Normally, when you challenge the conventional wisdom—that the current economic and political system is the only possible one—the first reaction you are likely to get is a demand for a detailed architectural blueprint of how an alternative system ...
[Jürgen Habermas' obituary to friend and philosopher, Richard Rorty] One small autobiographical piece by Rorty bears the title 'Wild Orchids and Trotsky.' In it, Rorty describes how as a youth he ambled around the blooming hillside in north-west New...
Severus Snape: It appears there is a connection between the Dark Lord's mind and your own. Whether he is, as yet, aware of this connection is for the moment unclear. Pray he remains ignorant. Harry Potter: You mean if he knows about it then, he'll be...
Mr. Merriweather: You're improving Jack, you just can't seem to get rid of that streak of honesty in you. The one that ruined you was that damned Indian, Old Tepee. Jack Crabb: You mean Old Lodge Skins. Mr. Merriweather: He gave you a vision of moral...
Carla Jean's Mother: And I always seen this is what it would come to. Three years ago I pre-visioned it. Carla Jean Moss: It ain't even three years we been married. Carla Jean's Mother: Three years ago I said them very words. No and Good. Cabbie at B...
Tyler: [while creating RoboCop] We were able to save the left arm. Bob Morton: What? I thought we agreed on total body prosthesis. Now, lose the arm, okay? Tyler: Jesus, Morton! [snaps his finger at RoboCop] Bob Morton: Can he understand what I'm say...
When the full moon was out the other night, it created one of the most spectacular scenes that I have seen in the Alps. The high glaciers of the Mont Blanc range were glowing an eerie bright blue-white, and they looked like huge ghost ships in the da...
Behind us, the man laughed. "Looks like we aren't the only ones looking for a little diversion. There's an empty office right over there, guys." Marsten raised his hand in thanks. The couple moved on. I let the kiss continue for five more seconds, th...
And all at once the heavy night Fell from my eyes and I could see, -- A drenched and dripping apple-tree, A last long line of silver rain, A sky grown clear and blue again. And as I looked a quickening gust Of wind blew up to me and thrust Into my fa...
No matter how bad things got, no matter how anxious the staff became, the commander had to “preserve optimism in himself and in his command. Without confidence, enthusiasm and optimism in the command, victory is scarcely obtainable.” Eisenhower r...
Wine and women make wise men dote and forsake God's law and do wrong." However, the fault is not in the wine, and often not in the woman. The fault is in the one who misuses the wine or the woman or other of God's crations. Even if you get drunk on t...
Let me paraphrase what Paul is saying here: Jesus married the Church - Christians, you and me, us. The Church is His literal bride. He laid His life down for the Church. And Paul writes that husbands should love their wives in the same way that Jesus...
As I focus on diligent joy, I also keep remembering a simple idea my friend Darcey told me once -- that all the sorrow and trouble of this world is caused by unhappy people. Not only in the big global Hitler-'n'-Stalin picture, but also on the smalle...
The results of decades of neurotransmitter-depletion studies point to one inescapable conclusion: low levels or serotonin, norepinephrine or dopamine do not cause depression. here is how the authors of the most complete meta-analysis of serotonin-dep...
Pretty quickly, I stopped seeing the company as an engine of community. Instead, I saw it as a mythmaker offering only an illusion of belonging and meeting its customers' desire for connections in form, maybe, but surely not in substance. Once I came...
If the whole world seems like it's against you, it helps to know that you've still got home. A safe place. It just takes one person—a teacher, a friend, a parent. If I didn't have you and Dad, if you hadn't made it so clear you loved me as much as ...
There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody. You built a factory out there? Good for you. But I want to be clear: You moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for. You hired workers the rest of us paid to educat...
The others cast themselves down upon the fragrant grass, but Frodo stood awhile still lost in wonder. It seemed to him that he had stepped through a high window that looked on a vanished world. A light was upon it for which his language had no name. ...
I can't promise you that I won't hurt you," he said softly after it became clear I wasn't going to speak. Sincerity flowed from him like water in a river and it nearly broke my heart. "I can't say that I won't ever do something stupid, or forget your...
Displaced Person’s Song If you see a train this evening, Far away, against the sky, Lie down in your woolen blanket, Sleep and let the train go by. Trains have called us, every midnight, From a thousand miles away, Trains that pass through empty ci...
As well as being essential to theological study, philosophy is an indispensable tool for communicating theology, for evangelization and catechesis. A faith based on how warm and comfortable you feel and how "affirmed" you are by your community is ple...
