I recently came across the news that a young woman at my alma mater had been murdered. The Iowa State civil engineering student had been playing a round of golf when she was sexually assaulted and murdered. This news comes right on the heels of the news about Mollie Tibbets, a University of Iowa student, who was murdered when she was out for a run. At least 20 transwomen have been murdered in 2018 thus far. This type of news is heartbreaking and shocking, but at the same time, it feels achingly

About fifteen years ago I heard a man’s phone ring and it played the William Tell Overture. This wasn’t a phone ring . This was a phone overture . Me, I’m old-fashioned. I set my smart phone ringer to the traditional sounds of, well, a ring . In the old days the ringing of a phone was always the same, from coast to coast. But the same ring meant different things to different people. If you’d ever had the phone ring and gotten terrible news, then every subsequent ring augured dread. Back in my

It was a typical summer morning. Sitting on the back porch, I was enjoying the usual sounds of wildlife as I read the paper. Chirps and bursts of songs from the birds. Rustling chipmunks scurrying up the drainpipes. Chattering squirrels chasing each other in circles. Suddenly, I became aware of an eerie silence. The birds were gone from the feeders. The rabbits, chipmunks, and squirrels had disappeared from view. A rustling movement caught my eye. The merest flash of brown wings. It was a hawk,

Just when you think you have heard it all, another disturbing fact jumps out from your daily news feed. As I write this one of the worst hurricanes in many decades, if not ever, is bearing down on the southeast coast. The Trump administration has eased restrictions on the release of methane into the environment which has been identified as one of the leading causes of climate change. And I could go on and on. At the same moment I can look up and spot a goldfinch taking a drink from the bird bath

One day, I stopped at the gas station and saw an old friend. She was busy picking up the litter throughout the gas station parking lot. After watching, I realized my friend had been simply walking by the station and had decided to take a moment to clean up. It’s a small act, picking trash and depositing it in a garbage can. It takes little physical effort or time. However, it takes a commitment to take that moment, to exert that effort. Why? Americans pride ourselves on our individualism. We

Most people have heard the most famous line from Shakespeare’s The Tempest : “What’s past is prologue”. It’s often used to imply that history determines the future. But the real meaning is made clearer by the line that follows: “What to come, in yours and my discharge”. What it means in context is that all of the past leads to this moment. And all that will happen depends on what we choose to do right now. In the play it’s a deliberation on a plot to kill the king. To me, this quote effectively

Synchronizing heart and mind to better ends requires inspiration, which is the stirring toward an elevated plane of feeling or action. Literally to “breathe in,” inspiration breathes life into our aspirations. Art often abets this enlightenment. Classical tragedy was a religious experience integral to Athenian identity. Audiences grieved together, providing cathartic reconciliation to the will of the gods through struggle. Nineteenth century English poets helped expose the immorality of the

If you’re like most people, you experience conflict with your partner on occasion. But if you leave the house on a truly sour note, you might be damaging your health, as well as your relationship. Higher levels of hostility can lead to higher levels of inflammation -- along with the more immediate effects of the “fight or flight response” including body tension and a pounding heart. Conflict can also cause “leaky gut,” which sounds as disgusting as it is. This is when your gut leaks out bacteria

I recently worked in an I Care clinic in rural Mexico. Volunteer optometrists -- and regular people like me -- brought used glasses from the Lion’s Club, portable equipment, and a desire to give quality eye care to people who have no access to it. Members of the local Rotary C lub worked beside us every day. In the end our feet and our backs hurt, our brains were worn out from thinking in two languages, but we accomplished something. Together we gave glasses to 2,000 people in four days. One, a

The machete slices through the weeds, the stems bleeding milk, a plant toxic to my horses. When I read about people calling President Trump and his supporters Nazis , I hear the opening credits to Hotel Rwanda -- “ The Tutsi rebels, they are cockroaches…we will squash the infestation.” I can’t think of a label more dehumanizing, except the N word. If someone’s a “ Nazi, ” people feel justified using violence. R abbi Jonathan Sacks in Not in God’s Name says “ pathological dualism sees humanity as