Last week I spent three days in Corvallis, Oregon, as a participant in a gathering celebrating “The Sacred in Nature.” I was invited by two of the conference organizers, philosopher Kathleen Dean Moore and poet Charles Goodrich, friends of nature and writers of exceptional grace.
Articles with Religious naturalism
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The path to heaven doesn’t lie down in flat miles…
During my lifetime, America party politics have mostly turned on matters of class, money, and race. This year’s election is the first where the fault line between the parties is primarily religious.
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The mystery of life? I don’t know
Albert Einstein said, “Theories should be as simple as possible, but no simpler.”
The 72-inch Rosse telescope mirror • Photo by Geni (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Dread and alluring mystery
When I first visited the capital of Ireland in 1972, Dublin was a gray, cheerless city with beggars and litter everywhere. I couldn’t wait to get away.
The Kununurra region of Western Australia, where zebra rock is found • Photo by Reise-Line (CC BY-SA 3.0)
Nature illustrates its law and chaos
My daughter, a geologist, gave me zebra stones for my birthday.
Webb Space Telescope image of galaxy cluster SMACS 0723 • NASA, ESA, CSA, STScI
The big questions are still out there
Last week’s column mentioned in passing the medieval European liberal-arts curriculum, required of every university student who sought a bachelor’s degree.
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Value of jet lag dawning on us
Returning to the States from a summer in Ireland, I’m jet-lagged for several weeks. I wake up at 4 a.m. no matter how late I try to stay awake at night. There’s nothing to be done but get up, shower, dress, toss my laptop into my backpack, and walk to work.
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Snow falling on the senses
One fat flake. Then two. Then dozens dancing in the air. One lands on the sleeve of my jacket — a perfect hexagon, an icon of some great ordering principle in nature.
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Ecological world view offers vision of cosmic harmony
Two weeks ago I attended a meeting of nature writers who had gathered to consider the relationship between ecology and spirituality, convened by the Forum on Religion and Ecology.
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Time to end debate on material vs. ideal
When I was in school back in the 1940s and ’50s — parochial schools — materialism was thrown up to us as the bugbear of bugbears. Not even “Godless communism” offered a more perfidious peril for our souls.