For example? Following the wise advice that one should begin with one’s own group: even if one thinks traditional Christians and evangelicals got cultural critique right, many of the solutions were as bad as the problems in the 1980’s and 1990’s. An... Read more
I asked for new voices and Jake Carr stepped up . . . Mr. Carr graduated from Biola University and the Torrey Honors Institute in 2015. His is currently working towards a PhD in Philosophy and Education at Teachers College, Columbia University. Learning and teaching are his greatest loves, save only the love for his wife, Dawnielle, and his son, Rémi. Mr. Carr take the wheel: The following quotation is from Readings in Classical Chinese Philosophy, edited by Philip... Read more
Do you ever get tired of the times? I do. Sometimes I am tired, just sick of the noise, failure (some mine), and ugliness of these times. Evil seems to prevail and good flustered. Why stand for the right? Why not just despair and go play some endless online game? But if we are tired, there are those at the very bottom, with not even the time or ability to read online. Seeing injustice triumph, decadence spread, tyranny empowered grinds... Read more
Do not devour the poor. When the weak are despised by the elite, the rich, the educated, and groan for justice, stand with them. Take your complaint to God. That’s a continuous theme in Sacred Scriptures. The Bible speaks for the powerless, because few do. The poor are too beaten down, often hungry. One way to know the powerless is they have no network, no means to speak.. They are forgotten, when “lucky” enough to not be despised. The prophet... Read more
LORD, I have heard the report of you, and your work, O LORD, do I fear. In the midst of the years revive it; in the midst of the years make it known; in wrath remember mercy. The prophet heard what the LORD was doing and was afraid. God was coming to Judah and God was mad.* God is a just God and that should make any of us fearful. God is a merciful God and that gives hope. Sometimes people... Read more
I asked for new voices and got some outstanding writers! Today we hear from the erudite James R. Harrington. James R. Harrington earned his M.A. in Ancient History at California State University Fulleron and is a member of the Torrey Honors Institute. James has been a classical educator in a variety of settings over the past thirteen years. He lives in Houston with his wife, Sharon, and their daughter. Harrington began with a series on shields in classical literature and now... Read more
I long to see the glory of the Lord, but I cannot see His glory if my heart’s true ambition is for the world, pleasure, or the diabolical. The greatest glories, the most intense joys, are only possible in justice, modesty, and holiness. The knowledge of God drives out ignorance. There is nothing more ignorant than self-satisfaction, the opposite of self-knowledge. The wise Socrates urged us to know ourselves. As a young man, God have mercy, I thought self-knowledge was taking an inventory... Read more
God is with us: justice with mercy are certain. And yet. And yet we will not see all the good things of God in this life. The consummation of God’s plan will only come when we are glorified and made new in the City of God. There is no Utopia in this life, no city that can ever be wholly just. Sometimes this makes the coming triumph of love seem a con, a sales pitch where the delivery of the... Read more
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