I participated in my first “crop mob” yesterday at Bellair Farms (CSA). If you’re already lost — what’s a “crop mob” and what is “CSA”? — you’re not alone. Both are pretty new ideas out of the old world of agri-culture, sustainable and sweet. First, CSA: It stands for “community supported agriculture” and is a way […]
“It’s one thing to read the Bible, quite another to appreciate the historical context in which its various books were written, the different translations and versions that have emerged over the centuries and the indelible impact the book continues to have on our culture. With her new book ‘Bible Babel: Making Sense of the Most
“Did you know,” a bright-eyed young woman breathlessly exclaimed to me, “that when King James wrote the Bible, he didn’t actually put everything in?!” I was riding the DC Metro a few weeks ago when she sat down beside me with this information. Since people don’t normally talk on the train (unless it’s a first
Cut the Cake, the KJV is 400 Read More »
While the rest of us are schizophrenically both celebrating the wonderful run of our VCU’s Rams basketball making it to the Final Four and bemoaning the out-sized emphasis higher education places on its sports, my colleague Cliff Edwards finds the sweet spot that lets us have it all. “The power of the imagination is the very stuff of
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Had a great time at Chop Suey Tuey bookstore in Richmond’s Carytown yesterday for Bible Babel‘s paperback debut. In the midst of the excitement of VCU’s big basketball game (on to the Final Four! wow) and the ever-amazing French Film Festival at the historic Byrd Theater, just across the street from Chop Suey Tuey, we filled the
Bible Babel on a Sunday Afternoon Read More »
“What does your book say about evil?,” an attendee posed to panelists at the VA Fest of the Book event that I moderated. It was a lively event, not least because the composition of the panel led inevitably to passionate disagreement. As the psychiatrist who wrote of religion as a product purely of human physiology
Since we’ve split the atom, dealing with hatred is the fundamental project of the humanities. With that thought, Jim Leach, chairman of the National Endowment for the Humanities, concluded his talk in the University of Virginia’s historic Rotunda. Soft-spoken and notably lacking exclamations or even physical gestures (he’s from Iowa), Leach delivered a clear and inviting speech
Civil Discourse and the Humanities Read More »
Does the Bible have anything to say about Japan’s devastating earthquake? Because I wrote about biblical responses to pain some years ago, people occasionally ask me what the Bible says about natural disasters. It’s discomfiting — not the question (it’s a good one, and I’m happy to discuss it), but the absence of a single
The Bible, Natural Disasters, and Suffering Read More »
A silent film nearly 100 years old will get a fresh airing complete with new music tonight (March 3) in Baltimore. I have yet to see D. W. Griffith’s “Intolerance,” but I’m intrigued. It tells four different historical moments of intolerance, the first of which deals with the fall of Babylon to Cyrus II. I can’t tell
Griffith’s “Intolerance” and Cyrus Read More »
We enjoyed a wonderful dinner with a dear friend this weekend, a UVA professor, now in his 90s. Mr. Mead taught music out of his academic and professional expertise, and he continues to conduct a seminar for a few lucky seniors to explore contemporary issues in study and conversation. Over the decades, Mr. Mead has not only instructed
When Everything Seems a Variation Read More »
