On a handful of occasions, a work of art has riveted my attention. As a college student, a painting in the Butler Museum of Art titled In Flanders Fields Where Soldiers Sleep and Poppies Grow by Robert Vonnoh had that effect as I pondered young girls picking scarlet red poppies in what had once been a killing field. For Henri J.M. Nouwen, it was a portion of Rembrandt's painting of The Return of the Prodigal Son that had this same effect. Eventually he spent several days meditating upon the original and out of this and … [Read more...] about Book Review: The Return of the Prodigal Son
Rembrandt
Beyond Ordinary and Proper
"There is something wrong with you," she said, her face twisting in genuine disbelief and horror. "You are crazy." I laughed, but comments like these were starting to get to me. At work, I've been sharing more and more about what my life in the city is like. By this I mean telling the fun and juicy stories: nearly getting jumped, waking up to gunshots, living next to pedophiles & sex offenders, finding gas leaks and mice in the kitchen. I should have known that focusing on these more dramatic & exotic … [Read more...] about Beyond Ordinary and Proper
Lenten Preparations: A Time of Contrition
As you prepare for Lent, meditate upon (and share with a friend) these words from C.S. Lewis' Miserable Offenders: An Interpretation of Prayer Book Language: The Lenten season is devoted especially to what the theologians call contrition, and so every day in Lent a prayer is said in which we ask God to give us "contrite hearts."1 Contrite, as you know, is a word translated from Latin, meaning crushed or pulverized. Now modern people complain that there is too much of that note in our Prayer Book. They do not … [Read more...] about Lenten Preparations: A Time of Contrition