…most of us take a wandering path, doing what good we can along the way.
Category: Personal Life
Happy Diwali!
Because we UUs seek out what all the world’s religions offer us, today’s Community Church service focused on Diwali.
How Quickly We Forget
Hmmm. Has anything like that ever happened again — revolutionary fervor on campuses challenging the established sense of order?
Why Religion?
Answering the question “Why religion?” for people who don’t believe in the God portrayed in the Bible is what I’m attempting to do with my blog.
Was Blind but Now I See
True story with changed names: Tom and Nancy Morgan, along with their 16-year old daughter, Ruby, joined a Unitarian Universalist church where they felt welcome…where they all felt welcome. That was important, because Ruby has Down syndrome and often felt unwelcome, even in other churches. Several members showed special warmth to Ruby, and no one…
The Buddhist and the Hot Dog Vendor
We all know what the Buddhist said to the hot dog vendor: “Make me one with everything.” And most of us know what happened next. The Buddhist handed a $20 bill to the hot dog vendor, who pocketed it. “Where’s my change?” asked the Buddhist. The hot dog vendor replied: “Change comes from within.” That…
Bei Mir Bist Du Schoen, Bubby
So many of us who live in relative affluence act as though we earned it on our own and resist the obligation to help today’s immigrants. We in the developed nations pretend that we owe none of our success to the refugees in our family trees who sacrificed to make a better life for us. We…
Even These Things May Seem Pleasant — November 1, 2015, Sermon
I can tell you that each one of those traumas was a great teacher, but I can’t find one pleasant thing about any of them…
A Contrarian View of Suicide
I was severely depressed and decided that my depression would help me understand and show compassion for others. So I volunteered to answer the phones at the Northern Virginia Hotline.
Evil
During a four-day Thanksgiving Weekend retreat at the Bhavana Society a dozen years ago, I was listening to the society’s founder and abbot, Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, give a dharma talk. A Sri Lankan monk from the age of 12, Bhante G came to the United States in 1968, when he was 40. He earned a bachelor’s, a…
Acceptance
My own experience tells me that, with a few very rare exceptions, we are born with the intention to do good in the world…
Confession of a Former Newsman
I worked in the newsrooms of Philadelphia and New York City tabloid newspapers from 1966 to 1976. Although U.S. tabloids were not as outrageous then as they are today, they did have their faults, including an emphasis on the sensational. It’s popular to despise the media now, to blame the media for much of what’s…
Melting-Pot Dharma 