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December 2018

December 17, 2018

Sorrow to Joy: Our Christmas Cup

The little tin cup sits in honor on our shelves on Christmas. The history of...

December 16, 2018

“Reason” and “Religion:” Why Religion does less harm, even when misunderstood.

Everyone should wish to be reasonable, just as everyone should wish to breathe. The unreasonable person...

December 13, 2018

The Purity Culture of Christmas: Commercialism is Bad. So?

Let’s kill the Purity Culture of Christmas. Our family fought Christian Gnosticism (“purity culture”) as best...

December 12, 2018

Our Thoroughly Smug Thought Leaders and Us

O generation of the thoroughly smug and thoroughly uncomfortable, So begins a Salutation from Ezra Pound*...

December 11, 2018

The Commute to Bethlehem: Getting There on Time

Every so often a commuting college student will realize his final ("Don Rags" here) is...

December 10, 2018

Problems and Solutions: Physical, Spiritual, and Psychological

People are complex immortal souls, consciousness, in an animal body. We are not angels, we...

December 08, 2018

Mary was born to get the Christmas we got, because she consented. Thank you, Mary.

Mary was born, raised by good parents, decided to say “yes” when she could have...

December 07, 2018

Looking for Good Shepherds (Thoughts from Dad)

My Dad has a pastor’s heart. He set a high standard for ministry and he...

December 06, 2018

An Unexpected Journey: Michael Ward and Answering a Question

From a brief retrospective here: In an issue honoring a remarkable scholar, I have been...

December 01, 2018

The Color Line Cannot Be Ignored: An Example from the Columbian Exposition

Ida Wells: a leader in the fight for human dignity and against lynching. Nothing...

November 2018

November 30, 2018

The Right Place to Talk: the Importance of Nature to Education

Only go to virtual college if you have a virtual soul. Take virtual communion if...

November 28, 2018

The Budget, the Local Church, and Who Is Helping: People not Money

Can we look at where a local church spends money and judge what that congregation...

November 27, 2018

See You at the Great Christmas my Brother . . . (On a Syrian Buried in Bath)

He was buried in a Roman province far away from home, this Syrian Christian. We...

November 26, 2018

No Ant Farm for Me: Counting Down to Christmas

Comic book ads were almost my downfall. One year I made what I thought at...

November 25, 2018

Number 1: Thank U Next (An Old Guy Reads the Lyrics and Wonders as He Writes a Review)

I try to listen and think about the number 1 song of the moment: Ariana...

November 24, 2018

Don’t Cross the Bridge (Think Differently)

He had the most famous sideburns in American history did General Burnside, but Ambrose Burnside...

November 23, 2018

The Christmas Movie that Helped Build Our School OR Why a Christmas Movie You Have Never Heard of Is the Movie You Should Watch Now

Hope and I did not know what to do. There were practical choices and yet...

November 22, 2018

People for Thanksgiving Dinner (The Feasters, not the Feast!)

Today social media gave me a chance to ‘find’ the six people who would come...

November 21, 2018

Thankful for Unearned Happiness

Sometimes we are paid what we are due, that’s just. Thank God, often we do...

November 19, 2018

Don’t Be a Party Pooper

A jingle from my childhood went: Every party has a pooper, that’s why we invited...

November 16, 2018

Thanksgiving in Vegas

Some cultures die as men of iron and blood. Nobody mourns them. If they had...

November 10, 2018

Heroic Losers: On Why Winning Is Not Always Winning

We need more heroic losers. While getting more heroic losers, we might aspire to shed...

November 07, 2018

Will Ye No Come Back Again: The Longing for Absent Leaders

God help us, but we miss our leaders, mostly the leaders we have never had....

November 03, 2018

Trust in the God Who Knows

God knows. The cosmos is vast, but God knows our names and loves us. This...

November 01, 2018

The Coming Party with the Once Dead: the Party of All Saints

Someday, if we choose to do so, we can party with the once dead. And...

October 2018

October 24, 2018

Heavenly Music (Timaeus)

Get Truth Where You Can Get truth where you can. Some useful ideas comes to...

October 21, 2018

Throwing Pie at the President

Traditions, especially weird traditions, and college programs go together. I have been told there is...

October 17, 2018

Forgetting the Heroes, I like Ike More than Atlantis (Timaeus)

Beat the bad guys and the History Channel will end up talking more about the...

October 14, 2018

The Story: Every Word Is True (Timaeus)

History matters. There is a central importance to what happened, because what is now is...

October 13, 2018

The Great Wave (Timaeus)

Tolkien began writing by being overwhelmed by the great sea wave that swept away Atlantis...