Awe is a sense for the transcendence, for the reference everywhere to Him who is beyond all things. It is an insight better conveyed in attitudes than in words. The more eager we are to express it, the less remains of it.
The meaning of awe is to realize that life takes place under wide horizons, [...]
“The Greeks learned in order to comprehend. The Hebrews learned in order to revere. The modern man learns in order to use. To Bacon we owe the formulation, “Knowledge is power.” This is how people are urged to study: knowledge means success. We do not know any more how to justify any value except in [...]
Nerds (C-)
I’m a sucker for picking up books that are on the featured shelf at the library. At our library, there is a section where each librarian puts their “picks”. Like at Blockbuster. Two of them pick crappy stuff (1 goes for romantic novels, the other conservative politics) but the third one always picks winners. [...]
“Cheap elecricity, cheap cars, and cheap gas, combined with the rising incomes of a growing middle class, prompted an exodus from cities to suburbs and a shift from the public entertainment offered by theaters, amusement parks, and urban streets to the private diversions served up by televisions, radios, and hi-fi sets. Broadcast media, also made [...]
Excerpted from The Politics of Heaven: American In Fearful Times by Earl Shorris
I’ve never been a huge Sigmund Freud fan. In fact, I think he’s a bit of a loon. But he actually sounds rather succint here.
The individual in any given nation has in this war a terrible opportunity to convince himself of what should [...]
“I think the rebellion is that kids aren’t rebelling,” says Rana Reeves, creative director of PR Agency Shine Communications. “They aren’t rebelling against the marketers; they want to be the marketers. That’s the rebellion. Rebellion is there, but I think that MTV and culture and society have become so much more permissive, that there is [...]
More book shares from my weekly reading.
“The implication invariably has been that for a few feckless worshipers of God to obey Christ’s commandments may be all right, but in practical manners such as war and preparation for war we will obey Caesar. The Christian followers of Caesar have thus committed themselves to an absurdity that [...]
War & Peace (B-)
I’ll be honest. I gave this book my best shot. I started it over Thanksgiving and was going to read it through the holidays and into Christmas. It’s the only thing I tried to read in December and it was really, really tough. The translation I picked up topped out at almost [...]
Continuing on in my effort to share with you small portions of what I’m reading as a way of encouraging you to explore some of these authors, I give you a few excerpts from Tony Jones’ new book, The New Christians. If you haven’t read my glowing review of The New Christians here, then you [...]
Tony Jones has a new book coming out in March 2008. Tony was gracious enough to send me an advanced reader’s copy (in advance of an upcoming podcast) and I devoured it in 3 sittings. While I’m prone to hyper-active spurts of exaggeration, in this particular instance I’m afraid I’ll understate things. I think The [...]