The Coming of Wonders

Human beings must always be on the watch for the coming of wonders.

-- Charles Kettering

Allow Your Wonder to Wander

I'm wondering...: 

In simple and unexpected moments of epiphany, you will sense that you are connected to creation in ways that bypass your self-protective, preoccupied, rational mind. Your task? Be attentive. Allow your wonder to wander. 

-- Wesley Granberg-Michaelson

Don't Try to Explain

Don’t try to explain the Incarnation to me! It is further from being explainable than the furthest star in the furthest galaxy. It is love, God’s limitless love enfleshing that love into the form of a human being, Jesus, the Christ, fully human and fully divine.

-- Madeleine L’Engle

Observations & A Question

We are only vaguely aware of most of what deep money systems are really about.

Something about Christmas and nostalgia seem inextricably linked — fortunately Christmas also exceeds it.

"Do you hear what I hear?" … may be one of the better questions of the Christmas season.  

Why don’t we ask more questions?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

So Little Respect (for anyone else)

Letters from an American

 

For the last couple of months, Senator Rumson has suggested that being president of this country was to a certain extent about character. And although I have not been willing to engage in his attacks on me, I’ve been here three years and three days. And I can tell you, without hesitation, being president of this country is entirely about character.

-- Andrew Shepherd, The American President (a Rob Reiner film)

Be Jolly

This morning, I saw this t-shirt my wife laid out for herself as she readied for her school day.

And, it hit me, my disposition yesterday had some stuff baked into it.  One, that things like feeling the spirit of Christmas is something that should happen to me.  In other words, it is somebody else's job.

The reality, though, is that such things are really within me.  When I'm not feeling it, it is more likely because of things I am doing which prevent me from accessing them.

Christmas is more of a state of being than anything else, isn't it? So, it's really more my choice (than someone else's) to...BE, among other things, jolly.

Am I Missing It?

It’s happening again this year…I’m right up against Christmas and I feel nearly nothing about it.  It's like I’ve missed the spirit of it…again (not even the best eggnog seems to be working!).

Most years now it still sneaks up on me — it finds a way in.  But, until it does, I find myself wondering, will it this year?

You Can't (Allow Yourself) Not See This

Click to watch:

Try to understand men, if you understand each other you will be kind to each other.

-- John Steinbeck

LT: Get The Job Done

Leaders are the ones who, in spite of all the obstacles, find a way to get the job done — good leaders are the ones who do that respectfully.

Defying Any Sense of Human Decency

Defying, even more (if that's still possible), any sense of human decency:

Rob Reiner, a tortured and struggling, but once very talented movie director and comedy star, has passed away, together with his wife, Michele, reportedly due to the anger he caused others through his massive, unyielding, and incurable affliction with a mind crippling disease known as TRUMP DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, sometimes referred to as TDS. He was known to have driven people CRAZY by his raging obsession of President Donald J. Trump, with his obvious paranoia reaching new heights as the Trump Administration surpassed all goals and expectations of greatness, and with the Golden Age of America upon us, perhaps like never before. May Rob and Michele rest in peace.

-- Donald Trump

Nauseating even by his own standards, we can't just rage back, though. Fighting fake-fire with fact-fire requires an, "OK, can someone please remind us of how this kind of thing should be done?"

Our now nearly endless cultural familiarity might yet still yield to a more constructive example of how to do it: 

Remembering Rob Reiner

Evaluate

I’ve noticed…that I tend to evaluate myself…a lot. 

I often catch myself doing this through a grid of consistency, as if consistency would prove (secure) something or, at the very least, inconsistency would (right?).  What if, though, not really?

Us do-gooders often fear observations like, "that guy is pretty inconsistent".  But, when you hear someone say something like, "Well, at least he's consistent"...what does that really get us?  

Obsessive evaluation in nearly any context is often unhealthy.  Some basic self-evaluation is...well, necessary at times, isn't it?

So, what would be a better way (than consistency) to 'evaluate' ourselves?  Self-awareness, emotional intelligence are among the options because self-protection isn't really our primary goal in life after all.

Incarnation

The Incarnation always brings good news, but it never minimizes the realness of our pain. Advent declares the hope that a light is coming, but first it declares the truth that the world right now is so very dark. 

-- Stephanie Duncan Smith

Observations & A Question

A lot of the way we are living living our lives culturally is not sustainable.

Chaos as a management strategy rarely works out well for those involved or for those impacted by it.

Most good observations come from experience (as opposed to theoretical ideas).

What most catalyzes change?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

Pretty Much Says It All

Don’t the sayings go, “live by the sword, die by the sword” or “you reap what you sow”?

I was proud of the Indiana senators who finally stood up against this kind of self-serving power.

Besides, aren’t we all just a little done with the simplistic (if not condescending) ‘Socialism!’ trope as a cover for this level of greed and power?  He knows too many of us aren’t paying very close attention, but we’re also not as dumb as he likes to think.  Just because he doesn't have a conscience, doesn't mean we don't...we do.  

...so much about the conflation above is wrong.

Meaningfulness

“That was really meaningful”.

We almost long for such sentiment, especially when it isn’t…sentiment.  We want something that feels real, authentic.  When something is like that, it reaches far down to something deep inside us.

Why is that?

Perhaps this feels enhanced for so many of us because there is so much of our lives that feels little more than contrived.  We know about the real thing, but rarely actually experience it ourselves.  If anything, we watch depictions of it.  We consume things that portray it, thinking that must be all we can do — not really experience it ourselves, but substituting that by just entertaining ourselves with it.

But, knowing about something or even understanding it doesn’t really measure up to what we ultimately want, the experience of it.

Meaningfulness is often more a function of participating in something, than it is in simply understanding it.

We can know about Selma, but there is nothing quite like walking over that bridge.  Seeing a picture of beautiful mountains is nice, but nothing like actually hiking in them.  Listening to a great song is rarely as good as being at the concert where it is performed ‘live’.  And, then there’s Christmas — all of the ambiance, music, sweetness, softness, and nostalgia year after year seems to actually create the opposite effect when it isn’t shared with real friends and loved ones.  

We want the real thing — to experience it ourselves.  Because, that’s what makes it meaningful.

Does Not Depend On What Happens

Joy is that kind of happiness that does not depend on what happens.

-- David Steindl-Rast

Enlarge The Box

Every problem, every dilemma, every dead end we find ourselves facing in life, only appears unsolvable inside a particular frame or point of view. Enlarge the box, or create another frame around the data, and problems vanish, while new opportunities appear. 

-- Rosamund and Benjamin Zander

Though perhaps a bit too reductionist, the essential concept is an important one to consider. What frame inhibits the way I view problems?

Sexuality

Ever noticed...that we all have some degree of sexual insecurity?

Maybe that’s part of why we seem so obsessed with it culturally.

I am a Christian because of women who said yes.

I am a Christian because of women who said yes.   

-- Rachel Held Evans, Wholehearted Faith 

Public theologian Rachel Held Evans (1981–2019) reflects on how Mary’s yes was pivotal to the Incarnation.    

I am more aware than ever of the startling and profound reality that I am a Christian not because of anything I’ve done but because a teenage girl living in occupied Palestine at one of the most dangerous moments in history said yes—yes to God, yes to a wholehearted call she could not possibly understand, yes to vulnerability in the face of societal judgment, yes to the considerable risk of pregnancy and childbirth… yes to a vision for herself and her little boy of a mission that would bring down rulers and lift up the humble, that would turn away the rich and fill the hungry with good things, that would scatter the proud and gather the lowly [see Luke 1:51–53], yes to a life that came with no guarantee of her safety or her son’s.  

By becoming human, God encourages us to honor the vulnerability of our own lives: 

It is nearly impossible to believe: God shrinking down to the size of a zygote, implanted in the soft lining of a woman’s womb…. God inching down the birth canal and entering this world covered in blood, perhaps into the steady, waiting arms of a midwife. God crying out in hunger. God reaching for his mother’s breasts. God totally relaxed, eyes closed, his chubby little arms raised over his head in a posture of complete trust. God resting in his mother’s lap…. 

I cannot entirely make sense of the storyline: God trusted God’s very self, totally and completely and in full bodily form, to the care of a woman. God needed women for survival. Before Jesus fed us with the bread and the wine, the body and the blood, Jesus himself needed to be fed, by a woman. He needed a woman to say: “This is my body, given for you.”…  

To understand Mary’s humanity and her central role in Jesus’s story is to remind ourselves of the true miracle of the Incarnation—and that is the core Christian conviction that God is with us, plain old ordinary us. God is with us in our fears and in our pain, in our morning sickness and in our ear infections, in our refugee crises and in our endurance of Empire, in smelly barns and unimpressive backwater towns, in the labor pains of a new mother and in the cries of a tiny infant. In all these things, God is with us—and God is for us. And through Mary’s example, God invites us to take the risk of love—even though it undoubtedly opens us up to the possibility of getting hurt, being scared, and feeling disappointed.

-- Rachel Held Evans

4 Observations (from Others)

Have a heart that never hardens, and a temper that never tires, and a touch that never hurts. 

-- Charles Dickens

We act as though comfort and luxury were the chief requirements of life, when all that we need to make us happy is something to be enthusiastic about.

-- Charles Kingsley

Joy is the most vulnerable emotion we feel. When we feel joy, it is a place of incredible vulnerability—its beauty and fragility and deep gratitude and impermanence all wrapped up in one experience. 

-- Brené Brown, Dare to Lead

 

Real integrity is doing the right thing, knowing that nobody's going to know whether you did it or not.

-- Oprah Winfrey

Prior 4 Observations (from Others).

Voters Increasingly Disapprove of Trump's Handling of the Economy

New York Times

...it is still shocking (to me) how little concern there is about so many things, until it affects the economy.

On The Lighter Side: Do We Look Like…?

On the Lighter Side:

The Clearest Symptom Yet

The Clearest Symptom Yet 

Can’t say I disagree — they sure went after Biden on this topic.

The Atlantic

If only this was the worst of it.  Not even half the stuff going on right now would get anyone else fired instantly for violating protocols (if not the law).

Regarding the Substack referenced above, it has been observed that the only thing that sells more than sex is fear (that's encouraging...).  So, maybe Trump knows exactly what he’s doing and we can’t just chalk it up to being old (or dementia):

Snatching The Eternal

Snatching the eternal out of the desperately fleeting is the great magic trick of human existence.

-- Tennessee Williams

Being Human

Being human takes practice and hard work. Being inhuman, unfortunately, comes all too easy. 

-- Simon Sinek

Innocence

I'm wondering...about innocence.

Among other things, how does this time of year play into it?  For the most part, we seem to want to let our guard down a little and believe in something more…innocent, for a moment.

Innocence is often referenced as something lost.  Perhaps this is why we watch for opportunities to reclaim it somehow.  Why certain situations, places, or times of year seem to enable us to suspend the things that have taken it from us.

In these ways, we often opt for things that make us feel like a child again.  The cynicism of growing older resubmits itself to the possibility that, even for a moment, things could be uncomplicated, simple, pure, good, and hopeful again.  

We all had a kind of innocence and most love a chance to feel it again.

Grant That I May See Them

Almighty God, who creates all that is and gives us all that we possess: I thank you for the objects of our daily life. Grant that I may see in them your holiness, often present in the ordinary and common. Allow me to treasure the things that I forget to notice because they are so present in my daily life. Give me the grace to appreciate them, to see them, to treasure them. Amen. 

-- Laurie Brock

Observations & A Question

Thinking about what you can give today is a choice.

We tend to get more fearful as we get older — beware those that pedal to your fears.

Love learns to forget about reciprocity. 

Is it your job to meet all of (or any of) my needs?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

Black Friday

Lots of press about Black Friday again this year.

Makes one wonder if consumption hasn’t become our nearly highest cultural good, and about how low a bar that really is.

The Happiness of Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving, it seems to me, is true happiness.

When we are grateful for what we have been given, we have less room to worry about what we haven’t (been given). It is this posture that enables us to receive even more…and positions us to be part of giving that for others. 

…which is about as close as you can get to true happiness, isn’t it?

If gratitude is the mindset, expressing thankfulness is the action that embodies happiness about the specifics involved.

Gratitude: Ten Lepers (Luke 17:11-18)

Ten people broken and ostracized. Ten people crying out for deliverance. Ten people cleansed by the power of the Great Physician. Ten people able to return to their homes and families. And only one returns to say thank you….  

But this passage is not about the thank-you as much as it is about the returning and the remembering. In the story, only one of those healed returns to Jesus. He does not just say thank you; he throws himself at the feet of Jesus and cries out in a loud voice. This is not polite gratitude for a favor done. This is the cry of someone who has been restored to a healthy condition, a condition he thought unattainable. 

Gratitude, real thankfulness, is a mental return to the moment of need—a physical, spiritual or emotional need…. Gratitude requires returning to that moment of need even after the need has been met. 

Pierce reflects on how she has been in the position of each character in the story: 

I have been the broken one in need of healing, who fails to return to my moment of need and to remember after I have been healed. Full of energy and new life, I have forgotten to acknowledge the source of my strength and say thank you…. 

I have also been the one who has returned, throwing myself at the feet of those who have so richly blessed me. I have at times heeded my grandmother’s advice to “give others their flowers while they are still living.” Whether with real flowers or words of praise, I have at times remembered to return in gratitude to those teachers or neighbors or colleagues who have blessed my life even if they did not know it. 

But nothing has humbled me more than to be on the receiving end of someone’s gratitude. After a long season of pouring out pieces of my heart and soul, thinking no one understands or appreciates my efforts, I may receive a card or note or a visit with a word of thanks. Tears flood my eyes when this happens, because at that moment I truly understand the power of gratitude. The recipient has been blessed, and their expression of gratitude humbles and blesses the gift giver. 

It is in this space of mutuality—giving and receiving, thanking and being thanked, returning and remembering—that we can truly appreciate the story of the one man with leprosy who returns with words of thanks. He is not only cleansed; in his expression of gratitude, we can locate his complete healing. The cleansing from the disease takes place after only a few words from the Healer. But the full healing of his mind and body happens when he acknowledges his need, gratitude, and love for the Divine One. Ten are cleansed, but only one, through remembrance and return, is made completely whole. 

 -- Yolanda Pierce

Radical Humility and Gratitude

All the truly great persons I have ever met are characterized by what I would call radical humility and gratitude. They are deeply convinced that they are drawing from another source; they are instruments. Their genius is not their own; it is borrowed. 

We are moons, not suns, except in our ability to pass on the light. Our life is not our own; yet, at some level, enlightened people know that their life has been given to them as a sacred trust. 

They live in gratitude and confidence, and they try to let the flow continue through them. 

 -- Richard Rohr

Only Day I Can Really Live

I’ve noticed…that the only day I can really live is today.  

Is that defeating or liberating?

We all know it depends…on how we look at it, right?

Few things are in more contrast than how we look at things. Anxiety compounds itself when I’m preoccupied with what I think deserve. Gratitude ever-expands when I realize how much of what I experience is a gift.

Every day is a new opportunity for this. It, in fact, is freely provided for us. Worry about the future or regret about the past only serves to rob me of the opportunity of today — to gratefully receive what has been given and to be a part of giving to the world around me.

Bears vs Steelers, 2025

More pics...here.

3 Observations & A Question

To love someone is to believe in them…no matter what.  

Controversy and substance are not always self-referential.

We could all benefit from more quiet.

Is gratitude a response or a discipline (watch out for binary questions, by the way)?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

Song “A”

'Poem for the week' -- "Song “A”":   

Where my kindred dwell, there I wander.

Child of the White Corn am I, there I wander.

At the Red Rock House, there I wander.

Where the dark kethawns are at the doorway, there I wander.

With the pollen of dawn upon my trail, there I wander.

At the yuni the striped cotton hangs with pollen. There I wander.

Going around with it, there I wander.

Taking another, I depart with it. With it I wander. 

In the house of long life, there I wander.

In the house of happiness, there I wander.

Beauty before me, with it I wander.

Beauty behind me, with it I wander.

Beauty below me, with it I wander.

Beauty above me, with it I wander.

Beauty all around me, with it I wander.

In old age traveling, with it I wander.

On the beautiful trail I am, with it I wander.

-- translated from the Navajo by Washington Matthews

The Power of Confirmation Bias

I've heard people say that bias-training is stupid; because they don’t have any biases (sounds a little biased to me).  Such things are often said in a certain context — to identify with something or to resist something.  If we can disarm whatever is…arming us, we might recognize that there are some important (and helpful) things to know and learn about ourselves.

I think this is one of those things:

We all have filters: What do I already believe? Does this new idea or piece of information confirm what I already think? Does it fit in the frame I’ve already constructed? 

If so, I can accept it. 

If not, in all likelihood, I’m simply going to reject it as unreasonable and unbelievable, even though doing so is, well, unreasonable. 

I do this, not to be ignorant, but to be efficient. My brain (without my conscious awareness, and certainly without my permission) makes incredibly quick decisions as it evaluates incoming information…continue here.

-- Brian McLaren

Those stories that we will follow are the ones that feel true, feel like they have continuity to our past and that resonate with the trajectory of our lives. We’re looking for the story that doesn’t necessarily change our minds; we’re actually looking for the story that confirms what’s in our minds.

-- Jacqui Lewis

Be One

Waste no more time arguing what a good man should be.  Be one.

-- Marcus Aurelius

You Don’t Need More Intensity

You don't need more intensity; you need more consistency. Intensity impresses; consistency transforms.

-- Shane Parrish

Anger & Pain

Ever noticed…the obvious relationship between anger and pain?

There are those who say something like, “…why do they have to be so mad all the time?”.  The answer appears to not be so obvious to them (except when they’re in pain for more than a minute  or two).  For the most part, it’s a basic lack of understanding of these two brothers (I was going to use sisters here, but that would just slide right into another whole issue, right?) — pain and anger.

Maybe we would better off starting with some basic education in human psychology…or simply a little more personal honesty.  How often is your anger related to pain (pain you’ve experienced or pain you’re trying to avoid) in your life?

It has been observed that hurt people hurt other people.  I don’t need a lot more evidence that this is how it often works in me.  Unless I recognize this relationship and take pre-emptive steps, I do this rather easily.

Imagine, then, what this is like at nearly any scale, in a society….

God’s Goodness

God brought things into being in order that God’s goodness might be communicated to creatures, and be represented by them; and because God’s goodness could not be adequately represented by one creature alone, God produced many and diverse creatures, that what was wanting to one in the representation of the divine goodness might be supplied by another. For goodness, which in God is simple and uniform, in creatures is manifold and divided. 

-- Thomas Aquinas

3 Observations & A Question

We do the best we can to plan our lives, and then…life happens anyway, as if only partially interested. 

We often don’t see things because we stop looking. 

It’s just too much easier to be critical than it is to be constructive.  

What happens when a petulant bully is given more power than anyone in the whole world (that’s getting more painfully obvious by the day, isn’t it?)?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

The Longer It Takes

Morning Brew

Enough

Ultimately, you come to recognize that you have enough.  

Sometimes (when I slow down), I notice how much of what is in my closet I haven’t really worn in a while.  Or, I’ll notice how much stuff is accumulating in my basement (most of which is there because I don’t use it regularly).  And, then, I look around my house and my garage and my yard…’stuff’ everywhere.  I don’t need much more of anything (where would I put it anyway?).

This recognition happens, in part, when you can’t really do very much more by having much more. In our American context, that recognition seems more rare (and counter-intuitive) than not. Pretty obviously, this is a function of the consumer orientation we’ve developed about our existence as a culture.  Our economic engine actively promotes making more stuff so that we buy it (whether we need it or not).  We actually get bored with our lives if we can’t spend our money on more things.

Accordingly, we don’t really like the notion of enough. Because enough is, actually, not very much. The problem is, though, that the appetite we create for more, more, more only becomes more ravenous…it even feeds on itself (often without us even realizing it). But, there is a point at which you can’t do anything, at least substantively, by simply getting more. 

More actually takes us in the opposite direction, primarily because it takes us away from our need (both our sense of it and what that actually is). Perhaps this is, essentially, what is behind the trope 'less is more'. Because more buries us. It hides us from ourselves. It fills, what needs to be filled, with things that make us less of what we are.  

We don't need more because more keeps us from knowing what we really need. 

And, how we discover what we need is also rather conspicuous, isn’t it? We should take note of that and let it lead us in a deeper recognition of, and to the better questions about, what is truly enough.  

Ultimately, this happens to us anyway as we are naturally reduced over time by our capacity to handle more (or, even the same amount).

…unless we simply choose to ignore it.

It Takes Time

It takes time to live.  Like the work of art, life needs to be thought about.

-- Albert Camus

LT: How Long It Takes

In most things, success depends on knowing how long it takes to succeed.

-- Montesquieu

What We Own

I'm wondering...about what (we think) we own.

This one was sparked by one of Saturday's observations.

Our sense of being is tied to ownership more than we realize. We often value something about ourselves based on what we own (or don't).

But, whatever we own, isn’t there a significant omission — for how long? Nobody really owns anything for more than a brief period of time (especially, against the spanse of time involved in human existence). So, how does acknowledging that change something...in us?

For one thing, what if our identities weren't tied to who owns what (or, how much)? What would (could) our identities then be tied to? How different would the shapes be of so many things involved in who (we think) we are?

Alternative Wisdom

Worth your time:

We admitted we were powerless over our algorithms

Jesus taught an alternative wisdom that shakes the social order instead of upholding the conventional wisdom that maintains it. 

He is leading us to the new self on a new path, which is the total transformation of consciousness, worldview, motivation, goals, and rewards that characterize one who loves and is loved by God. 

-- Richard Rohr

3 Observations & A Question

Praise effort, rather than success… especially in children.  

Organize your life with practices that help prevent you from starting each day at a deficit. 

The magic happens in relationship  — relationships certainly aren’t all magic, but it rarely happens without them. 

Aren’t we all really just the latest renters, on planet earth?

 

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…

On The Lighter Side: Nearly Fell For This One...

 On the Lighter Side:

Shared Suffering

It is our suffering that connects us to humanity — unfortunately, it seems to be our shared suffering that makes us human (or keeps us human). 

Too often, when we acquire wealth, our primary utilization of it is to avoid suffering. But, even though it is just an illusion, we don’t realize that it is this avoidance that too often separates us, not only from humanity, but from our own humanity.

Even Jesus knew this…

and came to show us how solidarity works.

Infinitesimal

In the perspective of infinity, our differences are infinitesimal. We are intimately related.

-- Fred Rogers

Who We Are

Our passion lies deep in who we are, not what we do.

-- Simon Sinek

Fix My Mind

I’ve noticed…that to fix my mind, I have to engage my body.

Harvest of the Heart

This is the season of gathering in, the season of the harvest in nature. Many things that were started in the spring and early summer have grown to fruition and are now ready for reaping. Great and significant as is the harvest in nature, the most pertinent kind of in-gathering for the human spirit is what I call “the harvest of the heart.” 

Long ago, Jesus said that [people] should not lay up for themselves treasure on earth, where moths corrupt and thieves break in and steal, but that [people] should lay up for themselves treasures in heaven [Matthew 6:19–20]. This insight suggests that life consists of planting and harvesting, of sowing and reaping. We are always in the midst of the harvest and always in the midst of the planting…. 

Living is a shared process. Even as I am conscious of things growing in me planted by others, which things are always ripening, so others are conscious of things growing in them planted by me, which are always ripening. Inasmuch as I do not live or die unto myself, it is of the essence of wisdom for me conscientiously to live and die in the profound awareness of other people. 

The statement, “Know thyself,” has been take mystically from the statement, “Thou has seen thy brother, thou hast seen thy God.” 

-- Howard Thurman

4 Observations (from Others)

Saints always have a past and sinners always have a future.

-- Oscar Wilde

The more you are focused on time — past and future — the more you miss the Now, the most precious thing there is. 

-- Eckhart Tolle

For the things we have to learn before we can do, we learn by doing. 

-- Aristotle

What if scarcity is just a cultural construct, a fiction that fences us off from a better way of life? 

--- Robin Wall Kimmerer, The Serviceberry

Prior 4 Observations (from Others).

9 ‘National Emergencies’ & the Longest Gov’t Shutdown in History

Morning Brew

We elect officials to govern by serving the needs of 'the people’.

If they won’t do that (or even meet to try), they should give up their own paychecks; not force workers to keep things going without pay. 

And, then, there’s SNAP.  I’d be surprised how many people, who’ve never had to use the system, really even know what it is (outside the narratives that have been attached to it for political purposes).  Read a history of the program…here.

While most things government were started with good intention to address a public concern (that wasn’t being addressed otherwise), many are imperfect.  This is why we elect officials…to perfect them — make them better where they fail.

But, if these elected officials won’t do the work, then they need to get out of the way…so the public can be served.

The only reason they won’t (not to mention the even more nefarious things they’re allowing, like this) is they don’t think the public is paying attention — are they right? Are we?

Lord, increase my bewilderment

That is the entire prayer, as far as I have been able to discover. I came across it in a work of fiction by Kaveh Akbar, with no way to track it down. All Akbar said was that it came from Sufism, a mystical school of Islam. 

Lord, increase my bewilderment. 

What a petition! What a verb! To ask for more bewilderment, not less, from a higher power who must hear billions of prayers for more certainty, more conviction, more proof, more faith. I wrote the prayer down, then realized that wasn’t necessary. It was only four words long, with such good news in it that I memorized it before the ink dried. My increasing bewilderment wasn’t a problem after all. It was an answer to prayer. 

You would be right to ask what kind of bewilderment I mean, since there are many forms of it, including some that belong in a trash file, not a prayer…continue here for a rather beautiful read.

-- Barbara Brown Taylor

Books To Write?

For years now, I have been keeping a list of book titles or concepts that I have mused about writing.  

More realistically, these are just a collection of various ideas that have struck me, at any particular moment, for which either a concept or a catchy title has captured my imagination.

I actually kind of forgot about it, until this week when another title possibility popped across the screen of my mind:

The Corruption of Capitalism

Sometimes, given the span of time now involved, I forget what I was thinking at the time.  So, I started adding some cryptic notes for each to remind me later.  In this case, the thought base is:

A double entendre; more clearly than ever, capitalism in America has reached the edges of its impacts on the common good. In simplest form, the ability for people to make a product for a profit is not necessarily a bad thing. But, when the scale (think private equity) of what can be done outpaces what is good for all, an existential question emerges. Further, when that scale is so disproportionate to the simple concept, even the best of guardrails are inadequate to prevent the likelihood of corruption.

Whether or not I could develop this idea enough to fill a whole book remains to be seen.  But, it is fun (for me) to grab ideas in this way.

Here are some others I’ve collected along the way (without their respective explainers):

BE

Perspective:  Everyone Has One

Overrated: Toughness and Other False Virtues

What’s Your Favorite Color? Thoughts On Racism

The Strength of Tears

I Don’t Know What To Say: And Other Thoughts About Cancer

If It Doesn’t Matter NOW,  It Doesn’t Matter Later

Love Doesn’t Make Sense: If It’s Just About You

The Gospel Was Never About (Just) You or If They Aren’t In, You Aren’t Either

Richest

That man is richest whose pleasures are the cheapest.

-- Henry David Thoreau

Perception of a Problem

The perception of a problem can be as bad as the problem itself.

-- Nathaniel Persily

Problems & Patience

Ever noticed…that half the problems seem to kind of go away with a little patience. 

Besides, it’s often our impatience that perpetuates or creates many of our problems. 

The trick, though, with the other 50%, is knowing when more than simple patience is needed.

Action From Stillness

From the beginning, the Christian life was shaped by the rhythm Jesus himself modeled—a life of action flowing from deep stillness. He withdrew to pray alone. He took his friends up the mountain to witness transfiguration. He sought the silence of the wilderness. Clearly, something transformative happened when Jesus stepped away, and those around him recognized that his outward life was rooted in his inward union with God. 

-- Adam Bucko

Anyone…?

Anyone…?!? This (or this, for that matter) certainly doesn’t feel descriptive of the Republican party any more.  So, what happened?

Somehow we’ve ended up with this:

...and, even worse, this (and we still don’t seem to think we have a serious problem on our hands? — it sure looks like it to me).  

Apparently, I’m not the only one:

3 Observations & A Question

You learn things when you talk to other people – which is one reason to do it. 

There are ideas and, then, there is what champions ideas.

Tradition and evolution are often in tension with each other — both are real and important.

Do you ever stop to actually consider what is dictatingl the script of the narrative promoted by various media?

Prior 3 Observations & A Question…