Orlando, June 12, 2016… As I was preparing this blog post, we experienced the deadliest mass shooting in US history. Once again, we mourn, try to make sense of the senseless, debate and, hopefully, come together in solidarity. But we must face facts: violence in the US, especially violence involving firearms, is a serious problem, […]
Blog
The Place of the Religious Life in the 21st Century
Nuns and monks – perhaps not the first people who come to mind when you think of our modern culture. But quietly and steadfastly, many of these folks daily contribute to society from a standpoint of faith, spirituality and commitment. Here I want to highlight the lives of “my” sisters, the Episcopal order of the Society […]
A Break
I’m taking a break this week – which gives you, dear reader, a chance to catch up on the blogs you may have missed! 🙂 Ponder beauty, love and peace in the meantime! (Pictured here is a mosaic from the floor of the Octagon Basilica at Philippi, Greece.)
What We Women Want in the Workplace
Periodically we hear another story about what women want in the workplace. I’ve been thinking about that issue a bit lately, as well as the slams we hear against so-called “political correctness.” I found a very good treatment about both issues in a March 2016 article by Cord Himelstein, Vice president of Marketing and Communications at […]
Workfare versus Welfare: The European Approach to Social Support Services – and Life
Let’s face it: our “war on poverty” and “war on drugs” haven’t worked very well. As Senator Bernie Sanders has pointed out time and again during the current presidential campaign, most new wealth in our country goes to the top one percent of Americans, there is vast income inequality (and has been for awhile), and […]
The Trials and Tribulations of Translating Scripture 3: The Work of the Jesus Seminar
Voting about the words and deeds of Jesus – ee gads! This is how many people respond when they hear about the Jesus Seminar. In this post, we will pick up on our two previous posts about translating and interpreting Biblical texts with a look at Westar Institute, home of the Jesus Seminar. (In the […]
The Trials and Tribulations of Translating Scripture 2: Pitfalls and Challenges
In Trials and Tribulations 1, we presented an overview of the history of the Bible and the various ancient manuscripts that scholars have used over the centuries to translate Biblical texts from the original languages into other languages. We noted that translating from ancient languages and incomplete manuscripts copied centuries later present challenges to translators […]
The Trials and Tribulations of Translating Scripture 1: Introduction
The Bible: a vitally important text in Western history. Contrary to some popular misperceptions: not one book but many; not written in King James English but in at least three ancient languages; and not originally written but rather passed down orally for generations. It should go without saying, then, that translating a collection of ancient […]
The Trump Effect
I’ve refrained from commenting directly on the 2016 presidential campaign, but I feel the need to share a new publication from an extremely important organization that I have supported for years, the Southern Poverty Law Center. Our schoolchildren are being greatly affected by the rhetoric of the election, and I encourage everyone to read The […]
Abortion and the Paranormal Evidence
Abortion is often in the news, but it has reappeared again lately in three guises: the controversy around Planned Parenthood and the supposed sale of fetal tissue, the violent attacks and murders in a Colorado Planned Parenthood facility by an anti-abortion radical, and the comments by GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump that women who have […]