Man, John of the Cross sure could have used some selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors. Then he could have avoided that whole Dark Night thing
Francisco Antonio Gijón (1653–c. 1721) and unknown painter (possibly Domingo Mejías), Saint John of the Cross, c. 1675. Painted and gilded wood. Image source: National Gallery of Art, Washington, Patrons’ Permanent Fund St. John of the Cross was a 16th-century Spanish Carmelite friar who is perhaps best known for his poem and discourse Dark Night [...]
The surprising joys of the late Precambrian
Beauty etched in stone: A fossil of Spriggina floundensi, discovered in the Flinders Range of South Australia. This animal, which may have been a precursor to the trilobites, lived during the Ediacaran Period, the last of the Precambrian Eon. The fossil shown is about 3 cm long. Image source: Wikimedia Commons In today’s New York [...]
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Space Ranger Jesus rocks the Drake Equation
One of the most entertaining issues that comes up in any discussion about science and Christianity is the question of God, Jesus, the Atonement, and extraterrestrial life. (If you think this is not a serious issue for some people, please look here or here or here or here or even here.) Specifically, if we are [...]
Deserve’s got nothing to do with it
“I’ve always been lucky when it comes to killing folks.” William Munny’s resolve breaks at the end of Unforgiven as he goes on a brutal killing spree. The myth of redemptive violence lives on in the greatest of Anti-Westerns (making it, perhaps, the first Anti-Anti-Western). On Sunday my family and I (and my sister’s family) [...]
The truth is not out there
It’s stunningly beautiful, yes. And unimaginably large. But you won’t find what you’re really looking for in NGC 6188, a star-forming region 4000 light years away in the southern constellation Ara. The light of young hot stars reflects off the dust in the cloud out of which they were formed several million years ago, and [...]
Behold the Void
The Zen enso, a symbol of the interplay between Form and Void Sitting meditation is not, as is often supposed, a spiritual “exercise,” a practice followed for some ulterior object. From a Buddhist standpoint, it is simply the proper way to sit, and it seems perfectly natural to remain sitting so long as there is [...]
All atheists are equal, but some are more equal than others
The Greek word αθεοι (atheoi), as it appears in Ephesians 2:12 on the early 3rd-century Papyrus 46. It is usually translated as “[those who are] without God” I must tell you, I am fascinated by atheists. I think the reason has to do with the kind of theology I hold, so-called negative or apophatic theology. [...]
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