For a number of reasons I don’t have much in the way of family heirlooms. My parents’ families never had very many material possessions to pass on. My mother’s family left Sweden with nothing when they booked their passage to the U.S. and then had hard lives in New England. In my mother’s lifetime that … Read more
On my flight back from visiting my parents in South Carolina, I started chatting with the friendly but fidgety young man sitting next to me. As it turned out, he is a contestant in the American Idol show headed to the “Hollywood week.” I haven’t really watched since the first season, but now I will … Read more
Aside from the fact that I don’t agree with the “abstinence only” model of sex education, the idea of purity balls focusing the whole abstinence approach on the girls has really infuriated me. Now I see this video clip on Feministing and it just makes me want to hurl. Some of the post comments bring … Read more
I’m in South Carolina visiting my parents and have been watching CBS Evening News with Katie Couric for the first time. My mouth fell open last night when Katie introduced the story “Charm School Gives Troubled Girls Hope.” Apparently a juvenile detention center in Orange County, California has decided that the girls’ recidivism rate would … Read more
Do you listen to satellite radio? My husband is in love with his Sirius and wants me to join him in the rapture. I toy with the idea of getting it too, but so far haven’t really been smitten. I have listened to the online version of it and enjoyed listening to the music but … Read more
So I was looking at some beautiful pictures of Laguna Beach at sunset, remembering what it is like to be there at that time of day and feeling that wordless connectedness to All that is so essential to my religious experience. And I was wondering about the debates over defining religion and theologies. We feel … Read more