2011-11-01T15:11:50-07:00

IT IS HARD TO BELIEVE A MAN IS TELLING THE TRUTH WHEN YOU KNOW THAT YOU WOULD LIE IF YOU WERE IN HIS PLACE: A REFLECTION ON TRUTH, LIES AND MEANING A Sermon by James Ishmael Ford 11 January 2009 First Unitarian ChurchProvidence, Rhode Island Text I called to the Lord in my distress, and he heard me – Deliver me O Lord from a deceitful tongue and laying lips. Psalm 119 v 1-2 Today we’ll explore that notorious and... Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:50-07:00

Happy Birthday, Joan! Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:50-07:00

I gather in you go to a hotel in Japan you will probably come across a copy of a small book titled The Teaching of Buddha. It’s a pretty good anthology of Buddhist teachings, with a bit of a slant in the general direction of the Pure Land schools. If you haunt used bookstores, you may well have found a copy. I’ve even stayed at a West Coast hotel and found a copy in my bedside drawer right next to... Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:50-07:00

It looks like the final draft language for the proposed revisions of the Unitarian Universalist Principles and Purposes has been written. It still needs the approval of the UUA Board of Trustees to go forward to the General Assembly for ratification. It pains me considerably, considering my respect for the members of the Commission, but as things currently stand, should it make it to the floor of the General Assembly, I believe I will be voting against it. There is... Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

Zora Neale Hurston was born on this day in 1891. Her Wikipedia article sucinctly says she “was an American folklorist, and author during the time of the Harlem Renaissance, best known for the 1937 novel Their Eyes Were Watching God. In 2002, scholar Molefi Kete Asante listed Zora Neale Hurston on his list of 100 Greatest African Americans.“ Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

Thank you, Sean Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

Yunyan asked Daowu, “How does the Bodhisattva Guanyin use all those hands and eyes?” Daowu answered, “It is like someone in the middle of the night reaching behind her head for the pillow.” “I understand.” “How do you understand?” “All over the body are hands and eyes.” “That is very well-expressed, but it is only eight-tenths of the answer.” “How wouldyou say it, elder brother?” “Throughout the body are hands and eyes.” Case 89, Blue Cliff Recordtranslation by Joan Sutherland... Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

Click on image to enlarge… Thank you, Non Sequitur Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

When I was a child I was fascinated with a Bible my grandmother owned, which had in addition to the text a commentarial column which included a chronology of the events recorded. At the very beginning was the date 23 October, 4004, before the common era. That’s when God created the world. Well, today is the birthday of James Ussher, Anglican scholar, archbishop of Armagh and primate of the Church in Ireland. He provided those dates. While at that time... Read more

2011-11-01T15:11:51-07:00

The other day I stumbled upon a screed that notes how Barack Obama is really a Unitarian Universalist, which means he is really a communist. But of course… I suspect first for a politician, and second for one who had been working out his own faith journey which eventually took him to the African American church, that UU connection was probably something he’d just as soon ignore. And he certainly has… I don’t hold it against him. Just as a... Read more

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