Last week I was at Leeds University, giving a lecture on 13th century Asia-Europe connections at the annual International Medieval Conference. As I wandered around at lunch break, a plaque on a wall caught my attention. It was not on a main path, or very noticeable. But somehow my attention was drawn.  I do not… Read More “Live as if you were to die tomorrow, learn as if you were to live forever.”

  Are there words that cut off life? That create walls between people, that stop communication and instead of fostering growth initiates a death process? Yesterday I was in the beautiful northern part of Washington state, noticing again a large tree stump.  As regular readers of my blog will know, I have posted about dead stumps… Read More Words that cut off life

How many refugees left their homes in the last minute, somewhere in the world? According to a United Nations report issued today, on World Refugee Day, last year there were 20 people every minute that were driven from their homes. That is about one every three seconds, which would be less than the time I… Read More How many refugees left their homes in the last minute?

I’m reading a biography right now of Huey Long, a Louisiana politician, who has become relatively unknown in the decades since his violent death in the 1930’s. But Long’s life and his obsession with power is a cautionary tale that should be told to each succeeding generation. By some measures the decade of the 1930’s… Read More One of the Scariest People in American History

This was not an easy post to write. Or to read. The title alone is a problem, as of course we are not ALL racists!  Or are we? But I worded it that way on purpose, because the common human condition is to accuse always the other of being a racist, and not ourselves. Racism is an… Read More We are all racists now