Sometimes, the evening just calls for pizza. We recently had an evening just like this. I can’t remember exactly what was happening, probably some combination of children’s activities and parental fatigue, but for whatever reason, we decided to forgo our regular dinner rituals and pop over to the local franchise of my wife’s favorite national chain. Because we buy there several times a year, we always carry a take-out card. Basically, it’s a business card someone at the store marks... Read more
It’s that time now when school years end, and that means it’s time for commencement ceremonies to begin. I recently attended a couple and want to tell you what I saw. I thought that since this time of year is thick with them, you might find yourself at one and would appreciate knowing what to look out for. Above all, watch for hijinx. Graduation ceremonies have always invited a certain amount of irreverence. For years, graduates have pasted ornaments to... Read more
Last week, Mark Baxter and I sat down for a long chat on his podcast. You can hear it below, or on Mark’s site. Read more
Sometime in the 1990’s when other college kids were off on Spring Break, I was at home watching it on television. I remember distinctly sitting in my apartment watching a report on some prime time news magazine about what students set free for a week of hedonistic pursuits were getting up to. I remember just as distinctly concluding by the end of that report that our society was doomed. Any society that reared its young to see spending a week... Read more
My wife’s debit card wasn’t working. Someone at the bank made an error when setting up her account and now the system wouldn’t recognize her PIN. She had to call the bank to get them to fix the problem. But, it was after hours. So, she called the 24-hour telebanking number. A machine answered. It offered no way to reset her PIN. This meant another call to the bank sometime the next business day. This incident seems trivial. Things like... Read more
You may not know who Russell Moore is, but you should. He is president of the Ethics & Religious Liberty Commission of the Southern Baptist Convention. He is also an outspoken cultural critic who recently gained even greater prominence as committed member of the NeverTrump movement. Moore is squarely in the mainstream of “conservative” evangelicalism. For many in the movement what he says matters. I have long attended to his public statements and appreciated much of his work, particularly his... Read more
So, a man got kicked off an airplane and the incident sparked an uproar. Let’s review the facts. As we understand it now, a United Airlines flight from Chicago to Louisville was entirely booked when some United crew members showed up and said they needed to be on the flight. The airline then asked for volunteers willing to give up their seats in return for a $500 voucher and a hotel stay. No one responded. The airline then upped the... Read more
Traditionalists and modernists differ in that traditionalists don’t believe the world can be perfected. We don’t even believe it can be substantially improved with regard to basic human nature. Sure, we can invent some new gadgets, but we will never eliminate greed, callousness and the blind love of power from the world. Modernists, however, believe the world is on its way to an ever-improved state of affairs. They think things are going to get better and better. The belief that... Read more
My wife’s phone rang a couple of times last night. First, it was the pastor of a church in the area asking her to play piano for a funeral later this week. A few minutes later, someone from our own church called to say one member had a friend in the hospital and another had a couple of friends who were suddenly dead. A little while later, I bumped into a neighbor whose wife died a few months ago. He... Read more
My dog had to go on medication a couple of weeks ago. It makes her thirsty. She laps water by the bowlful. Consequently, she has to run outside every few minutes. A couple of times we’ve come down in the morning to find puddles on the floor beneath the dining table. To try to prevent more of the same, I’ve been getting up in the middle of the night to let her out to do in the yard what no... Read more
The Road Home
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