My last post was on Daniel Klein’s wonderful book Travels with Epicurus: A Journey to a Greek Island in Search of a Fulfilled Life. Today’s post is a natural follow-up: a chapel where they worship philosophy. O.K., so that’s a bit of an exaggeration. But until I visited Cornell University’s Sage Chapel in Ithaca, New York, I’d never been to a church that has a figure named Philosophia behind its main altar. What’s more, this thoughtful gentleman is surrounded by... Read more
Today’s post by Bob Sessions continues yesterday’s book review of Daniel Klein’s Travels with Epicurus: A Journey to a Greek Island in Search of a Fulfilled Life: I first encountered Klein’s book in a piece he wrote for CNN called Dancing Into Old Age. I was intrigued by what he had to say in the essay, and once I started reading his book, I was hooked from its first pages as well. I can’t recall another book of philosophy that... Read more
My husband and I have been arguing about who gets to write this book review (“I love this book more than you do.” “No, I love it more.”) In the interest of marital harmony, we’re both going to offer our opinions about Daniel Klein’s Travels with Epicurus: A Journey to a Greek Island in Search of a Fulfilled Life. You get my thoughts today, and Bob’s tomorrow. Let me begin by saying that if you’re under 50 years of age,... Read more
I’ve written about a wide variety of topics on the Holy Rover, with one glaring omission: hair. Today that will be remedied by introducing you to Leila’s Hair Museum in Independence, Missouri. Among the many off-beat museums I’ve visited, I think Leila’s Hair Museum may well be the most unusual. This is the sort of place that you either find fascinating or a bit creepy (actually, I thought it was both, but in the most delightful way). The museum owes... Read more
Today I want to tell you about a holy city that’s probably not on your list of major religious sites: Independence, Missouri. Yes, Independence, the town that is most famous for its connection to President Harry Truman. But there’s a lot of spiritual history in this part of Missouri, including a building that’s one of the most remarkable religious structures I’ve ever visited. Independence’s religious heritage is intertwined with the story of Joseph Smith, Jr., the prophet who received a... Read more
We can learn so much from our brothers and sisters in the Church of England (particularly on April Fool’s Day). Read more
Last fall I did an on-line version of St. Ignatius’ Spiritual Exercises (an experience that I highly recommend). The course includes the following video as part of a series of meditations on the Passion of Jesus. Vinita Hampton Wright’s poem about Good Friday has stuck in my mind ever since. Many Christians feel a kind of disconnect and disorientation during Holy Week, I think, for so much of the holiday has been secularized into pastel-colored bunnies, candy, and chocolate eggs. And even... Read more
The Holy Rover has been a-rovering for the past month, visiting a variety of sites that I’ll be telling you about over the next few weeks. I’ve learned about Amish culture in Indiana, found a place in New York where they worship philosophy, and become fascinated by Victorian hair art (this has a connection to holy sites, I promise). While I’ve been wandering, all sorts of interesting things have happened in the world of religion. The Roman Catholics have a... Read more
Sunday’s New York Times had an interesting piece by Kate Murphy on Walking the Country as a Spiritual Quest. The article describes the growing numbers of pilgrims who are walking across the entire length of the United States. While they do so for a wide variety of reasons, their journeys at heart are quests for existential meaning in a world too often focused on the superficial and trivial: “Almost everyone who does this has some sort of generalized unhappiness with themselves... Read more
While I may not get to heaven, I do have some sense for what it will sound like if I do. That’s because I had the good fortune to attend a concert a couple of weeks ago by Anonymous 4. In nearly three decades of recording and performing, the group has focused primarily on medieval music, much of it based on their own historical scholarship. Within the past years they’ve widened their repertoire to include other forms of music, including... Read more
Holy Rover
Ad-Free & Subscriber Log-In