Posted in Books, Catholic, Christian, Life, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Spirituality, Thomas Merton, Writing on May 25, 2008 | No Comments »
At Mass today, on this feast of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ I was reminded of something I read last fall:
Only a repeated miracle of God from minute to minute keeps me from falling into hell. I am made out of earth and ashes and spittle and a little mud. I don’t [...]
Posted in Books, Drink, Food and Drink, Health and Wellness, Life, Wellness, Writing on April 6, 2008 | No Comments »
Here’s another book that’s gotten a lot of attention over the last few months. The director of our public library suggested I read Michael Gates Gill’s How Starbucks Saved My Life: A Son of Privilege Learns to Live Like Everyone Else.
Reading some of the online reviews and reader comments it seems people often miss the point [...]
Posted in Books, Catholic, Christian, Life, News, News and Politics, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Spirituality, Writing on April 1, 2008 | 1 Comment »
For the last couple of weeks I have been reading Ken Follett’s “The Pillars of the Earth.” (Note: I was reading it before I had any idea it was enjoying a resurgence - heaven forbid I should actually do something because it’s popular.) I enjoyed it well enough, though at the end it seemed to [...]
Posted in Books, Catholic, Christian, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Spirituality, Writing on January 17, 2008 | No Comments »
Working my way through the works of Thomas Merton more or less consistently over the last several years, I found myself wondering what he sounded like. I knew there was a collection of audio tapes at the Thomas Merton Center at Bellarmine University, but there was nothing I could find on the Internet. Last fall [...]
Posted in Books, Computers and Internet, Cooking, Drink, Entertainment, Food, Food and Drink, Hobbies, Internet on January 13, 2008 | 6 Comments »
For almost ten years Mark Bittman has been writing for The New York Times as “The Minimalist.” Though I have been a regular (mostly online) reader of the Times for a while now, it’s only recently that I have really paid any attention to his writing and online video. (Never let it be [...]
Posted in Books, Catholic, Entertainment, Health and Wellness, Hobbies, Life, Motorcycles, Music, Photography, Religion and Spirituality, Spirituality, Wellness, Writing on January 11, 2008 | 4 Comments »
In my previous post I intended to talk a little more about the sometimes jarring experience of returning to work after an extended vacation. Whether two weeks constitutes an “extended vacation” is, of course, debatable, but let’s just stipulate to that, okay?
During vacation I was able to do more of the things that make me [...]
Posted in Books, Catholic, Health and Wellness, Life, Religion, Religion and Spirituality, Spirituality, Thomas Merton, Wellness on October 19, 2007 | 5 Comments »
I’ve been working my way through the journals of Thomas Merton lately. Several years ago I read Merton’s autobiography, The Seven Storey Mountain, after stumbling into it completely by accident. His style of writing, and thinking, struck a chord and I have been reading his work ever since.
Having read several of his books now, but [...]
Posted in Books, Hobbies, Life, Photography, Travel on October 11, 2007 | No Comments »
Every year I attend the ICMA conference I experience the same arc of thoughts from “I wouldn’t mind traveling more for business” to “Oh, God, I can’t wait to get home” and “I couldn’t deal with this on a regular basis.” No doubt the swelling ranks of travelers and the increasingly dysfunctional airline system (not [...]
