People

Category

Early German Christmas Traditions

EARLY GERMAN CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS

My parents were born in Germany in the first decade of the twentieth century, though they did not meet until many years later after they arrived in America. My mother was a Lutheran from Prussian and my father was Bavarian and Catholic, and since different parts of Germany had different Christmas traditions, my life as a child was a bit confused when the Holidays were upon us.  It was if a Episcopalian from Massachusetts married a holy-roller from Arkansas.  But since my...

The way things are

THE WAY THINGS ARE

This is a post on the human condition (conditio humana), something that philosophers and theologians such as Jean-Paul Sartre, Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche and (in our time) Hannah Arendt among others have wondered about and wrestled with themselves. By “others” I mean author John Steinbeck who likewise wondered about the way things are. And, once again, I’d like to anchor this essay to a passage in author John Steinbeck’s book “The Log From the Sea of Cortez.” This is an...

When Éirinn first rose

WHEN ÉIRINN FIRST ROSE

This is the history of Ireland. When Éirinn first rose, the waves of the Iapetus Ocean1 tossed about to and fro in anxious anticipation.  This was ~420 million years ago according to paleogeologists.  Two continent-sized masses–Laurentia and Gondwana—neither of which exist today, collided and one was pushed over the other.2 This act of creation made cousins out of the mountains of Donegal and the Appalachian Range in the eastern U.S., each of which share a common ancestor and amazing similarities. This is how Ireland...

LAND OF HOPE AND DREAMS

LAND OF HOPE AND DREAMS

This afternoon I plopped on the couch while my wife Deena was watching a rally where former President Barak Obama was speaking. It was in Wisconsin, that he was just concluding his remarks. The repeated rounds of applause were positively thunderous. As he was about to introduce Vice-Presidential candidate Tim Walz (D), Bruce Springsteen’s voice could be heard in the background singing “Land of Hope and Dreams.” Springsteen has always been a favorite musician of mine, at least since “The...

The Persecuted Church in China

THE PERSECUTED CHURCH IN CHINA

I have deliberately blurred the featured image to preserve the anonymity of the people in this photo. Worshippers may be arrested without warning in the Peoples Republic of China (PRC) and the persecution they are experiencing is getting worse than it has been in the past. For this reason, it is difficult to know with any degree of certainty how many Christians there are in China, today. CHRISTIANITY COMES TO CHINA As far as we can tell, Christianity first arrived...

Dust in the Wind

DUST IN THE WIND

We all reach a point where we wonder “What is this all for?”  The word “this” can mean any one of a number of things.  “This” can mean trying to buy your first home and being priced out of the market. “This” can mean trying to keep your kids off the street with mixed success.  It can mean finishing your college degree and not finding a job.  Or, “this” can mean trying to save your marriage, or staying sober, or working your entire life just to...

Diamonds

DIAMONDS

There have been several important men as far as my faith is concerned.  One was Chaplain Carl T. Hawkins who mentored me when the “scales dropped from my eyes” as St. Luke describes the conversion of St. Paul. Another was also a Baptist minister, Arthur Blessitt, best known for dragging a twelve-foot cross around the planet.  That sounds extreme, especially to my liturgical friends, yet alone people who have not yet come to faith.  It is sort of like the seemingly odd prophets of...

My mother was an illegal immigrant

HOW I CAME TO LOVE AN ILLEGAL IMMIGRANT

The years 1902-1929 were known as the Progressive Era in the U.S.  The doors to politics and political participation were thrown open wide to many more people, such as women who were disenfranchised, and it would henceforth be the People, not the states who would decide who served in the U.S. Senate. Immigration exploded as people from non-English European speaking countries started arriving in even greater numbers at our shores, and many were Catholic, or not considered to be white (or both.)  In particular,...

PUTIN’S DOGS

СОБАКИ ПУТИНА There is an old saying that the best thing about a man is his dogs. Unlike cats, dogs take the responsibility and do the heavy lifting when it comes to bonding with a person. They seek approval from people. Dogs will perform hilarious and sometimes humiliating tricks for a treat. Try getting a cat to perform. I’ve always gotten along with dog owners. I find that regardless of the breed, dog owners are most often friendly and it...

A penny for your thoughts

A PENNY FOR YOUR THOUGHTS

The idiom “a penny for your thoughts” can be traced back to Lord Chancellor Sir Thomas More (1478-1535) who first mentioned it in “The Four Last Things,” an unfinished work written circa 1535 and published after his death:   Thomas More, a devout Catholic who resisted the Protestant Reformation in England and who was eventually beheaded (and subsequently canonized), intended to imply that when a person seems lost in thought or distracted, it was fitting to offer them a penny if they would explain...

Verified by MonsterInsights