• Meditation for December Holiday Stress

    A Meditation for December Holiday Stress May we let go, if only for this moment, of mentally juggling our to-do lists.May we put aside, just right now, any obsessions with planning and preparing.May we also hold back desires and expectations, fears and anxieties,and just be present to this moment right now. While the holiday preparations…

  • A Season of Anticipation

    A Season of Anticipation

    Yes, the time is near for decorating the house, lighting candles, hanging ornaments on a tree, making festive foods, and celebrating.  Rather than fairies and sugar plums, new electronic games, cell phones and action figures are occupying today’s children’s heads. Adults can have their own anticipation that goes beyond what gifts might be coming their…

  • Poisoned by Craving

    Poisoned by Craving

    I like eggnog.  I make it for myself from time to time.  It tastes good but I don’t crave my homemade version.  Normally, I can’t buy commercial egg nog in the store during the holidays because I am lactose intolerant.  But about a year ago, I noticed Lactaid was making eggnog during the winter holidays…

  • Rescued by Love

    Rescued by Love

    Judging from the morose Facebook posts I’ve seen, I’m sensing more than a few here today are still hurting from the election results Tuesday night and Wednesday morning.  As a liberal Democrat myself, I could only stomach a little of the chatter Tuesday night and had to turn it off.  With Republican controlled Senates in…

  • A Sensual Faith

    A Sensual Faith

    Like to go to Art Galleries?  I do. When I was in Europe this past spring, I visited a lot of them. Second question.  Do you appreciate every painting you see in a gallery?  Probably not – some attract us and others will not. I was thinking about this in some of the major galleries…

  • Choosing To Be Free

    Elephant slavery begins when they are small babies. One ancient training practice is to chain the elephant’s leg to a stake in the ground. This limits her ability to freely roam around. As the elephant grows bigger and stronger, she could easily pull up the stake and go foraging for food. She doesn’t. Even with…

  • Unitarian Universalist … Brand Identity?

    In February, the Unitarian Universalist Association Headquarters, in its final days on 25 Beacon Street in Boston, announced a new logo for our Association. It replaced the star burst chalice, that has been used for the last nine years as the UUA’s logo. It replaced the first logo we used for 20 years starting in 1985.…

  • Jesus … A Zealot?

    Jesus … A Zealot?

    On July 26 last year, Fox New’s Lauren Green did an interview of Reza Aslan, author of Zealot, that many people found offensive. She questioned his ability as a Muslim to write a book about Jesus. Aslan pointed out that he is a scholar of religions. He wondered why she questioned that a scholar of…

  • On Being Wisely Compassionate

    On Being Wisely Compassionate

    Last Saturday, my wife Philomena, our son Andrew and my sister Sue were in the theater district of Manhattan. We were squeezed and jostled by the large crowds on a chilly, late December Saturday afternoon. With the sun, low on the horizon and shining in our eyes, we walked up to Central Park and then…