To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here As summer heat gives way to crisp autumn days, Midwesterners typically throw open their doors and windows. Then as nighttime temperatures become downright chilly, most homeowners will notice some visitors at their front door. We’re talking about houseflies. Having luxuriated for weeks in the warmth of August, flies who survive until… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Almost every film adaptation of Stephen King’s novels has been a disappointment. At least for the author. The exception is Stand By Me, a coming-of-age drama that was based, in part, on King’s own childhood. When director Rob Reiner privately screened the film for the novelist before its theatrical release in 1986,… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here All of us are called to be stewards, or caretakers, of the gifts and resources we have been given. That includes our talents and abilities, our bank accounts, our calendars, and our physical wellbeing. What’s often overlooked, however, is our need to be stewards of our personal energy. Almost 40 years… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Kenneth Turan of the Los Angeles Times called it “as much an experience we live through as a film we watch on screen.” He was referring to Saving Private Ryan, Steven Spielberg’s 1998 epic re-creation of the D-Day invasion of the Normandy coast and the costly days that followed. Spielberg was… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here When the boogeyman goes to sleep at night, he checks under his bed for Chuck Norris. That’s one of hundreds of so-called Chuck Norris “facts” that for the past 20 years have fed a logic-defying cultural phenomenon and Internet craze. In 2005, talk show host Conan O’Brien began to tell jokes… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here A few years ago, two first class passengers on a US Airways flight from Philadelphia to Seattle made arrangements to travel with a pet. Their “therapeutic companion animal” turned out to be a full-grown pig. Others passengers described the 300-pound hog as “enormous, brown, angry, and honking.” At first he was… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Many of life’s most memorable spiritual moments seem to come out of nowhere. They aren’t planned. They aren’t expected. They catch us off guard. It’s as if a curtain is suddenly pulled back, and we catch a glimpse, for just a fleeting moment, of the reality of the invisible world. And… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Generally the passing of a retired chemical engineer wouldn’t make a dent in the national news cycle. But Harrison Ruffin Tyler, who died May 25, was no ordinary citizen. He was the last surviving grandson of John Tyler. Yes, that John Tyler – the man who became America’s 10th president 184… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here New York City has always been a harrowing place to live. During the 1850s – a long time before the arrival of subways and skyscrapers – the city was deeply unsettled. As depicted in Martin Scorsese’s 2002 feature film Gangs of New York, the streets roiled with conflicts between rich and… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Tom Toro draws cartoons for The New Yorker magazine, long considered the ultimate cartoonists’ showcase. His work springs from his humorous observations concerning the challenges of everyday life, as evidenced by the panel above. But it took a while before he hit the big time. The New Yorker accepted his… Read more »
