Sunday, June 2, 2013

Lectures at D.O.N.E - May, 2013

D.O.N.E (Development of New environments) is a European based youth leadership program.

Participants train themselves through service, spiritual regimen, seminars and education, and fiscal and life-style responsibility and self-sufficiency.

The program trains participants to forge and develop cross cultural competence and relationships through travel and interpersonal collaboration in all areas of training.

I have been blessed with the opportunity for the past many years to teach during the classroom education component of the program.  I teach on self-development, social harmony, environmental sensibility, and self-sufficiency.

This year my son Frone is in the program.

Here are a couple of shots taken at the end of our studies this year:



Just prior to my time teaching, the group toured Israel and Palestine on a peace and service mission.

Here is a lovely video of their travels in the Holy Land




Tuesday, May 28, 2013

The most and least Christian states in America

A study measuring religious bodies in the United States called the, "2010 U.S. Religious Census: Religious Congregations; Membership Study (RCMS)" was recently released by the Association of Statisticians of American Religious Bodies (ASARB). The most comprehensive study of its kind, it provides detailed county-by-county information on congregations, members, adherents and attendance for 236 different faiths groups. (The survey differentiates between specific denominations within the same tradition.)
The researchers found Utah to be the most Christian* state with around 78 percent of population identifying as Christian adherents. The researchers found Maine to be the least Christian state with only about 27 percent identifying as Christian adherents.
most least christian state

Wednesday, April 10, 2013

Symposium to Honor Pioneering Bible Scholar, Daniel Patte

On April 6 scholars gathered at Vanderbilt University to celebrate the illustrious career of New Testament Scholar, Professor Daniel Patte.

I was one of the presenters on this occasion. 

Here are some of the documents for the symposium


Here are some images from the weekend. 

The first of them are pictures of the Scaritt-Benett campus where the visiting scholars for the symposium was held.  Scaritt-Benett was once a United Methodist Seminary, and is now run by the denomination as a conference facility.

A couple of pictures are from a stroll around one evening, and the final ones are from the symposium itself



I published a popular article on the symposium as well



Thursday, March 28, 2013

Pope washes feet of young Muslim woman prisoner in unprecedented twist on Maundy Thursday

Pope Francis continued his gleeful abandonment of tradition by washing the feet of a young Muslim woman prisoner in an unprecedented twist on the Holy Thursday tradition.

Pope-Feet-2_2522628c.jpg

Pope Francis washed the feet of 12 inmates aged 14 to 21, among them the two women, the second of whom was an Italian Catholic. Mr Greco said he hoped the ritual would be "a positive sign in their lives".