PHOTO PRAYER 2023-15. Jesus told his followers not to worry, but I do. Being loved and accepted, having food and shelter, keeping my health: these concerns continue. I worry about the Israel-Hamas War; the war in Ukraine less so. (How quickly our concerns change!) The upcoming presidential election. The fear our polarized society will come […]
Offspring of Inspiration
PHOTO PRAYER 2023-14. In my wife’s studio, geometry and color catch my eye. A glance is all it takes. Out comes my camera. As usual, the finished photo barely resembles the brief vision that inspired it. As philosophers have long observed, images cannot capture reality any more than words can capture the spark of inspiration. […]
Connected To Jesus
I know the air He breathed did not stay in Palestine. It spread across the whole wide world. Even now, air He breathed is in my lungs, in my blood. I know, too, that the water in which He was baptized did not stay in the Jordan River. It flowed into the oceans around the […]
Think About Such Things
Hamas has successfully provoked Israel into a war. Both sides now use the deaths and suffering to provoke us to take action, to take sides. God help us! God help us who want to make life better but see others who are provoked making life worse. I cannot sleep but I can write. How can […]
Targeting Civilians
Armed soldiers should not target unarmed civilians. That seems clear enough to me sitting thousands of miles from conflict, but those at war soon lose such clarity. For those at war, entire populations become the enemy. During World War II, the world condemned the Luftwaffe for bombing London and other cities in England, but then, […]
Day 2, Abandoned ATM
Our second day on the road was like a dream. First, we were in Warrenton, Virginia, a charming town self-consciously holding onto the past, to the point of not having traffic lights downtown. Then we climbed west on the Lee Highway to Shenandoah National Park, hoping to take Skyline Drive south, but the higher we […]
Smart Phone Cameras
We cannot see without using our smart phones. Their cameras let us record and then share our experiences. But even as our audiences grow, the attention we get and the attention we give becomes progressively more superficial. Flit, flit, flit — only the stickiest of posts gets more than a glance. This, too, is how […]
The Eyes See
The eyes see but the mind does not. It was not until much later, looking closer at this photo, that I saw that all these flags are not blowing in the same direction. While a strong east wind blows most of them to the right, a strong west wind blows one to the left. Remarkable! […]
The Best Words
My wife’s dog waits at the front gate, her gaze fixed on the empty driveway, intently watching for the joyous moment when her mistress will return. Unlike her dog, my wife’s husband exhibits no such display of longing and devotion. He is not kneeling in prayer, again and again exhorting God to keep her safe […]
Fill Up On Bread
“Fill up on bread! If I heard that once, I heard it a thousand times.” That is what my father said when he remembered living in New York City, one of eleven children growing up in Hell’s Kitchen and the Lower East Side during the Great Depression. If I heard my father say that once, […]