Presby-Musings

Whenever I officiate at a funeral, I will almost always read from Ecclesiastes 3:1-8--a passage that contains these words:  There is a time for everything,     and a season for every activity under the heavens:  a time to be born and a time to die... A time for everything... really?  Then why is it that so many of us find ourselves at the end of our days and weeks feeling as though there wasn't enough time to get all the things done that needed doing?   "It's Time that stands in our way,"we tell ourselves.  "There's only so much of it, right?"   Far too often our fears of using our time poorly, and then not having enough time to rectify our mistakes keeps us immobilized, frozen where we are, afraid to move.  We then spend our time agonizing over every decision, every urge that we might feel to act, to be bold, to strike off in a direction, any direction, and all because we worry we won't have enough time.  One o...

All of the direct quotes for this blog are from "How We Got To Now: Six Innovations That Made the Modern World."  by Steven Johnson  In the early 1600's, Galileo Galilei, made an observation in the Duomo of Pisa, when it shook with earth tremors.  The long swinging incense burners and lamps that hung from the ceiling all swung in a unified fashion according to the length of the chains that suspended them.   This observation would eventually lead Galileo to create the first pendulum clock.  It would also lead him to a fuller understanding of the universe, and the fact that Earth revolves around the Sun, and not the other way around   This assertion was believed to be heresy by the Catholic Church.  In his heresy trial in 1633, the following was read to Galileo following his conviction:  “We pronounce, judge, and declare, that you, the said Galileo… have rendered yourself vehemently suspected by this Holy Office of heresy, tha...