By Joel Bowman, on November 23rd, 2019% The end-of-the-year holidays in the States typically include Christmas, and New Year’s. These holidays are based on the assumption that most people are at least nominal Christians. Many (perhaps most) cultures have holidays based on days seen as the end of one year and the start of another.
In one way or another, the change of seasons provides the impetus for end-of- and start-of-year celebrations, including family gatherings and gift exchanges. Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Eve/Day. In the Jewish community, Hanukkah (or or “Chanukah”) is the celebrated day. In one way or another, most cultures celebrate what is seen . . . → Read More: Holiday Blues
By Joel Bowman, on February 28th, 2018% Steven Pinker’s new book, Enlightenment Now: The Case for Reason, Science, Humanism, and Progress is a beacon of hope in what I have been considering “dark times.” If you’ve been reading my blog awhile, you know that I haven’t been happy about Trump’s presidency. Pinker’s book has convinced me that there’s a lot more “ointment” than there is “fly.” Things in general will continue to get better in spite of Trump’s efforts to return us to the “dark ages.” Progress is not guaranteed, of course, but the long-term trend of history is increasing well-being for humans based on advances in . . . → Read More: Enlightenment Now
By Joel Bowman, on November 24th, 2017% We have officially entered the “Holiday Season.” I started writing this post on Thanksgiving, which will be followed by Christmas and the start of the New Year. These are supposed to be joyous times. At this point, I have seen a lot of Thanksgivings come and go. For most of my life, it was easy to think of things for which I could truly feel grateful. This year, that’s not the case. Of course, there are things for which I am grateful, but my concerns about the state of our nation have put a damper on my gratitude. This is, . . . → Read More: Thanksgiving, 2017
By Joel Bowman, on February 26th, 2016% I knew that it had been a while since my last posting, but I had no idea how long it had been. John Lennon is usually given credit for saying that “life is what happens while you are making other plans,” which is included in the lyrics for Beautiful Boy, written for his son, Sean. Since my last blog, we’ve had two major holidays (Christmas and New Year’s), and more than a month has slipped away while I was busy making other plans. And shoveling snow. It is, after all, winter in Michigan….
We have had some winter weather . . . → Read More: Time Flies
By Joel Bowman, on November 27th, 2015% On a cold and frosty late-December morning, when I lived in a previous neighborhood, I was out walking my dog. It was so long ago that in the years between then and now, not only has that dog died of old age, but my next two dogs have also died of old age. Even so, on that late-December morning I said something that still haunts me. A boy who lived in a nearby house, ran up to me holding up a new pair of gloves, saying excitedly, “See what I got! New gloves!” My reply: “They are really neat. Did . . . → Read More: What Did You Get for Christmas?
By Joel Bowman, on November 11th, 2015% With apologies to Paul McCartney, the winding road I have in mind for this blog is not to your door but to the 2016 elections in the US. For one reason or another, we seem to be off to an earlier and stranger start than is usually the case. The impetus for this blog post was an article in Salon by Heather Cox Richardson about the intellectual battle for the soul of the Republican Party. The article caught my attention because I started my political life as an “Eisenhower Republican” while I was still too young to vote. I liked . . . → Read More: The Long and Winding Road
By Joel Bowman, on May 9th, 2015% By now, you undoubtedly know about the devastating earthquake in Nepal. You may not have heard, however, about the earthquake in SW Michigan. Earthquakes come in all sizes, from the huge and deadly to the minor shake-ups. Michigan’s earthquake was a minor shake-up. When I was growing up in California, we had numerous minor quakes. Even though they always came as a surprise, we learned to recognize them for what they were. After I had grown up and left, California experienced at least two serious quakes with extensive damage and some deaths, one in northern California and one in southern . . . → Read More: Earthquakes
By Joel Bowman, on July 14th, 2014% I recently had two online exchanges with “True Believers.” In my case, both were Christian “literalists” whose “true belief” was in Biblical inerrancy, believing that the Christian Bible is literally the “Word of God” and therefore contains no errors. The belief in inerrancy is more complex than the phrase implies, as there are so many different versions of the ancient texts. My concern is with inerrancy in general rather than which particular form it takes.
Christians aren’t the only ones who have an inerrancy faction. Muslims have one, too. Sunnis and Shia are currently in the news for their . . . → Read More: True Believers
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