It was on this day in 1954 Elvis Presley recorded his first single That’s All Right. Read more

On this day is 1776 a remarkable document was signed by fifty-six men. The principal author was Thomas Jefferson. The document itself the product of high minded idealism, and low politics, including the removal of a critical paragraph denouncing slavery. Jefferson, so complicated a person, penned the Declaration. What all could accept reads: When, in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bonds which have connected them with another, and to assume... Read more

The Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi, an American Buddhist monk and scholar, increasingly known for his social activism wrote a very interesting meditation, Facing the Great Divide, where he attempts to define and contrast what he calls “classical” and “secular” Buddhism. While at the extremes I would agree there is indeed a divide, and probably unbridgeable, I would offer that at least in some ways these views are more like poles expressing the extremes of contemporary Buddhism, particularly as it is experienced... Read more

Nicholas Winton kept a secret for much of his life. It wasn’t until 1988 when his wife found a scrapbook in their attic that she learned the truth about her husband. Pretty much on a whim canceling a skiing trip in the winter of 1938, when he instead flew to Prague to join a friend aiding refugees fleeing the Nazi occupation of the Sudetenland in Czechoslovakia. He ended up being a principal organizer in the escape of nearly seven hundred... Read more

It was on this day in 1858 that the two people who first articulated the theory of evolution through natural selection, Alfred Russel Wallace and Charles Darwin delivered papers at the Linnean Society. In short here’s where it begins. There are those who like to ruminate on whether Wallace was cheated out of his place in history as the “real” discoverer. The bottom line reality is the idea was in the air. I suggest because in large strokes (we wouldn’t... Read more

Today Nelson Eddy would have been one hundred and fourteen! Another child of Providence, Rhode Island, Nelson Eddy rose from poverty to become an acclaimed actor. More important within that, he was a trained opera singer, and an early “crossover” star, appealing, as Wikipedia tells us “both to shrieking bobby-soxers as well as opera purists.” He is considered the gateway for a generation to classical music. Quite an achievement… Read more

Helen Keller was born on this day in 1880. She is justly recalled as a singular figure. And, of course, in truth however unique we might be, in a deep and true way, it takes a village. None of us, even the most remarkable, the most driven, the hardest worker, ever does it completely on their own. And so this morning I find myself thinking about those people who led to the miracle that was Helen Keller. For instance there... Read more

    I’ve now lived through three amazing cultural shifts here in the United States. The first the American Civil Rights movement, the second Equal Rights for women, and now Marriage Equality as the signature issue of Gay Rights, marked today as the Supreme Court declared there is no gay or straight marriage, there is only marriage. I’m so proud that Jan & I were a small part of this later process. When I was serving as minister of the... Read more

It was on this day in 1900 that the Taoist monk Wang Yanlu while trying to salvage ancient religious artwork in one of the ruined Caves of the Thousand Buddhas near Dunhuang, found a hidden door. It opened into another cave now known as the renowned “Library Cave.” In it he found a gigantic archive of documents. The archeologist Aurel Stein who was the first European to see the collection in 1906, described what he saw. “Heaped up in layers,... Read more

Not to mention a fair warning to astronauts… Read more