In a few short days, I’ll leave Pensacola for Richmond, Virginia, where I’ll begin new work for Veritas School. In my closing days at Trinitas, I’ve found myself wishing others “Good luck,” despite the unfortunately pagan conotations those words often carry. I’d like to offer a brief apologia. If you believe in giving turns, you …
The best known passage in Ecclesiastes, and perhaps one of the better known passages in all of Scripture, is the “A time for this, time for that…” poem in chapter three. Some commentators have seen here a profound and telling description of human mutability. A time to plant, and a time to pluck up what …
God bless you, it is awards season. Envy season. Extra credit season. Grades season. Mercy or justice? season. Born into trouble as the sparks fly upward season. A classical education isn’t about grades— a pious and believable fiction until three days before academic awards are given out at end of the year ceremonies. Academic awards …
In the summer, I stock up. By the end of the school year, I’m spent. I’ve said all my interesting things, and I need to find new interesting things for the following year. Over the summer, I stockpile new interesting things to say, then, come late August, I slowly begin ceding those things to my …
From time to time, I ask my students what words and expressions I use too often. I am not so much asking for their opinions as I am having them point out my own blindness. Yesterday, I asked and one student said, “You always say, ‘I’m going to,’ but you say it fast, so it …
Classical Christian Cliches: 4 Words We Need To Rethink. Read More »
Over the years, I’ve seen and heard plenty of people police the word awesome in a rather bizarre manner. Parents are particularly prone to fence their teenager’s use of the word. “That movie was awesome,” say teens, and pious parents say, “Only God is awesome.” This is curious, though, given that Christ doesn’t police the …
The Church calendar no longer sets the rhythm of our lives, sadly. I suspect my life revolves around the school calendar. The Church calendar commends two long periods of introspection to Christians, Lent and Nativity, as well as a handful of self-reflective, ascetic fasts in between. Festal periods immediately follow. The Church year is dappled, …
3 Things You Must Do Before The End Of The School Year. Read More »
While no longer in fashion, during the 1960s and 1970s, many films concluded with a still frame as opposed to a moving image which faded to black. The expression “moving picture” (from which we get the term “movie ) is something of a misnomer, though, because the “moving” nature of “movies” might be understood as …
The Metaphysics Of Moving Pictures And Still Images. Read More »
Is Hell locked from the inside? Dante seems to think so. Few residents of the Inferno object. From time to time they pitch a sob story, but none of them has a sense of the infinite, and so they don’t know how to long for something better. For the last several weeks, my Medieval history …
Hell, Locked From The Inside…Paradise, An Acquired Taste Read More »
With Holy Week now upon us, I suspect at least a few theology teachers across the country are taking a break from their regular schedules for an investigation of the Gospel’s account of those days leading up to the Crucifixion. When I have come to these passages in the past, often I succumb to the …
The Night On Which He Was Betrayed: A Psychological Interpretation Read More »
