RSS FeedTHE LIMITS OF REASON – NOTHING BUTTERY
Enlightenment thinkers in the eighteenth century understood the world through the lens of experimental science. Believing that all phenomena operated according to universal natural laws, they judged every intellectual proposition according to the test of reason. Their...
DOUBT HAS ITS REASONS
In answer to those who questioned his credentials, and the source of his teaching, Jesus claimed that it came from God who sent him. But how do we know that this is the truth? Jesus said, “If anyone chooses to do God’s will, he will find out whether my teaching comes...
THE COMFORT OF MOURNING
“Blessed are those who mourn, for they will be comforted.” (Matthew 5:4) The National Days of Mourning in the United Kingdom for the death of Queen Elizabeth II as covered on television are a salutary reminder of the need for a solemn period of grieving on the death...
ACCESSION PRAYERS
In the Book of Common Prayer (BCP) of the Church of England there is an Accession Service to be used on the anniversary day of the accession of the new sovereign. In the various copies of the BCP in my library the sovereigns mentioned are Charles II, William IV,...
FAITH IS RISK
Jon Guttman, in his Editorial for the June, 2002 edition of Military History, wrote about three decisive battles that owed their outcomes to calculated risk-taking. He says that officers today are taught risk assessment – the art of comparing the importance of one’s...
THE NECESSITY OF FAITH
In 1986, my wife Antoinette and I were in a shopping mall in Christchurch, New Zealand, when we noticed people looking at the televisions in the stores. My cousin, whom we were meeting for lunch, arrived, and said, “Have you heard about the space shuttle?” We hadn’t...
SUNDAY BABBLING
I have been reading Soren Kierkegaard’s “Practice in Christianity” and commentaries about it. He wrote it in 1849 as a critique of how Christianity was presented in the Church of Denmark. In particular he criticized the preaching of his bishop who influenced a...
THE CHALLENGE OF AGING – GRATITUDE
“Every good and perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights, who does not change like shifting shadows.” (James 1:17) IN RETROSPECT I am sitting tonight in the glow of the grate and am counting the years that have gone, And I’m thinking of how I...
A MEMOIR OF LOVE, HOPE AND FAITH
Senator Tim Scott has written a memoir and a love letter to America: A Redemption Story, subtitled, Choosing Hope, Creating Unity. He writes, “I challenge you to become love in the face of hate. Choose optimism in the face of cynicism. Identify with grace rather than...
THE CHALLENGE OF AGING – BEING READY FOR THE UNEXPECTED
An item in the newspaper obituaries caught my eye: So and so “died unexpectedly at the age of 74.” I am aware of many friends who have recently died “unexpectedly” in their seventies and eighties. Yet I spoke to another friend yesterday who is going to be ninety-seven...
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