Reading the Bible as Literarily (not literally) True

Last updated on: May 29, 2023 at 4:42 pm By Vance Morgan

Last week I participated in a two-day end-of-the-academic-year workshop with a dozen fellow faculty in the Honors program on our campus. As always, the discussions were excellent and invigorating; the Honors workshops are the one annual event that I can depend on to be non-ideological, collegial, text-based, and affirming of all the aspects of the academic life that deserve and need to be affirmed for insiders on a regular basis.This year’s workshop was bittersweet because it marked the end of... Read more

A Blessing for my Final Sabbatical

Last updated on: May 31, 2023 at 7:07 am By Vance Morgan

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The last three weeks, although a bit windy, have been beautiful bike riding weather here in Rhode Island, timed perfectly for the end of the academic year, moving into summer, and the beginning of the fourth sabbatical of my career. I’ve been on my bike every day but two of the last twenty, riding between 10 and 25 miles per day. Jeanne has joined me on a couple of weekends to ride on some of the beautiful trails our state... Read more

What Does Christian Patriotism Look Like?

Last updated on: May 31, 2023 at 7:51 am By Vance Morgan

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Memorial Day is a day for solemn remembrance. Memorial Day is also a day when many Americans express their patriotism with flags on their lawns and with slogans like “America First” and “America—Love it or Leave it,” expressing their support and love for a country that, according to many of the same Americans, was “founded on Christian principles.” How should those who profess the Christian faith think about American exceptionalism and exclusivity? Around this time a few years ago, I... Read more

A Pentecost Reflection

Last updated on: May 26, 2023 at 7:27 am By Vance Morgan

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Jeanne and I once watched a documentary called “Fierce Light: When Spirit Meets Action,” created, filmed and directed by a man with the fabulous name “Velcrow Ripper.” He is the cousin-in-law of a colleague and friend of Jeanne’s who made the recommendation. The movie was beautifully constructed and filmed, as well as being very thought-provoking. The central thread of the documentary traces various ways in which people seek spiritual growth and reality that are seldom located in traditionally religious frameworks. All... Read more

Why Being a Stoner is a Plus in the LIfe of Faith

Last updated on: May 22, 2023 at 1:36 pm By Vance Morgan

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One of my two sabbatical book projects is tentatively titled The Freelance Christian’s Guide to the Liturgical Calendar. It is in its initial stages, but I already know that it will be dedicated to the Living Stones seminar group that I have had the privilege of leading monthly at Trinity Episcopal Church in Pawtuxet, Rhode Island for more than twelve years. Here’s why. The Bible is filled with rocks. The patriarchs pile rocks up every time they want to remember a place... Read more

Where I have Been and Where I am Going

Last updated on: May 19, 2023 at 2:21 pm By Vance Morgan

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Providence College’s commencement exercises were two days ago. As I walked out of the Amica Mutual Pavilion (the AMP) at the ceremony’s conclusion, I thought to myself “I am now officially on sabbatical.” That’s not technically true; my Fall semester sabbatical begins with the start of fall classes the last week of August. But I won’t be back in the classroom until the day after MLK day next January, so for all intents and purposes I am on sabbatical. This... Read more

Thoughts on Discernment and a Blessing for the Graduates

Last updated on: May 17, 2023 at 3:19 pm By Vance Morgan

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Today is graduation day at Providence College, where I just finished my thirtieth year on the faculty. It also happens to be Ascension Sunday. I have never had the privilege of addressing the graduates on their special day; if I did, I would say something like this: Ludwig Wittgenstein was one of the most important, yet enigmatic and difficult, philosophers of the 20th century. The family into which he was born was fabulously wealthy, one of the most successful families... Read more

It’s Hard to Talk About God

Last updated on: May 16, 2023 at 11:53 am By Vance Morgan

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In our recently completed “Faith and Doubt” colloquium, my Dominican priest colleague and I filled the syllabus with authors who have shaped our own perspectives on and continuing lives of faith. I have written about mine many times over the decade of this blog’s existence; Anne Lamott, Michel de Montaigne, Simone Weil, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Iris Murdoch, and Rachel Held Evans all made important appearances during the semester. My colleague’s influences included several who also are on my list, including Soren... Read more

What Freedom Amounts To

Last updated on: May 15, 2023 at 7:02 pm By Vance Morgan

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Each of us can point to a time (or several times) in our past when we made a decision that, in retrospect, significantly shaped our lives going forward. Such decisions for me include getting married at one month past twenty, choosing to leave law school for a masters program in philosophy, and deciding to commit for life in my early thirties to a person whom I had known for six weeks. I could have chosen differently in each of these... Read more

She Opens Her Mouth With Wisdom . . . Her Childen Rise Up and Call Her Blessed

Last updated on: May 10, 2023 at 8:19 am By Vance Morgan

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Because of the quirks of the calendar, the anniversary of my father’s death and Mother’s Day often occur within a few days of each other. Last Thursday I wrote about my Dad; today it’s Mom’s turn. Although I would have denied it vociferously as a boy or adolescent, I was a classic momma’s boy. My older brother loved my mother but was all about Dad, while my attachments were the exact opposite. My brother and I were a twentieth-century version... Read more