On a Saturday morning three years ago, my son offered to write up something if I would type it for him. He was just shy of his eight birthday then so he dictated it to me, and I typed it up without any changes. Jacob often expresses what he's thinking or feeling, or reflecting upon, … Continue reading The Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup Bible
February 1, 2021 Reading “Koheleth” and Tolstoy's “Confession” back-to-back lifts both works for me. Both works struggle with the fact that death is coming for everyone. Both observe constantly how the good and the wicked have random rewards in this life; both hang on to the idea of knowledge/wisdom while questioning both its extent and … Continue reading Koheleth and Tolstoy
January 31, 2021 I keep running back into "War and Peace", in my re-read of Reinhold Niebuhr's "Moral Man and Immoral Society". This is from chapter 1: The growing intelligence of mankind and the increased responsibility of monarchs to their people have placed a check upon the caprice, but not upon the self-interest, of the … Continue reading Niebuhr and Tolstoy
January 17, 2021 Raphael Warnock's "Divided Mind of the Black Church" (2013) has a title that may sell the book short. This is a book about the black church, but it is a fine meditation on the meaning of Christianity, the role of the cross in any church, the role of a church in any … Continue reading The Divided Mind of the Black Church
November 19, 2020 I'm 25 chapters into "Mansfield Park" now, though I had not intended to read it. I was going to see only the movie from 1999, since I’d seen adaptations of all her other novels and knew nothing about this one. But I liked the story and movie so much that I opened … Continue reading Starting Mansfield Park
