I’ve been working out a few times a week for years at the Kent State University’s Student Recreation and Wellness Center, and it never occurred to me until last week to bring to mind the connotations of the name of the place. Recreation should be fun, not just grinding it out; and wellness is a … Read more
What a cliché! But I used to think that I was a teacher of positive attitude in class. Wonder why I found myself this afternoon, about to leave for a four-day trip, consumed with worries. Then I recognized: What’s this? Then I turned to you-know-Whom. Then I found a different attitude, a sense of adventure … Read more
When things get hectic and we’re juggling too many things, artistic living—walking in beauty—gets harder. We need to take breaks, perhaps breaks with a friend with whom we enjoy juggling. Often simply remembering to take breaks is enough to motivate us to restore rhythm and balance. But sometimes we find ourselves in a bottle-neck of … Read more
The harmony of contrasts is a leading theme in the aesthetics of nature and of the arts. Watch the harmonies unfold in this 1877 poem by English poet and Roman Catholic priest Gerard Manley Hopkins. Pied Beauty Glory be to God for dappled things— For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow; For rose-moles all … Read more
Christianity uses the word “incarnation” mainly to refer to Jesus of Nazareth understood as the Word of God, come down from heaven and made flesh, a person in whom divine and human natures were mysteriously and gloriously united. Hinduism and Buddhism regard us all as having had previous incarnations. And Hinduism speaks of “avatars,” deities … Read more
Receiving and giving To construct a philosophy of living project, we first identify some area of our lives that we would like to work on, some growth frontier. It is important to be realistic, not take on too much, but the greatest growth usually comes from focusing on our front-burner issue, the problem that would … Read more
Over the years, the sculptor who moved me most was Auguste Rodin, whose Burgers of Calais continues to symbolize for me the heights of human greatness. The work commemorates the men of the French city of Calais, who in 1347 responded to the offer of the victorious English king who had besieged their city but … Read more
Dr. Perry On December 22 when I posted the moving story of Taitetsu Unno’s ministry to the woman in the hospital, I did not know that he had died a few days earlier. Mark Unno, his equally brilliant and accomplished son, also a philosopher and Shin Buddhist priest, told me that during his last … Read more
Dr. Perry On December 22 when I posted the moving story of Taitetsu Unno’s ministry to the woman in the hospital, I did not know that he had died a few days earlier. Mark Unno, his equally brilliant and accomplished son, also a philosopher and Shin Buddhist priest, told me that during his last … Read more