So you desire the happiness of others, perhaps that of your own child… What are you going to do? We should notgive the individual,in so far as he desires his own happiness,any preceptsor recommendationsas to the road leading to happiness; for individual happinessarises from particular lawsthat are unknownto anybody, and such a man/womanwill only…
I joined a group of adults for an evening of theological discussion. The topic assigned to us had to do with the relationship between our sense of Christian faith and the struggle for power which will crescendo on November 5th. Christianity is inherited from late antiquity. I suppose you are acquainted with the stories….
The Trump rally of Sunday at Madison Square Garden has been in the news. The rally was billed as an occasion for the closing arguments of the Trump campaign. The “argument” developed as a hate fest, a racist orgy castigating Puerto Rico and immigrant citizens from Puerto Rico who certainly vote in elections. Trump himself,…
We watched a 2023 film entitled Poor Things. This is a fantasy, steampunk Frankenstein takeoff, that picks apart default moral assumptions of cultured society. Bella Baxter is brought back to life. Bella, waking with the brain of a newborn, learns to physically function as an adult female. The twist of this tale is Bella’s…
A widespread feature of Christianity is hardly ever spoken of. Entire cultural groups are yet to recover from this malignant, distorted, misshapen evaluation of human sexuality. Perhaps you’ve the wrestled with a haunting of shame, the guilt-goblin that obstructs, persists, impeding a natural expression of your mammalian self? Hauntings are concealed, never spoken of…
How many conversations have I overheard on the “golden rule”? You know the maxim which recommends that I demonstrate toward my fellowman/woman the same deference which I am wont to demonstrate toward myself. The consensus: everyone approves the rule of harmony, this prescription for universal peace-love-and-understanding. Simply keep the Golden Rule in mind, and…
Could Halloween as a matter of fact be a religious festival? I mean that taking stock of the otherworldly, that sense of life when touched by ghostly, supernatural presence, – a frank admission of fright, of something inscrutable about what life and death means… Nietzsche writes a speculative account of someone who experiences a…
I perused the New York Times email of today’s headlines. We are two weeks out from election day. Have you ever found yourself watching a prize fight that lasted too many rounds? At the final bell, judges render their decision and in the case of Trump v. Harris the judges will be the American…
I have nothing specific in mind, this morning. This text merits bringing to the fore for consideration. Scratch the surface of the widespread dissatisfaction with American society, and you will find those who wish to turn the country over to a sociopath are convinced that doom is in store. Divine judgment is near. There’s…
We viewed a film noir, The Killing by Stanley Kubrick. One’s sense of viewing, the take-away from the film hinges as much upon what one brings to the screen, as upon Kubrick’s cinematic composition of the tale of a horse racetrack heist. The mastermind of the theft from the track counting room, Johnny Clay is…
