Books

December 21, 2018

Year 3, Day 355 | No Comments

Section of The Taking of Christ, Caravaggio, 1602

Rummaging through my files as I review materials to pass on to one of my great grandsons who appears to be preparing for a professional life similar to mine, and both of us aware of the significant shifts in problems, sources, developments, and progress that he will face – I pause often to determine whether or not this or that is worth his attention for usefulness. I found an article from LIFE magazine for March 9, 1959 – now sixty years ago. It summarized the then current situation of the Harvard University Library. It was perceived as the greatest collegiate library in the world and second only to the Library of Congress among all libraries. It was seen as a… Read more

Humility

December 20, 2018

Year 3, Day 354 | No Comments

Section of Christ and the Woman of Samaria, Benedetto Luti, 1715-20

These are days when arrogance, self-expression, even narcissism, are somewhat stylish. Narcissus pined away to death for the love of himself, a love stimulated by the reflection of his face mirrored back at him from the water. During the last quarter of the twentieth century, numerous books were written about the popular turn toward individual self-esteem. They reviewed its value and damage. A new word has been coined for popular self-interest: selfie, and when applied to a group, selfies. A national news report noted the selfie word addition to the dictionary. It began with the new technology that easily permits a person to photograph rather easily one’s own image. A group may no longer be a social unit, but a… Read more

Generalists/Specialists

December 19, 2018

Year 3, Day 353 | No Comments

Section of Noli me Tangere by Hans Holbein the Younger

One of the evaluation interests of my life has been to analyze the differences between those persons known as specialists and those who are generalists. The specialists tend to look at life through different lenses than the generalists. Analysts and the public generally look at both through interpretive lenses. The most respected appear to be the specialists, but generalists tend to guide society. Specialists are fewer in number, paid better, are presumed to have more information about the topic/problem that has gained predominant attention, and are less likely, when established, to be the subjects of personal scrutiny. There are benefactors and scoundrels in both groupings as there are also in the general population. The generalists are concerned about the whole… Read more

Sign-Off

December 18, 2018

Year 3, Day 352 | No Comments

Section of The Descent from the Cross, Rogier van der Weyden, c. 1435

The date of this writing is May 27, 2015. Like the dated Pages for four years of daily readings, this Page is not written on the date assigned to it. The last Page of the four series was written long ago when the theme was emphasized to my mind. Pages were often generated by something that occurred on the day of writing but suitable to my plan for another date related to life, my wanderings and an irresistible desire to write to my family and Christian students, including their parents, about the meaning of life and the impact of learning for both the natural and spiritual contexts for life – with their overlaps and differences. One goal was to help… Read more

Drunkenness

December 17, 2018

Year 3, Day 351 | No Comments

Section of The Infant Jesus and St. John the Baptist, Guido Reni, n.d.

Perhaps no law has been sneered at in the United States as the Prohibition Amendment added to the American Constitution after World War I. It was heralded as one of the great liberating factors of history, and identified as permanent, presumably never to be repealed, to assure better life for the masses, especially for individual families. I remember well when it was repealed a little more than a decade later. Repeal came during the early part of the Great Depression. President Roosevelt said that if it meant return to the saloon conduct of the earlier years of the nation, we would regret the repeal. In easy flow of American ingenuity, saloon keepers simply changed the name of their establishments from… Read more

The End of the Earth

December 16, 2018

Year 3, Day 350 | No Comments

Increasingly nations are taking interest in concepts related to the end of the earth, earth as we know it. Survival or extinction is being taken seriously. From ancient times biblical literature has addressed the earth and mankind – their meaning and durability, blessings and threats, and purposes for existence. We now have a variety of prognostications based on science, faith, and assumptions both plausible and implausible. There is a general agreement that the life world, as we know it, will end. Some believe it will end with a whimper, some believe a cataclysm, some believe a dead planet, but all indicate the end of mankind unless some other locale is found for mankind to emigrate, and begin another phase of… Read more

Heroics

December 15, 2018

Year 3, Day 349 | No Comments

Section of Sistine Chapel ceiling, Michaelangelo, 1508-1512

In the changing mood of general society, modern stories of bravery, heroism, cowardice, and decline are increasing in numbers. In the rash of shootings taking many lives in schools, restaurants, business and churches, public places there is emerging the ordinary person doing the extraordinary thing in what may be a positive or a negative context. Persons are looking for fresh definitions of some honored words like hero. Is a person losing his or her life in an attack on New York that collapses two great skyscraper buildings, and takes 3,000 lives a recognized hero in another country than mine? That may be heroic for some but may be criminal for someone else – and vice versa. Are heroes only found… Read more

Animal Life

December 14, 2018

Year 3, Day 348 | No Comments

Animals appear to be part of a great parable of earth. They belong even more to earth than mankind. They live close to the land with modest nests, dens and adaptations to their environments. They have rather simple diets, often living off the lives of other animals with a natural nutrition they seem to discover. They usually care for their young, appear to make choices in mating for the most developed species of vertebrates, even creating families among some, especially with mothers and offspring relating in the first year or so of a newborn. They manage well in the matter of giving birth and finding ways of survival. Without the care and protection of human beings the animals are in… Read more

Distractions

December 13, 2018

Year 3, Day 347 | No Comments

One of the most effective tools for weakening the human meaning of the individual or the masses of individuals is distraction, a theme of a recent Page. As we approach Christmas I am impressed at the distractions of the holiday from the meaning of Christ born in Bethlehem.. Some historians accent Gibbon’s point related to the fall of Rome – the Circuses. By distracting the populace with dramatic entertainments, like feeding Christians to lions or gladiators, the leaders of the empire could hold the attention of the populace who were thereby distracted from the excesses of the rich and powerful. Leaders succeeded, for a time, to distract the public from the taxes, the long periods of warfare that swallowed their… Read more

Good and Evil

December 12, 2018

Year 3, Day 346 | No Comments

I look for treatment of theological issues in sources not identified directly with theology, even if some of those sources are close neighbors to theology. Biblical Archaeology Review reports on studies in the field as related to verification or modification of the biblical record of persons and events appearing in the book of history known as the Bible. Often the magazine reviews books about the themes of the Bible in the belief that theology is a factor to be included in understanding and interpreting artifacts of archaeology. In an article entitled, The Evil Inclination, Brian E. Dailey, SJ, there were reviewed two books dealing with the topic of sin. The first was a sweep through classical sources in identifying sin,… Read more

Monthly Archives: December 2018