Don’t forget this is World Turtle Day! Read more

Mary Cassatt was born on this day in 1844. As the Wikipedia article states, while a prominent Impressionist, “Cassatt’s popular reputation is based on an extensive series of rigorously drawn, tenderly observed, yet largely unsentimental paintings and prints on the theme of the mother and child.” Born to a well to do family, she traveled to France to learn from the acknowledged masters of the day. However she had to learn in the face of rampant and institutionalised sexism. Fortunately... Read more

When I saw that over at Killing the Buddha they were posting a list/poem titled Ways I have been a Bad Meditator, I immediately thought hah! I bet the author wouldn’t touch the beginning of the ways. So many amateurs out there writing of their tiny experiences… Then I read it. It is clear that while a tad on the sanitized side of things, this guy has been on the pillow… With a nod to the good folk at Killing,... Read more

Senator Al Franken was born on this day in 1951. Read more

So, who is a Buddhist? And who is not? This is an issue of some import as we have entered an era where Buddhist thought is cited for various purposes within our culture. And so, who may speak for the tradition? And who should be considered winging it while merely appealing to the name without justification? It is in fact problematic as Buddhism is some five hundred years older than Christianity and during its whole history has never had a... Read more

Jan & I saw the revival to Mel Brook’s the Producers down in New York City a year or two past. I saw the movie years before that, of course. Seeing the live production led me to thoughts about evil and humor and the passage of time. That humor will be applied to even the worst things imaginable is inevitable. Think Monty Python’s dealings with the Spanish Inquisition… The question is timing. Beyond that the why is more complex… But... Read more

Our official church photo historian Richard Boober just shot me a snap he took from when I was greeting folk before worship this Sunday. Time to go back to Weight Watchers. And maybe get a haircut… Read more

HOW TO BECOME A GAY CHURCH A Call to a New Age in Spiritual Community A Sermon by JamesIshmaelFord 17 May 2009First Unitarian ChurchProvidence, Rhode Island Text If indeed we love the Lord with all our hearts, minds, and strength, we are going to have to stretch our hearts, open our minds, and strengthen our souls, whether our years are three score and ten or not yet twenty. God cannot lodge in a narrow mind. God cannot lodge in a... Read more

On this day in 1954 the American Supreme Court overthrew the long standing “separate but equal” public education policy. Many consider this the beginning of the American civil rights movement. Read more

Danny Fisher posted this from Amnesty International: Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, a recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize, has been detained for 13 of the last 19 years, mostly under house arrest. On May 14, 2009, Aung San Suu Kyi and two of her assistants were taken from her home to Insein Prison following an incident in which an American man allegedly swam across a lake to her house and stayed there for two days. Reliable reports beginning in... Read more