The praise and accolades have been pouring in from around the world for Dolly Parton following her death this past Monday. And rightly so. She was universally recognized as a uniquely talented and remarkably good and generous person. Despite her seemingly perfect “Red State” pedigree—Appalachian roots and country music stardom—she genuinely transcended political divisions, embodying religious faith yet supporting gay rights, underwriting a COVID vaccine, and contributing generously to charitable causes, including her own Imagination Library. It’s not surprising, then,…

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Recently I watched two interviews with climate scientists discussing the heat waves that have stunned Europe this summer, as well as other parts of the world. Both said, in effect, “we ain’t seen nuthin’ yet.” These events are not anomalies, they said, but only an introduction to new weather norms that will only get worse, much worse. It was obvious that both speakers wanted to be as blunt as possible. They were done with pulling their punches. And both identified…

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In an early scene of Moonstruck (one of my favorite movies), Loretta (played by Cher) puts her fiancé on a plane to Sicily to visit his dying mother. As Loretta stands looking at the plane, an elderly Italian woman in traditional garb turns and vehemently says to her, “I’ve put a curse on that plane!” She explains that her sister is on the flight and fifty years ago she stole the man the woman was in love with, a man…

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In my last post, I said that we are in a time of “do it yourself religion.” We can’t anymore rely on traditional institutional religion for our spiritual wellbeing, so we must take care of it ourselves. There are a couple of obstacles to that happening. One which I mentioned last time, is that it takes time and effort. The other is that we may not feel we have permission. Most versions of Christianity (like many religions) have a concept…

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People today have become increasingly accepting of, and proactive about, taking care of themselves. Not like pioneer folks on the frontier. Rather, they are recognizing that many things previous generations assumed would take care of themselves, or were beyond their control, won’t or aren’t. Career and personal finance, physical and mental health are areas of life people increasingly, even if reluctantly, realize they need to be the ones in charge. In the past, it was typically assumed such things just…

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