My Journey Back to Appreciating a Protestant Sermon
My previous post on the “Word of the Lord,” drew a few different comments encouraging me to expand on what I had written there. Many of them had to do with the fact that I hadn’t fully come to terms...
View ArticlePersonhood Series-Fatherhood Redefined
“What is your earliest memory?” the psychologist asked me. “My earliest memory is of my father holding me in his arms at a nude beach, and he was flirting with two topless women.” “Do you remember how...
View ArticleThe Theologian’s Free Association with the Academy
I was recently perusing the latest edition of JAAR (Journal of the American Academy of Religion, vol. 86 [2]) and was reminded of why I have been, shall I say, pessimistic about the current practice...
View ArticleThe Wisdom of Birds
God gave Solomon very great wisdom, discernment, and breadth of understanding as vast as the sand on the seashore… He composed three thousand proverbs, and his songs numbered a thousand and five. He...
View ArticleThomas Merton and Why I Quit Facebook
About five years ago, I sat in a coffee shop reading Thomas Merton’s New Seeds of Contemplation. During the preceding weeks and months, I considered deleting my Facebook account on several occasions...
View ArticleChrist and the Future
When we commune with another, we forget self. We are opened to transformation. Change appears on the horizon of ego. It has deemed itself insulate, indomitable—impermeable to all that derails...
View ArticleTurning Swords into Plowshares
“They will beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks. Nation will not take up sword against nation, nor will they train for war anymore” (Isaiah 2:4). Over the Memorial Day...
View ArticleImmeasurable Grace: How a Buddhist Reformer Led Me to the Gospel
The summer after my freshman year of high school, my family vacationed in Lahaina, a picturesque town on the western side of Maui. My parents and brother were drawn to the beach, but I was pulled in a...
View ArticleHappiness, Death, Anxiety, Resurrection – Part III: Ecclesiastes
In my first and second posts in this brief series, I raised the classical question of ethics and walked through at least part of Plato’s and Aristotle’s answers. While gleaning much from them, I argued...
View ArticleYou Are Not OK
On April 6, 2012, Thomas Kinkade, who was among the most popular artists in the world at the time, died in his California home from acute intoxication from alcohol and Valium. His death shocked both...
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