Posted inThe Good Word

A Mary New Year

My Mother can still recite the blessing in German nbsp She learned it as a child for New Year rsquo s Day when folks in Rush County in central Kansas would go from house to house offering a benediction in return for food drink or coinIch w nsche Euch Gl ck zum neuen Jahr Gesundheit Frie

Posted inThe Good Word

To Love Another

Jack Miles is perhaps best known for his Pulitzer Prize winning work nbsp God A Biography nbsp 1996 In the most recent issue of nbsp The Atlantic nbsp Dec 2014 he shares a portion of his own story The former Jesuit seminarian was so impressed by the audacious atheism of the philosopher Bert

Posted inThe Good Word

The Weary World

No less an authoritative voice than that of Michael Caine intones the professorial judgment ldquo We must confront the reality that nothing in our solar system can help us rdquo nbsp The irrepressible Matthew McConaughey responds ldquo Now you need to tell me what your plan is to save the worl

Posted inThe Good Word

Hopeless Grief Is Passionless

Suppose you have no desire to go on nbsp Suppose the world has oozed into another holiday season but you can rsquo t even feign enjoyment of family and friends nbsp To you the entire season seems hollow and fragile like cheap ceramic ornaments on trees nbsp Suicides go up during the holiday

Posted inThe Good Word

An Image Compelling Conscience

Photographic images helped to end the war in Vietnam a Vietcong prisoner shot point-blank in his temple a screaming young girl running naked after a napalm attack a Buddhist monk transformed into a human torch in protest of the war Since then American troops go to war under Pentagon-imposed

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