In my various courses this semester we have spent a good deal of time developing and discussing a specific moral perspective that provides guidance for how to live a life of meaning and purpose in a world that provides neither directly or easily. In my honors colloquium on Montaigne’s essays, we have explored the influence that the ancient Stoics had on Montaigne as he lived in 16th century France during the violent Wars of Religion. In my team-taught interdisciplinary course... Read more
In her award-winning trilogy of novels about Thomas Cromwell, the consigliere and fixer for Henry VIII, Hilary Mantel explores the dynamic of how the son of a violent and abusive father, over many years as a soldier, a merchant, and ultimately a self-made lawyer makes his presence known at court through his sharp insights and practical wisdom. Those of noble and aristocratic birth do not appreciate the rising influence of this low-born peasant. Early in the first novel in the... Read more
Today is St. Patrick’s Day, not my favorite holiday (as you’ll see below). Portions of what follows is included in an early chapter of my work-in-progress book Nice Work If You Can Get It: Stories and Lessons from a Lifetime in the Classroom. The section of the chapter is called “Lighten Up!” Enjoy! A few years ago, I had a brief locker room conversation with a campus security guard who frequently tortures himself at the gym around the same time that... Read more
Truth isn’t sympathetic to our need for certainty or stability. Jared Enns, “The Bible for Normal People” There is a self-described atheist who regularly comments on this blog, usually to express his strong disagreement with suggestions that a conception of God might be something more than a myth or fairy tale. His most recent comment was in response to an essay I posted around Christmas titled “Why the Details of Jesus’ Birth Don’t Matter.” He observed that So, at least... Read more
Yesterday I had a very encouraging conversation with an editor from a publishing company who has expressed strong interest in one of my two sabbatical book projects: For Everything There is a Season: An Outsider’s Journey through the Liturgical Year. Keep your fingers crossed–if everything works out in the best way possible, this might actually be in print this year. For today’s post, here is a shortened version of the proposed introduction to that book (the whole introduction is about twice... Read more
Today’s gospel gets us back to the basics. Sports fans old enough to remember the 70s and 80s will recall that a regular occurrence at baseball or football games either in person or on television was, when the camera panned the stands, to see a person—often wearing a colorful fright wig—holding up a large homemade poster board sign with a cryptic reference that made sense only for initiates: John 3:16. I often imagined the confusion that many might have felt... Read more
In the opening lines of Genesis we are told that “In the beginning . . . the earth was without form and void, and darkness was over the face of the deep.” Then God says, “Let there be light!” and creation gets rolling. It’s not at all difficult to conclude that, from the very start, God prefers light to darkness; a multitude of passages from scripture to come bear this out. This seminal account of the interplay between light and... Read more
Tomorrow is my birthday (#68)–the fact that my youngest son finds a way to travel from Colorado annually to help Jeanne and me celebrate the auspicious event indicates that birthdays are still a big deal in our house. Permit me in this post to ramble a a bit as I mark yet another orbit around the sun. This year Justin scheduled his flights so his eight-day visit would have the last two Friars home games as bookends, so perhaps the... Read more
Next week is my birthday week, an annual opportunity for me to consider how old I have become. I have been the senior member in terms of experience at the college in my philosophy department for the past three or four years–and I’m pretty sure I’m the oldest in years as well (the other candidate is on sabbatical so I can’t ask him how old he is). We have three new faculty memers in our department this year and I... Read more
This has been a challenging week in class, not because of my students but because of the topics we are studying. On Monday I spent two hours in seminar with thirteen honors students considering Sartre’s play No Exit and Camus’ extended essay The Myth of Sisyphus which begins with the following upbeat observation: “There is but one truly serious philosophical problem, and that is suicide. Judging whether life is or is not worth living amounts to answering the fundamental question of... Read more
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