Teaching young children has always been a joy for me. One of teaching's special advantages is the clarity that emerges from conversation with people under the age of ten.
I was always taught of the advantage of simplicity in language. My favorite author during my adolescence was Ernest Hemingway, and I remember reading comments that he made criticizing those who used multi-syllable words when shorter words would suffice.
Having lived on the eastern seaboard of the United States for most of my life, I know the havoc wrought by a severe snowstorm. Nevertheless, I am also very aware of the beauty of such snowstorms and especially by the beauty of each single snowflake.
Wisdom is the rarest of all important human qualities. Observers of the contemporary state of affairs often remark that wisdom, which is especially necessary in this day and age, is now particularly lacking.
There are jokes which are very funny on the surface, but which, upon reflection, can be quite painful and disturbing.
You don't hear much about them, and sometimes you don't even know their names. But they are the true heroes and heroines in our lives and in our times. As I hope to demonstrate, it was also true in biblical times that very important characters in the narrative are hardly mentioned, perhaps only hinted at.
Grief is the most powerful and most painful of human emotions. Yet, it is an emotion which few human beings can avoid in their lifetime. We all face loss, and we all grieve.
Fear and trembling. Those have been our primary religious emotions during the past several weeks...
It is a question which I learned never to ask. I first learned this lesson in my training as a psychotherapist, long ago. I was seeing a gentleman for a number of problems, including his marital difficulties.
It was the first time that I announced a contest from the pulpit. It felt like a risky thing to do, and probably was. But it worked, and I tried it several times over the ensuing years.