tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-62841682012-02-18T05:52:31.588-08:00Redeeming BarthReflections on the state of the world which proceed with the scriptures in one hand and the newspaper in the otherfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.comBlogger2411100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-35584435324480768442012-02-18T05:52:00.000-08:002012-02-18T05:52:31.592-08:00A Quarterback We Can All Admire With No Exceptions
Eli Manning, the quarterback of the latest Super Bowl victors, the New York Giants, completed a two day victory (and promotional) tour of the country with an appearance on David Letterman’s Late Night Show. Manning comes from a storied football family, the son of Heisman Trophy winner Archie Manning, and brother of Peyton Manning, who guided thefrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-75620499691555885502012-01-31T18:58:00.000-08:002012-01-31T18:58:05.603-08:00Leviathan: On Technocrats, Accountability and Creative Fabrication
The message was urgent. It said the General Education Program Assessment results absolutely had to be submitted by the end of the month. It was imperative that those of us who had not yet reported our program’s results do so immediately. Or so the message said.
So I spent the greater part of this morning trying to figure out frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-18574765176249849152012-01-24T07:49:00.000-08:002012-01-24T07:49:26.107-08:00Tebowie: The Tone Deaf Would-Be Hero
Jimmy Fallon has outdone himself this time. I love Jimmy, particularly his ability to laugh at himself and others, giggling amidst his routines. But his recent video in which he combines David Bowie’s Space Oddity and Tim Tebow’s antics on and off the football field is priceless.
Dressed as Bowie, complete with Mohawk, platform boots and face paint, Fallon frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-35018337045869807752012-01-24T06:24:00.000-08:002012-01-24T06:24:56.907-08:00Survey Says…..
My copies of the Student Perceptions of Instruction from my fall classes arrived in my box last week. As usual, they offered little of value in terms of useful feedback even as they could have. But I have come to expect little more from the Factory and the corporate overlords it now unabashedly serves.
Take Our Survey – Win $1000!
The initial page of the survey provides a key frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-17537227258565942412011-12-23T15:37:00.000-08:002011-12-23T15:37:36.129-08:00The Grinch of Atonement steals Christmas
As Advent wanes and Christmas approaches, I always feel a growing sense of relief. I have long observed that the behaviors of my fellow Americans become noticeably more aggressive in the frenzied media-driven run-up to what is probably best described as Consumermas. Negotiating the local roads or the parking lot of any big box store or even a strip mall frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-46970103821358248842011-12-14T11:15:00.000-08:002011-12-14T11:15:10.714-08:00G-d’s Quarterback?
Of humility, mindfulness and evangelism on - and off - the football field
I have a long love/hate relationship with Tim Tebow. As the former quarterback for one of my alma maters, the University of Florida Gators, Tebow was the first sophomore to win the Heisman Trophy and led his team to the national championship. In former years, that would have been cause for great frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-52591343529621559752011-12-14T08:25:00.000-08:002011-12-14T08:25:59.534-08:00End of the Term Madness
How many times have you received an email beginning “Dear Sir/Madam…” that then proceeds to lay out some poorly connived story about your need to help them by giving them access to your checking account? In years past I used to respond with a note to the business school boys who sent the note that they should spend more time studying for finals and less on such poorly frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-10700793168358330562011-12-14T07:57:00.000-08:002011-12-14T07:57:08.348-08:00The Evolution of a Small Town
Sunday’s Orlando Sentinel carried this story on its front page:
Vote shows Orlando is growing more gay-friendly
By Mark Schlueb, Orlando Sentinel 10:37 p.m. EST, December 11, 2011
The relatively easy passage of a new domestic-partnership registry in Orlando is the latest sign the city has grown more accepting, members of the gay community say.The registry, whichfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-49103452424704411652011-11-28T04:45:00.000-08:002011-11-28T04:45:14.505-08:00Of Birds, Cherubim and the Good Creation
On one of the lists on which I write from time to time, this message arrived this morning:
Psalm 80:1
Hear, O Shepherd of Israel, leading Joseph like a flock; *
shine forth, you that are enthroned upon the cherubim.
Cherubim are winged angels that carry prayers to God.
An osprey called my attention to this verse this morning. She cried as I frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-43769329550911209182011-11-26T15:15:00.000-08:002011-11-26T15:15:05.521-08:00In Gratitude for Random Acts of Kindness
One of the things I teach my world religions students is that the basis of most indigenous religions is gratitude. These traditions evidence an underlying awareness of the many aspects of the natural world which are required to create and preserve life. Humanity exists because of the generosity of nature. Indigenous people never forget that and their frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-3279694946225503722011-11-15T07:32:00.000-08:002011-11-15T07:32:05.278-08:00Stepping Back to Take a Second Look – Part II
(continued from Part I)
The Mother of the Bride
I left the Franciscans after lunch to attend a wedding of one of my former students. She is one of the brightest young people I have ever taught and her performances in my classes were inevitably stellar. I had the pleasure of supervising an independent study with this young woman on the subject of frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-60720000528564136432011-11-15T07:14:00.000-08:002011-11-15T07:14:15.282-08:00Stepping Back to Take a Second Look – Part I
There are times in my life where I have been required to back up and take a second look at something I thought I’d already figured out. In years past when I was a little closer in orbit to the Episcopal Church, I would have described that as G-d using an existential 2 X 4 to get my attention and perhaps that’s not such a bad description to use. This frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-64907768991240331942011-11-10T08:19:00.000-08:002011-11-10T08:19:33.143-08:00Saying “Something About Our Institutions and Even Our Values…..”
At the Inside Higher Ed site this week, Joshua Kim posted a column entitled “The LMS: 10 Things I Don't Know.” It was an interesting post but, as often is the case with proponents of technology in higher education, it begins with a number of presumptions. Joshua has been pretty good about posting my responses. But I feel this frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-6109154200507520292011-11-10T07:31:00.000-08:002011-11-10T07:31:56.773-08:00The Dilemma
Increasingly I find the process of teaching to be overtly - and uncomfortably - political. The question that increasingly confronts me as an instructor is not what is the right thing to do, indeed, not even what is most likely to lead to education, but rather how must I respond to the context in which I am spending my last working years before retirement. It is a context in which frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-31097941868170065632011-11-03T18:52:00.000-07:002011-11-03T18:52:39.278-07:00The First Obituary for the Academy
Yesterday I read what I fear will prove to be the first obituary for the university as we have known it. In an article entitled “Socratic Backfire?” on the Inside Higher Ed website, Kaustuv Basu reported the following:
Some students didn't take well to Steven Maranville’s teaching style at Utah Valley University. They complained that in the professor’s “frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-74373578811623805652011-10-07T16:33:00.000-07:002011-10-07T16:33:26.625-07:00
Nancy Grace: A Broken Heart and a Poisoned Mind
from People Magazine online today at
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20534097,00.html
Nancy Grace: Amanda Knox Decision Is 'Miscarriage of Justice'
Nancy Grace doesn't see an innocent young woman in Amanda Knox, who was tried and convicted of the 2007 murder of her roommate Meredith Kercher – and then set free Monday after a frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-43566821776666550992011-09-11T07:13:00.000-07:002011-09-11T07:13:23.657-07:00Musings about ‘Merka on the eve of 9-11
From time to time I participate in discussions on various sites online which feature news stories of interest and allow for comments on the stories. I find the news provocative and the comments which follow even more provocative. And from time to time, I add my own. This morning was one of those times.
I hasten to add such sites are NOT the primary frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-56183559579159888692011-08-25T06:25:00.000-07:002011-08-25T06:25:24.729-07:00The Help
Rosetta E. Ross has written a provocative self-described “rant” in Religion Dispatches about why she will not see the film The Help. Unlike her, I have not read the book but have seen the film. And, unlike her, I am white and thus have had a very different experience in a nation in which “we breathe racist air,” as my black classmate in seminary at the Episcopal Church Divinity School frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-87141345208801432542011-08-16T06:33:00.000-07:002011-08-16T06:33:46.166-07:00It’s Just Not Any Fun Any More
In today’s Inside Higher Ed, Dr. Lewis Margolis, an associate professor of maternal and child health at the Gillings School of Global Public Health of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, lays out a lament against the ongoing corruption evident in big-time college sports, ending his jeremiad with these words:
How many scandals will it take for faculty frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-24310434482326586192011-08-15T10:22:00.000-07:002011-08-15T10:22:52.877-07:00Brasilian Knightmare
I have always found that international travel stimulates my dreaming. I have a fairly active dream life to begin with and generally can remember at least one of my dreams each morning. Sometimes I write them down, other days I muse over them throughout the day. As a student of Jungian deep psychology, I have long known that our dreams have important messages for us. And on frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-73390766941172836622011-08-10T19:35:00.000-07:002011-08-10T19:35:43.448-07:00Such a Pity!
I snuck onto campus last weekend under the cover of darkness to pick up my new textbooks (one for each of the four different classes I am teaching this fall) and check my mailbox. It’s taken me most of this week to recover from my six weeks in South America, much of it trying to overcome a nasty respiratory infection I battled off and on the last three weeks of the trip. And it’ll frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-82873709865221377472011-08-10T18:10:00.000-07:002011-08-10T18:10:56.919-07:00America, Irrationality and the Irony of Turned Tables
While it was more than a little nervous making to watch the Tea Partiers playing chicken with a national default from overseas in South America (Will our money still be worth what it’s worth today? Will FAA shut down and will that affect our ability to fly home on time? Will the problems we’re causing nations around the world mean we have to frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-4499787902039367472011-08-08T16:45:00.000-07:002011-08-08T16:45:31.054-07:00Choice, Consumerism and Education
One of the many online services to which I subscribe is eschool news. It’s predominately a propaganda site for the deadly duo of corporate imperatives and technocrats that increasingly dominate higher education. I read the items there because it gives me insights as to how the folks driving academia these days (some might say directly into the ground) are frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-8782619491322309112011-06-26T10:00:00.000-07:002011-06-26T10:00:57.428-07:00http://www.onlineuniversities.com/blog/2011/02/20-startling-stats-on-minorities-in-our-schools/
Another interesting article worth considering.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-35611736007790118262011-06-26T09:54:00.001-07:002011-06-26T09:54:45.416-07:00http://www.onlinecollegecourses.com/2011/06/22/15-most-controversial-academics-of-all-time/
Interesting article here.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The Rev. Harry Scott Coverston, J.D., Ph.D.
Member, Florida Bar (inactive status)
Priest, Episcopal Church (Dio. of El Camino Real, CA)
Instructor: Humanities, Religion, Philosophy of Law
University of Central Florida, Orlando
http://frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-90132427577260901742011-06-26T09:46:00.000-07:002011-06-26T09:46:28.663-07:00Time to grow up, boys.
ST. PETERSBURG, Russia (AP) – Russian police on Saturday detained 14 gay rights activists trying to hold an unsanctioned demonstration in St. Petersburg, as well as one person suspected of attacking the protesters.
Police detained two groups of activists protesting their lack of rights in two central districts of the city. An Associated Press photographer saw frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-81459389877663192542011-06-12T10:59:00.000-07:002011-06-12T11:03:08.757-07:00Transparency and Wants v. Need
Another contributor to the Mama Ph.D. column this week writes the following:
“While I don’t subscribe to the commercial model of education … I do want to know what my students want and expect. After all, if I don’t know what they are hoping for, or expecting, my approach may confuse or disorient them. The more transparent we can all be about our expectations, the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-13203670375652969572011-06-12T10:26:00.000-07:002011-06-12T10:26:31.142-07:00Checking Our Presumptions at the Door
A contributor to the Mama Ph.D. column (an always provocative column at the Inside Higher Ed site) wrote the following last week:
My dance teacher had been absent the previous week and had engaged a substitute. A number of students had reported for the class, noted the sub, and left. "That was incredibly rude," he admonished us. "She [the sub] was so frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-38343864598131791912011-06-06T14:30:00.000-07:002011-06-06T14:30:24.639-07:00A Sermon for the Feast of St. Aelred
I was invited to celebrate the eucharist for Integrity USA at the Gay Days event at Disney World this past weekend. It was an honor to do so. Integrity is the LGBTQ ministry of the Episcopal Church. I have been a member for some 25 years now. It is banned in this Diocese of Central Florida where I reside which often confuses homophobia with the tenets of the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-199196974770182682011-06-03T01:21:00.000-07:002011-06-03T01:21:42.491-07:00Hidden Costs – Who Pays?
It’s late, much later than I want to admit being up. I couldn’t sleep and so I’m checking my online course site. While I tell my students I’m not on call, in reality I do check my site regularly throughout the day during summer sessions when I’m not in real classes (and yes, I am one of those stalwarts who have not drunk the koolaid about online classes being just as frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-16950112428072590312011-05-29T08:34:00.000-07:002011-05-29T08:34:33.635-07:00Which Bastards Do We Choose?
In an article in the March 2011 edition of Wired magazine, there is an article by Matt Schwartz entitled “The Overlords of Open Source: Why are people-powered projects ruled by tyrants?” The article begins with a quotation from Julian Assange of WikiLeaks fame who, in answer to Der Spiegel’s question as to why he didn’t use his talents to build a fortune and a Palo frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-15239130717202334932011-05-25T08:46:00.000-07:002011-05-25T08:46:14.030-07:00Grading Teachers By Testing Students
The New York Times is reporting today the following:
New York City education officials are developing more than a dozen new standardized tests, but in a sign of the times, their main purpose will be to grade teachers, not the students who take them.
There are so many problems with this plan to grade teachers by using student test results that it’s hard tofrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-78967668433968685602011-05-23T10:08:00.000-07:002011-05-23T10:08:51.260-07:00But on the other hand….
After working through my previous post in which I vent my own spleen about a lazy honors college student’s bashing me on Ratemyprofessor.com in the context of that student’s mediocre performance in class, it would be tempting to dismiss all honors students as slackers with an inordinate sense of entitlement. Such a dismissal might seem readily apparent in the wake of thisfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-62716396889435548092011-05-23T09:35:00.000-07:002011-05-23T09:35:42.735-07:00Outrageous and Nitpicky and Bulls*t. Oh My!
A Response to a Public Character Assassination
A student dropped in during my office hours Thursday for advising regarding graduation and his plans to attend law school. While I’m not a Philosophy advisor, I was happy to offer my best impromptu advice given his transcript and our departmental requirements. I was also willing to offer some advice on frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-26098654480583454462011-05-17T16:51:00.000-07:002011-05-17T16:51:16.637-07:00Burnout, Context and Online Teaching
Yesteday, a lengthy article appeared in Inside Higher Education which made the following claim: “In this light, burnout risk for online instructors seems less about the medium and more about personality.”
My bullshit detector went on red alert at that point. Here is the response I offered the site. We'll see if they actually publish it:
-------------------frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-14857077890092043452011-05-16T08:24:00.000-07:002011-05-16T08:24:51.019-07:00CNN, Franklin Graham and Barack Obama
A Dangerous Two Step
This weekend, CNN online ran an opinion column under the headline “Franklin Graham wrong to question Obama's Christianity.” Written by Roland S. Martin, the column began by noting that despite repeated assurances by Barack Obama that he is a Christian (UCC in tradition), “for some reason, the question as to whether President Barack frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-63884487301968445902011-05-15T17:04:00.000-07:002011-05-15T17:04:19.087-07:00A Fabulous Cheap Grace
This past week the Presbyterian Church of the USA (PCUSA) officially lifted its ban on ordinations of gay and lesbian clergy. Like the United Church of Christ, the Episcopal Church and the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America (ELCA) before it, this comes at the end of a long, hard struggle. The vote by the Minnesota Presbytery to accept the denomination’s vote at its frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-37662955223114937292011-05-11T09:16:00.000-07:002011-05-13T13:41:32.418-07:00Rowan Williams on Uganda
Tepid, timorous, cynical
In the news today there are reports that Rowan Williams, the Archbishop of Canterbury, has reiterated his statement of 2009 regarding the pending legislation in Uganda which would make being gay a capital crime and failing to turn in gay people a felony. Williams, in his usual tepid, timorous manner, says the following:
"Overall, the proposed frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-73325441167996380992011-04-24T16:53:00.000-07:002011-04-24T16:53:59.888-07:00Eucharist: Gratitude, Community, Civil Disobedience- III
The Rite
Holy Week marked the end of our study of the liturgy as a community. At our celebration of Maundy Thursday this week, we used a Eucharistic liturgy I constructed from the words of I Corinthians 11 as well as a line from the Gospel of Mark. A version of the berakah prayers of Judaism over bread and wine (which Jesus, like any frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-91893111692066549002011-04-24T16:47:00.000-07:002011-04-24T16:47:00.839-07:00Eucharist: Gratitude, Community, Civil Disobedience- II
A Devolving Sacrament
The textual history reflected in scripture above evidences the developmental history of the theology of the Eucharist. From its beginning as a celebratory communal meal,
• It loses its communal context
• It loses the actual meal and the act of eating together
• It becomes focused on sinfulness
• It becomes frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-68462521302339317432011-04-24T16:39:00.000-07:002011-04-24T16:39:56.282-07:00Eucharist: Gratitude, Community, Civil Disobedience - I
Changes Over Time
Over the Lenten season, the weekly meeting Francis/Clare Community (F/CC)of which I am convener has worked through the Eucharistic prayers of the various incarnations of the Book of Common Prayer beginning with its first version in 1543. One week we were led by an independent Catholic priest in our community in the Latinfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-31638092052457089462011-04-07T05:39:00.000-07:002011-04-07T05:42:56.778-07:00"God isn't doing well?"
A long time friend from California I’ve known since my days in seminary sent me a column from the National Review Online this morning. I don’t generally read the National Review but this column by David Prager was provocative. It was entitled “Why God Isn’t Doing Well.”
Prager offers four reasons for G-d’s apparent malaise. The first is that Western universities have frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-38521543083176398892011-03-24T07:41:00.000-07:002011-03-24T07:41:17.455-07:00Scenes from a Slowly Disintegrating Social Contract
Technopoly and the Generation Gap
The little boy was screaming at the top of his lungs. His head was down on the seat of the booth, his feet flailing in the air across the counter and into the kitchen at the Baja Burrito restaurant. The cooks looked on with obvious irritation as did most of the diners around his table. His shrill voice was frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-6615073959876126422011-03-21T06:28:00.000-07:002011-03-21T06:28:44.108-07:00An Indispensable Element
OK, quick. Which leftist pundit said the following:
“Labor unions are an indispensable element in social life…indeed a mouthpiece for the struggle for social justice.”
You might ask yourself who came to mind. Michael Moore? Russ Feingold? Karl Marx?
The answer is Pope John Paul II. This quotation comes from his encyclical Laborem Exercens. And, as the editorial in frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-2403594344755002382011-03-18T05:11:00.000-07:002011-03-18T05:11:24.116-07:00Saying Goodbye with Gratitude for a Precious Gift
He came by during my office hours on his last Friday in town, his one year old little girl in hand. He had come by to say goodbye after seven years. They were on their way to a new life in southwest Florida, his school teacher wife to follow at the end of the school year.
It was a bittersweet moment, We celebrated the job he had just landed frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-63498292772321287412011-03-06T09:52:00.000-08:002011-03-06T09:53:40.559-08:00Don’t Mess with Texas? Who wants to?
From Today’s Houston Chronicle:
AUSTIN — The Texas Nationalist Movement marked Texas Independence Day with a rally on Saturday at the Capitol urging Texans to save the state by seceding from the United States.
A small but enthusiastic group of Texans gathered on the steps of the Capitol, as an assortment of massive Texas flags blew above them in the chillyfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-66347621089868083682011-03-04T15:43:00.000-08:002011-03-04T15:43:05.790-08:00Requiem for a Very Human Bishop
News came to me this week that Bishop Richard Shimpfky had died. It is ironic that this news arrives in this month after the retirement of John Howe here in Central Florida. Shimpfky, then bishop of El Camino Real of the central California coast, often squared off against Howe in the Episcopal House of Bishops particularly over issues involving LBGQT people. frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-64760587864447412782011-03-04T09:49:00.000-08:002011-03-04T09:49:53.657-08:00Cops and Robbers
This morning as I did my 1.75 mile walk around Lake Underhill before heading out to classes on this last day before spring break, I notice what I first presume to be two broken down vehicles. The two SUVs were stopped in the far right lane of the bridge over Lake Underhill, the lane that serves as entrance from Lake Underhill Drive and the exit for Conway Road. One of the SUVs frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-28907701881773704712011-03-03T07:05:00.000-08:002011-03-03T07:05:36.880-08:00Morning Reveries
This morning just before waking, I found myself dreaming of the Vicar of Dibley, the rotund woman vicar in the fictional village of Dibley, England on the BBC sitcom bearing her name. In my dream, the vicar was leading the eucharist in her most beautiful Elizabethan English. Sunlight poured through stained glass windows of the ancient chapel into pools of color on the slate frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-2975450758510107942011-02-27T16:59:00.000-08:002011-02-28T04:09:11.867-08:00More on Mormons and Muslims
Interestingly, no sooner had I posted the entry on Glen Beck’s absurd analogies than I find this item on the Google news site:
Glenn Beck does not have a reputation for admitting mistakes, but after his recent comments on the radio comparing Reform Judaism to Islamic Extremism, he apologized on his Feb. 24 program, tail tucked firmly between his legs…."I've always frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-19174226732980685592011-02-27T09:08:00.000-08:002011-02-27T09:08:14.587-08:00Mormons or Muslims – which supremacy do we choose?
On my trip with my father to see relatives in Pensacola at the end of the Christmas Break he made a comment that I found completely bizarre. He said that he believed that in my lifetime the Muslims would have successfully taken over the world. “Everyone will be Muslim,” he said, “and we’ll have Sharia law.”
I have to admit I was absolutely frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-32426441329224285942011-02-24T06:08:00.000-08:002011-02-24T06:08:13.800-08:00Obliviousness, Compulsion, Lost Opportunity
It was a beautiful morning in Central Florida. An unexpected bank of fog had moved in from the nearby Atlantic shrouding treetops and houses. Even the nearby expressway whose bridge cuts through the middle of Lake Underhill, laden with rush hour traffic, was only in partial view, the lights of the cars and the sounds of the motorists hurrying to work frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-44945271222456528882011-02-22T07:23:00.000-08:002011-02-22T07:23:55.589-08:00Post-script: On the Retirement of John the Oppressor
Homophobia – the elephant in the room
When the story in the Sentinel ran, I held my breath fearing an onslaught of comments that would bash anyone who dared to actually criticize this self-styled heroic bishop of Central Florida. To my relief, only one comment was offered from a writer identifying himself as JohnOS who said, “I good (sic) frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-48749531070594967942011-02-22T07:07:00.000-08:002011-02-22T07:07:19.357-08:00On the Retirement of John the Oppressor - II
Whiter, Grayer and Stagnant
The conservative myth about church and society often asserted as somehow self-evidently true is that if a tradition becomes too liberal it loses all its conservative members to more conservative denominations. In fact, that has rarely been true of the Episcopal Church where social mobility and social cachet have played frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-78855756394173948102011-02-22T06:53:00.000-08:002011-02-22T06:53:11.785-08:00On the Retirement of John the Oppressor - I
He was a lot of things, hero was not among them.
Last week I was contacted by a writer for the local Chicago Tribune tabloid (née The Orlando Sentinel). He wanted to talk about the retirement of John Howe as bishop of the Diocese of Central Florida. The story ran this week with a paragraph devoted to our conversation. Not surprisingly, I was the onlyfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-18068375370489708652011-02-17T10:16:00.000-08:002011-02-17T15:19:22.325-08:00Remembering Ronnie Raygun
Were Ronald Reagan alive today, he’d be celebrating his 100th birthday. Mercifully – for all parties involved – Ronnie has gone home to his reward, as they say in the South. Poor Ronnie checked out a few years before he actually died, the poster boy for Alzheimer’s Disease, a fate I wish on no one. But his legacy has proven to have a much longer life and to be even lessfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-33979450753451239032011-02-15T05:55:00.000-08:002011-02-15T05:55:11.945-08:00This is why I ride the bus
Over the years, I’ve periodically ridden the local city bus to the university in lieu of driving my car through the gauntlet of texting and talking drivers, arriving at my destination to play the “Stalk the Possibly Leaving Driver” game in the parking lot once at the university. There’s no small amount of extortion in an employer charging his employee to park at the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-60287990808748515922011-02-12T16:38:00.000-08:002011-02-12T16:38:16.258-08:00No Small Amount of Irony
ITEM ONE: Dueling Fundamentalisms
Isn’t it ironic that the very people who so vehemently oppose Islamic fundamentalism and seek to punish anyone who has ever had any connection to any madrassas teaching Islamic fundamentalism - no matter how remote or indirect that connection - are the very same people who are happy to defund public schools in America to fund the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-12912851051632191522011-02-01T11:20:00.000-08:002011-02-01T11:20:38.191-08:00Happy Birthday, Saint Marge
Today would have been my mother’s 88th birthday. She was born in 1923 in Homestead, Florida, 30 miles south of Miami down Dixie Highway (US Highway 1) through orange, mango and avocado groves and the occasional alligator infested swamp. She was the second of five children, only the oldest of whom still survives, my Aunt Frances who now lives in Pensacola.
My motherfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-74946069800471273552011-01-25T10:04:00.000-08:002011-01-25T10:04:43.332-08:00Naïve, Simplistic and Tucson – Part II
Coming to Grips with our Murderous Culture
I observe there are a lot of contributing factors to this criminogenic composite that has become 21st CE America. Clearly the political rhetoric which dehumanizes others and constructs them as enemies of the people if not of G-d himself is a part of the problem. Again, it is naïve to suggest that we can flood our frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-90764758792992269852011-01-25T09:59:00.000-08:002011-01-25T09:59:12.124-08:00Naïve, Simplistic and Tucson – Part I
Fellow-Feeling, an onus against Uncle Sam and Murder
In the wake of the murder of a federal judge, a nine year old girl and a handful of others in an attempt to kill Congresswoman Gabbie Gifford in Tucson, Arizona, a spate of reciprocal finger pointing has erupted. Some progressives sought to blame hatemongers like Rush Limbaugh and tea pots like Sara frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-53331846150433964522011-01-25T07:56:00.000-08:002011-01-25T07:56:42.484-08:00Shatter Your Mirrors!
Among the many tributes offered this week upon the death of Sargent Shriver, founder of the Peace Corps and former vice-presidential candidate, I found a quotation from a commencement speech Shriver made at Yale University in 1994. It bears wisdom well worth repeating.
Shriver said:
“Break your mirrors! Yes, indeed — shatter the glass. In our society that is so frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-91955537659144627492011-01-16T11:06:00.000-08:002011-01-16T11:06:05.252-08:00Entitlement, Immaturity, Self-Focus – God Bless America?
The driver in front of me on the narrow main drag through Winter Park, Orlando’s affluent enclave of Republican old money, was taking his time this morning. Cell phone in hand, he was more than willing to make everyone behind his oversized SUV wait while he continued his telephone conversation oblivious to the world.
On the bumper of frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-41715284093743753242011-01-02T18:51:00.000-08:002011-01-02T18:51:53.716-08:00“Very Revealing….” – II
“That’s just your opinion…”
[Continued]
“the professor is very liberal. Read his blog. It is revealing.”
While I appreciate this plug for my blog and I welcome my students along with the rest of the world to read it (what other reason would anyone blog in the first place?), the plug’s juxtaposition to the comment “he’s very liberal” suggests that the invitation to frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-78235277022925848902011-01-02T18:36:00.000-08:002011-01-02T18:36:02.590-08:00“Very Revealing….” – I
A little context
Sometimes revelations can be inadvertent. But almost always, they prove enlightening. And inevitably they reveal as much about the revealer as that which they would endeavor to reveal.
Against my better judgment, I checked the Ratemyprofessor.com site again this week. While we in academia have come to realize we must endure this kind of mindless frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-77963243285931962752011-01-02T07:57:00.000-08:002011-01-02T07:57:43.638-08:00A Spirituality of Being – II
Believing, Belonging, Being
[Continued]
In my own experience and from my studies and observations, the development of spiritual life follows a decided pattern. It begins with the word-driven, security conscious social constructions of beliefs. This believing stage of spiritual life is focused on ideological conformity and the incessant affirmation of religious frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-10575474591073896702011-01-02T07:50:00.000-08:002011-01-02T07:50:34.959-08:00A Spirituality of Being - I
In-the-Gut knowledge of the Divine
On this first day of a new year and decade, I find myself considering this thought from an Episcopal laywoman from New York whose experiential wisdom is offered in this month’s Faith Matters column in The Christian Century. Here’s a part of her column:
From Suzanne Guthrie, “The Sound of Silence,” in Faith Matters, 127 The frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-70996929070607719842010-12-24T08:47:00.000-08:002010-12-24T08:47:54.496-08:00Having it both ways in the Golden State
From today’s Los Angeles Times:
California officials estimate that the U.S. Census Bureau failed to count 1.5 million of the state's residents, a discrepancy that if true could cost the state billions of dollars in federal aid over the next decade and perhaps an increase in its representation in Congress….A key challenge facing California in any frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-50764269969552250852010-12-23T08:27:00.000-08:002010-12-24T08:29:10.424-08:00Losing My Religion?
Part 2 – Of Serpents, Satans and Sirens
For many Americans, this is the point that college enters the picture. Many students arriving at a college or university have been largely sheltered from any views about religions other than their own by their parents and pastors. A number come to us today from Catholic parochial schools or their often more dogmatic cousins, white frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-44322098976454299372010-12-23T07:56:00.000-08:002010-12-23T07:58:36.844-08:00Losing My Religion? -
Part 1 – Polls, politics and the power of education
Oh, life is bigger
It's bigger than you
And you are not me
The lengths that I will go to
The distance in your eyes
Oh no, I've said too much
I set it up
(chorus)
That's me in the cornerThat's me in the spotlight, I'm
Losing my religion
Trying to keep up with you
And I don't know if I can do it
Oh no, I've said too much
frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-53632664693243297552010-12-20T07:36:00.000-08:002010-12-20T07:36:33.768-08:008 Astonishing Stats on Academic Cheating | OEDbFrom a reader:Hi Harry,We recently published an article that you may be interested in entitled, "8 Astonishing Stats on Academic Cheating".I thought perhaps you'd be interested in sharing this article with your readers? After having followed your blog for a while, I feel that this one article would align well with your blog's subject matter.If interested, here's the link for your convenience: ( frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-43322056227574117242010-12-15T21:22:00.000-08:002010-12-15T21:22:02.668-08:00In Praise of Rate-My-Professor.com
The term is ending and the usual comments appear at the Rate-my-professor.com site. I have come to look forward to the sour grapes kvetching and the occasional perceived need of students who appreciated my classes to defend my honor.
In all honesty, my ego is secure enough these days to read these comments without too much apoplexy. I was recognized by the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-10205905690174421442010-12-07T08:54:00.000-08:002010-12-07T08:54:22.540-08:00The Elephant in the Room - Public Universities for a Socially Irresponsible Public
From today’s Inside Higher Education comes this little blurb:
Ideas for U. of California
A special commission studying the future of the University of California released its final report Monday, with numerous recommendations for the university system to thrive in an era of limited state budgets. Most of the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-58490393962425696662010-11-21T17:57:00.000-08:002010-11-21T17:57:58.471-08:00And yet….
I have smoldered and simmered this past week over the cheating scandal, worrying about what it says about higher education today and where we as a country are going tomorrow. But I have also discovered I am not the only one distraught about this momentous event for our university which has ultimately tarred all of us with the brush of 200 malefactors. In this case, misery does, indeed,frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-66595459314107846532010-11-21T08:38:00.000-08:002010-11-21T08:38:12.637-08:00Academic Honesty in the Garden of Eden
‘Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you not to eat?’ 12 The man said, ‘The woman whom you gave to be with me, she gave me fruit from the tree, and I ate.’ 13 Then the Lord God said to the woman, ‘What is this that you have done?’ The woman said, ‘The serpent tricked me, and I ate.’ (Genesis 3:11-13)
This frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-79004083877868277342010-11-16T07:33:00.000-08:002010-11-16T07:33:41.032-08:00Signs of Basilea in a Sea of Fearful Portents
The smoke has cleared from elections 2010 and I would guess most Americans are feeling a bit fatigued from this latest assault on our senses - and our good sense. I feel no small amount of gratitude that the assault has ended. This past campaign was marked by a decided misanthropy. Beginning with all the ad hominem advertising, the tendency to frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-43093216892793326982010-11-03T05:25:00.000-07:002010-11-16T07:25:04.587-08:00Blue Islands in a Red Sea of Rich Retirees and Rednecks
The electoral map of Florida graphically illustrates the truth this morning. While the governor’s race has narrowed to 50,000 votes, it still appears that billionaire Rick Scott has bought himself a governorship. The map shows the handful of blue urban islands surrounded by a sea of red suburban and rural counties, the realm of the rich frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-89645997234765334832010-11-02T20:32:00.000-07:002010-11-02T20:32:27.969-07:00Making sense of the latest black night in American politics
It’s been a long night for those of us who believed that America might possibly engage in some real, substantive change a mere two years ago. I look to the Hope poster on my wall with the stylized portrait of President Obama and my heart sinks.
The results from Florida are dire. Republicans have swept the mindless Tea Pots into frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-87402836828913275482010-11-02T10:35:00.000-07:002010-11-02T10:35:31.643-07:00So, this is what Academia comes to?
On one of the lists on which I occasionally contribute comments there is an article about a racist work of fiction in which a thinly veiled Southern Poverty Law Center figure is murdered by a racist zealot which has been assigned by some professors at a handful of colleges for student reading. At least one of the professors, himself an avowed semite, hails frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-58020113489794287392010-10-30T07:24:00.000-07:002010-10-30T07:24:04.310-07:00Fearing Democracy in the Hands of a Consumerist Electorate
On Florida’s ballot next week is a measure which would give citizens the power to vote on any development which would impact a region in a substantial way. Currently, such decision making takes place on county commissions which are increasingly dominated by developers with the result that Paradise is being paved to put up a parking frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-42924439583972267872010-10-07T07:37:00.000-07:002010-10-07T07:37:52.751-07:00Inside the Circled Wagons
Last week Pew Research Center announced the results of a survey it had conducted among American residents regarding their familiarity with world religions. The talking heads have been abuzz ever since over the results, most of them offering sound bites of sensationalism rather than anything of substance.
The survey found that most Americans are largely unaware of frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-7113422124752442222010-09-30T09:04:00.000-07:002010-09-30T09:04:37.332-07:00On Intellectual and Moral Courage – Part II
The second site I found which proved useful in bringing to consciousness this question of intellectual courage v. cowardice comes from perhaps an unlikely source. Lloyd Flack is an Australian statistician, according to his limited biographical information, writes a blog entitled “It looks different from here: Irregular postings on science, politics, frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-2501345140345287512010-09-30T08:53:00.000-07:002010-09-30T08:53:59.871-07:00On Intellectual and Moral Courage – Part I
Last week I assigned students in one of my classes to examine the findings of the Princeton Review regarding life on the nearly 400 campuses their review covers. In addition to assessing academic standards at given institutions, the Review also provides a consumer guide to schools by having students respond to surveys regarding everything from campus frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-6370388403070870202010-09-25T09:37:00.000-07:002010-09-30T08:46:01.324-07:00Idiocy and the Twilight of American Culture
Last week I had my students read an excerpt out of Charles Pierce’s Idiot America as one of the six readings assigned for the unit on critical thinking. Scathing in his critique, Pierce begins his rant with a discussion of the Creation Museum in Ohio where a literalist approach to Genesis has led religious believers to create models of dinosaurs frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-88367188704935164472010-09-23T07:26:00.000-07:002010-09-23T07:26:13.185-07:00The Punishment of Ben Stein
One of the articles that came up on the opening page of Google.com/news this morning was a lament by actor and sometimes economist Ben Stein entitled “Raising My Taxes Is a Punishment.” The deadpan Stein, known for his Visine commercials and his role as the deadly boring teacher in Ferris Bueller’s Day Off, argues that ending the Bush tax cuts for the wealthy, tax frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-53243402962808624152010-09-12T08:21:00.000-07:002010-09-12T10:22:51.482-07:00Why Marriage? Why Now? – Part 3
There were a lot of hoops to jump through before our marriage could happen. We decided to ask the bishop of the independent Catholic movement (CACINA) who had blessed our union in 1999 in the chapel of the Episcopal Divinity School in Cambridge, MA to officiate. We figured that now that he was able to actually marry us, it ought to be his role to finish the ritefrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-54609415514218262702010-09-12T07:57:00.000-07:002010-09-12T07:58:14.676-07:00In the beginning...Kappa Sigma Fraternity, University of Florida, 1974Andy was my big brother. We lived in my dad's former room in the house.
Why Marriage? Why Now? – Part 2
So, why buy in? Why bother? Why would we want to be like the breeders (to use the cynical, bitchy term with which we queers sometimes respond in kind to homophobic epithets)? Why not settle for domestic partner benefits frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-52576207184002588322010-09-12T07:30:00.000-07:002010-09-12T07:48:48.527-07:00
Why Marriage? Why Now? – Introduction
At 11:15 a.m., Friday, August 13, 2010, I stood with my life partner of 36 years on the first row of steps sweeping up to the U.S. Supreme Court. With the inscription on the court portico “Equal Justice Under Law” looming over our heads and marriage license in hand, we listened attentively as the following words were spoken:
By the power frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-20242140518083032272010-08-03T07:04:00.000-07:002010-08-03T07:04:11.844-07:00Does Hitchens Have a Prayer?
Today’s Religion Dispatches contains an article by Garret Keizer entitled “Does Hitchens Have a Prayer? Since the dire diagnosis of esophageal cancer a question has arisen over whether to pray for famous atheist, Christopher Hitchens.” Keizer’s essay informed me that famed contrarian Christopher Hitchens has been diagnosed with esophageal cancer. Hitchens is an frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-61569994321314287802010-07-22T10:50:00.001-07:002010-07-22T10:57:53.927-07:00Creating a Paper Trail
I finally got confirmation from the college bookstore today that my books are indeed ordered for the fall term. Despite my requesting notification at the online order site for all four classes (I have four different plannings this fall), I received only two - the Humanities I and World Religions books which we always use. The other two classes – Encountering the frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-76112565003786493162010-07-21T09:44:00.001-07:002010-07-21T09:46:20.806-07:00We Judge Too Quickly ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
The weekly discussion question I posed to my students in my online course was with which of the vows of Benedict’s Rule would they have the most trouble. The results were interesting to say the least. One of the comments, however, spurred this response from their instructor based partly in an article on the Rachel Maddow show last night.frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-45354470768696067082010-07-16T10:33:00.000-07:002010-07-16T10:33:42.579-07:00Gay Friendly?
Reflexiones de Cuba – Reflections of Cuba – I
The young American couple seemed a bit anxious when they sat down next to us in the Jose Marti Airport in Havana. We assumed they were worried about the same thing we were dreading – going back through American customs in Miami after having been to Cuba, albeit legally in our case (presenting a paper at an academic conference). They frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-88038395309482416412010-07-16T09:46:00.000-07:002010-07-16T09:47:16.639-07:00A pain in the ass?
Overheard As I walked across campus week five of the first summer session:
The young man walked his bicycle past the construction zone on campus. As he passed, he said to his classmate walking with him, "I dunno, I just haven't gotten up the drive to post anything to discussions yet. I find the stuff interesting and all but..." he trailed off. The young woman, without frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-26325122423591357222010-07-16T08:26:00.000-07:002010-07-16T08:32:59.851-07:00The Logical Possibilities of Education in a Corporate Sports World
From Friday’s USA Today, this little story tucked in the bottom of the last column of the Sports section:
http://www.usatoday.com/sports/college/football/sec/2010-07-08-alabama-thursday-classes-canceled_N.htm
Alabama students to get day off for rare Thursday game in November
TUSCALOOSA, Ala. (AP) — Alabama’s first weekdayfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-86756561126142637462010-07-16T07:20:00.001-07:002010-07-16T07:29:03.771-07:00A Song for Simeon
[Message to friends and family sent Saturday afternoon, 7-10]
Friends,
Please join Andy and me in saying a little prayer of thanks for the life of Simeon, my big black cat. He died this morning after giving us 15 years of life and love.
Simeon adopted me at the Humane Society in Tallahassee quite literally. I had gone there to adopt an orange tabby only to find out she frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-53140340031207829992010-07-11T07:17:00.000-07:002010-07-11T07:17:18.666-07:00Things that make you go Hmmmmm……
Occasionally I see an aging,dirty white pickup truck with a camper on the back covered with bumper stickers here at the local Starbucks. Some of the stickers suggest the owner is a Vietnam veteran, a beer lover, A Gator fan and a motorcycle rider. The other stickers suggest this is someone I might not want to spend much time with. To wit:
• “Welcome to Americafrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-2363971415999781102010-07-03T08:31:00.001-07:002010-07-03T08:41:57.389-07:00Of Evangelicals, Presumptions and Being a Jerk Online
I ran across a CNN blogspot called Belief Blog today. It’s an interesting site. I’m not sure how I came across this piece by Jonathan Acuff but his title caught my eye given the research I am doing on the dehumanizing aspects of 21st CE technology. Jonathan was writing about “Why Christians are jerks online.” It’s a fairly thoughtful frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-9635047551400639052010-06-13T07:42:00.000-07:002010-06-13T07:42:49.918-07:00Time to talk honestly with our families ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
From last Tuesday’s AP wire, this story:
Rep. Ike Skelton, a conservative Missouri Democrat, said he thinks the debate in Congress over the proposed repeal of the "don't ask, don't tell" law might force families to explain homosexuality to their children. "What do mommies and daddies say to their 7-year-old child?" frharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-76746553595121915012010-05-17T07:05:00.000-07:002010-05-17T07:12:46.712-07:00Awaking with a Start
I awoke from my dream with a start this morning. I was shaking and my breathing shook my frame. It had seemed very real, as my dreams often do. This is what I was dreaming:
I was walking through a big city park in the middle of the day. It reminded me of Central Park in New York. There was a slight incline up a hill. Above me on the hill there was a man in a business suitfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6284168.post-8967261450247037262010-04-21T16:03:00.000-07:002010-04-21T16:03:37.433-07:00Things That Make Us Go Hmmm…
On the faculty side of the parking lot, two rows away from the student’s bumper sticker reading “Smile! Your Mother Chose Life” (see my ranting about this one below in my blog of Nov. 9, 2009) is this amusing take on life in 21st CE America:
I express my individuality through mass-produced bumper stickers.
Indeed.
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The Rev. Harryfrharryhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/17765076740795402119noreply@blogger.com0