April 29, 2013

This is the second in a series of posts about the Bible in which I want to say how and why I find the Bible essential for my spiritual life. (The first is here.) I hope these musings may be useful to others.  The reflections in these posts about the Bible draw on material I presented at the Midyear gathering of Iowa Yearly Meeting Conservative, and on reflections that Friends at that…

April 25, 2013

I had the great good fortune to be a presenter at Iowa Yearly Meeting's Midyear Gathering this year at Bear Creek Meetinghouse near Earlham, Iowa. I spoke on "The Bible in Our Midst." On her blog, LizOpp provides a lovely summary of what we talked about.  Jeff Kisling took a great photo of those gathered. …

April 23, 2013

This is the first in what I am imagining as a series of posts about the Bible in which I want to say how and why I find the Bible essential for my spiritual life. I hope these musings may be useful to others. I know the Bible has come more to divide Friends than hold us together, but I believe it could be useful in our finding greater unity among Friends. The reflections in…

April 22, 2013

Over and over, CNN and ABC, CBS, NBC (I am repelled from Fox) show me the face of Dzhokhar Tsarnaev: the slightly sad, uncreased face of a man-boy, crowned by an appealing mop of hair.  These channel-constructors of reality endlessly replay the events, lionize and scorn, and hint darkly at things that ought to have been done or ought now to be done in the name of safety.

I believe he did something terrible, but honestly I still want to hug him, still want to…

April 3, 2013

“Supreme Court Debates Same-Sex Marriage – Should We?”   This was the title of a recent blog post by Micah Bales that has stayed on my mind.  In it, he says he strongly supports moves towards legalization of same-sex marriage and yet harbors reservations.

Concerning his reservations, he says, “I recoil from the rights language that so many advocates of gay equality have…