As my journey enters the "second half" moving from learning and earning to living and giving - I'm convinced it's all about relationships, creating lasting memories, community and social networking.
Watching the path of Hurricane Dorian (now one of the worst Hurricane's in history- above Category 5), caused me to recall the only Hurricane that I have experienced first hand. When living in Slidell Louisiana (near New Orleans), our family sat through the "eye" of Hurricane Betsy in 1965. Only a Category 4 in winds, based on the Hurricane Severity Index it is still tied for #2 Most Severe Landfalling Atlantic Hurricanes.
My memories were playing football out in the back yard during the early stages (it hit New Orleans the evening of Sept. 9, 1965). Mom and Dad called us inside and within the hour a large pine branch had fallen directly where we were playing. D'Lane and I both remember the large pine trees (trunks with diameters of 3 feet) with the tips bent totally to the ground. Luckily no tree snapped or hit our house. Dad had taped the windows but probably wished he had boarded them instead. Mom said that not evacuating was one of her poorest decisions. Luckily no disasters for our family.
What amazed me is the path and predicted path of Dorian on MSN interactive site:
Dorian August 31 - Sept 4, 2019 10am
And the Historical path of Hurricane Betsy 1965:
Hurricane Betsy Aug 27 - Sept 12 1965
I wonder if they predicted the path of Betsy 1965 with any of the precision that they now have for Hurricane Dorian 2019.
As a 10 year old child this was just another exciting day to remember. The innocence of not being aware of natures power and potential destruction at that age, coupled with no tragedy of experience, allows that memory to be a good one. I'm sure there are others not so fortunate.
Last night I hosted the Boston Legal tradition #17. A tradition that started the summer of 2013 of three guys just enjoying company, conversation and good dining. I imposed on the guys the showing of two simultaneous movies - "Inherit the Wind" produced in Black and White in 1960 with one of the three (yes three '65, '88, and '99) remakes - the MGM 1999 version. What an all star cast - Spencer Tracy, Fredric March and Gene Kelly ('60) and Jack Lemmon, George C. Scott and Beau Bridges ('99).
While the 1999 television version stayed true to the script, there were some scenes changed that I would characterize as stronger feminism statements. After reading the Wikipedia "facts" about the Scopes "Monkey" Trial, I think the fictionalized movie did an adequate job of depicting the 1925 trial - even the "deliberately staged reason" for the small town of Hillsboro (really Dayton Tennessee). However there were some radical inconsistencies with the actual facts - but that's what movies and revisionist history is all about.
I got "wind" of this movie during the Sunday sermon at ACUMC on belief and faith. Also my breakfast book club with P.N. and R.M.2 on Ancient Faith and Modern Physics and my recent read of "Sapiens - A Brief History of Humankind" has spurred my thinking about apologetic arguments for Christianity.
The Fundamentalist-Modernist controversy about the inconsistency of evolution and religion continues to this day. I haven't been to the Creation Museum (right here in Cincinnati) but have been to the Ark Encounter several times (Ky - but a short drive from Cincinnati). It becomes a tension (like the courtroom) of education and ideas. Is the Bible the inerrant word of God? the inspired word of God? or just another set of ancient texts to be read as mythological stories by unenlightened ancestors?
I prefer how C.S. Lewis would have answered the question above if he had been in the courtroom:
“We must not be ashamed of the mythical radiance
resting on our theology. We must not be nervous about "parallels" and
"pagan Christs": they ought to be there-it would be a stumbling block
if they weren't. We must not, in false spirituality, withhold our imaginative
welcome. If God chooses to be mythopoeic-and is not the sky itself a myth-shall
we refuse to be mythopathic? For this is the marriage of heaven and earth:
perfect myth and perfect fact: claiming not only our love and our obedience,
but also our wonder and delight, addressed to the savage, the child, and the
poet in each one of us no less than to the moralist, the scholar, and the
philosopher.”
The yearning for knowledge points us to some ultimate source. The tension of arguing about that ultimate source allows each individual to explore their faith and beliefs. What better way to draw closer to God?
Drummond: Isn't there something... What touches you? Warms you? Everyman has a dream. What do you dream about? What do you need? You don't need anything do you? LOVE, and IDEA … maybe to just hold on to.
Drummond: You're alone and when you go to the grave there will be nobody to pull the grass up over you. Nobody to mourn you. Nobody to give one damn. You'll be what you've always been. ALONE
Hornbeck: You're wrong Henry. You'll be there. You're the type. Who else would defend my right to be lonely?
It's been about a year since I was introduced to the Bible Project www.thebibleproject.com . As a teen comic collector and fan of comic art this graphical web based narrative of the Bible was an immediate hit with me.
Timothy Mackie and Jonathan Collins are God inspired and gifted to put each book of the Bible (and other narrative series and themes) in 8 minute YouTube summaries that help a novice (and even experts) understand the timeless complexity of an interweaved unified story.
Now anytime I begin to read a book of the bible - I pop over to this website to watch the 8 minute summary prior to reading that book myself. I even bought the coffee table book that has all the final artwork - what a conversation starter.
If you sat down and watched each book of the Old Testament it would take 5 Hrs and 24 minutes; The New Testament 4 Hrs and 34 minutes. WOW - The Entire Bible in 10 hours!
Mom reluctantly permitted comic books in her house - the Bible Project would have convinced her that any media that ignites the Holy Spirit is glorious. She is smiling now about my love of comics.
It was Boston Legal #16 (or Cincinnati Legal) on Thursday May 23 hosted by J.P. and serendipitously the movie picked was No Country for Old Men. As K.C. pointed out we are just Old Men talking about politics when the Millennials are now a larger eligible voting block vs the Baby Boomers. Of course the skeptic in me had to look it up:
Yes Millennials are now 32% vs 30% Baby Boomers. Adding in Gen X and the younger generations are 57% - THE MAJORITY.
It was a small gathering at Stephen Field Bicentennial Monument for the National Day of Prayer this morning. The Men of Armstrong UMC showed up to add our prayers and support to this traditional day. My memory fades but I believe Fred and Lois Owlett encouraged a prayer vigil at the Old Chapel for the entire day. I also remember attending prayer breakfasts downtown around this time also.
I remember reading Will and Ariel Durant's book The Lessons of History - in Chapter VII (Religion and History) they end the chapter (paraphrased) - as long as there is poverty, religion will flourish. Clearly Will and Ariel felt History did not support a belief in a "personal" God and therefore the need to pray:
“Does history support a belief in God? If by God we mean not the creative vitality of nature but a supreme being intelligent and benevolent, the answer must be a reluctant negative.”
—Will & Ariel Durant, The Lessons of History (1968) see ffrf.org
Yet - why does the majority of the world pray? Why is hope embedded into the soul of human nature? Conversely why does wealth correlate inversely with prayer?
I like Patrick Morley's quote in his book "How GOD makes Men: "Suffering compels us to seek the God that success makes us think we don't need" Wealth is the illusion of independence from GOD yet that very distance extinguishes the very significance the heart yearns to achieve.
Thomas Piketty's book "Capital in the Twenty-First Century is only 685 pages (200 pages less than Wolff's). It is exactly why Introductions and Conclusions are the best starting points for determining whether to even fan through the pages or even look at the table of contents.
What fun for an latent Economist/Mathematician/Statistician to see after chart of empirical data captured from best available historical sources. However a sample size of less than 300 years is a difficult foundation to theorize mathematical/economic premises. Piketty uses the intuitive r>g (return on capital greater than rate of growth of income/output) to conclude that divergence in inequality of wealth will likely outpace convergence.
I did enjoy Piketty's justification for a bias to the French data (vs USA) based on lower population growth and other factors. Also entertaining was his comment about the discipline of economics in "childish passion for mathematics and for purely theoretical and often highly ideological speculation, at the expense of historical research and collaboration with the other social sciences." I admit in my studies, I hated the expression "with all other things being equal".
It's always interesting to read the last words. Usually it ends up being what the author really wants you to understand.
"Yet is seem to me that all social scientists, all journalists and commentators, all activists in the unions and in politics of whatever stripe, an especially all citizens should take a serious interest in money, its measurement, the facts surrounding it, and its history. Those who have a lot of it never fail to defend their interests. Refusing to deal with numbers rarely serves the interests of the least well-off,"
In my Vistage 2011 presentation on Risk/Luck I said "Manage your investments or they will Damage you". It was my way of saying if you don't pay attention to your money your interests will not be served.
I just picked up Edward N. Wolff's book "A Century of Wealth in America" from the library. It is 865 pages of empirical data and statistics about wealth in the United States from 1900 to 2013 but with most of the attention to the last 50 years. I read one or two chapters and then lazily decided to listen to any recent lectures that might be on the internet - thankfully I found one:
Warning - the book and this lecture is not for the faint of heart. As Wolff himself warns in the preface of his book - "aimed at a more scholarly audience" and "follows the Baconian method of inductive reasoning rather than Descarte's method of using mathematical reasoning:.
With recent political posturing and preliminary 2020 election market testing, the start of the debate of Income and Wealth Inequality is beginning. Whether this topic will sustain into a 2020 top three debates will be determined soon. Since it naturally morphs into the political camps about taxation, my prediction it will survive and thrive. It is especially hot right around April 15th.
So - I may spend some blogging time putting my spin on this topic in the future. Like religion, this one is full of mystery, faith, and tension and full of prophets, teachers and high priests. The Bible talks more about money than hell and maybe even heaven. Maybe some of the political candidates will recommend a "year of jubilee" (now when is that really).
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