How many times this week did you hear or read, “This is not who we are.” This is a normative statement that we can understand as “This is not who we ought to be.” It’s also descriptive because in fact that there is a “new” American narrative being written in spasmotic tweets and executive orders….
A Note on Our Divided Hearts,Or This Sunday’s Afternoon Sermon I knew I didn’t belong in church anymore when I realized that I had heard this all before and it wasn’t making any sense this time ’round either. Sometimes we have to know when enough is enough. So, just how much must we engage those…
A Few Words in Defense of Our Country, or at least For the Choir We are consoling ourselves with talk of impeachment or resignation, with fantasies of divine intervention and, dare I say, even the notion of “reasonable Republicans.” That last one is more laughable than the divine intervention bit. So? That’s Not.Going.To.Happen. What do…
Words are actions even if they are only the prelude to deeds and outcomes. After all doesn’t the “man of action” move from pure instinct, from impulse, from the place where thinking just “gets in the way”? Over the past six days —yes, it’s only been six days— the prelude of words has not only…
What do we do today? Do we pray for our country today? How do we begin to resist this catastrophe? Perhaps we should start with acknowledging who we have been and where we are today. I’ll start with an admission. I’m not the praying type. But it’s not like I haven’t tried. Prayer, in common…
December 13, 2016Bristol, New York From Richard Cohen today in the Washington Post, “…I will not concede that a greater wisdom exists in what is known as “flyover country.” It has voted for a charlatan, a blinged ignoramus who has promised the past as the future. Trump… lives in a gilded bubble of his own…”…
American men are indeed in deep trouble. This article puts together some of the facts and circumstances that point to our collective failure. But there is far more to the story than economic displacement and social injustice. There is the need to confront our history, our shadows and failures in ways we have barely begun…
We all know, I think, about the debilitating and stifling features of shame. America’s Protestant history includes putting the wayward in the public stocks as well as the endorsement of pan-religious commitments to guilt, shame, and blame for acts of non-conformity. To be shunned, in social worlds or in matters of conscience, for expressions of…
Today the media is reporting that the new polls indicating a closer Presidential race are a feature of the American public at last “paying attention” as the election approaches. I demur. We shouldn’t concern ourselves too much with these tightening polls much less place value on this assessment. America is not finally getting around to…
Last night we were treated to history because after 240 years of occasionally great, barely tolerable, and too often mediocre men, a major party nominated a serious, steadfastly committed, and exceptionally accomplished woman. It should seem unfathomable that gender has been such a barrier in an America that professes equality but it is hardly mysterious. …