"Christ, not Christianity, is the power that has soothed and satisfied the spirit of the great multitude which no man can number." --CANON AINGER

​Why do we need religion in our post modern condition? This type of question turns off many believers, yet it's a question any person of faith will deal with--whether we want to or not. Our doubts and insecurities are real. The manner in which we deal with these doubts is what will build or crumble our faith. Christians around the world are preparing to celebrate the birth of Jesus, yet our influence on the world is lessening. We aren't as effective as many of us would like to be, and some of us won't even try to make a difference. How have we (Christians) become so impotent?

If you’ve been paying even a small amount of attention to current events lately, you know that drugs have entered the national conversation in a big way. Marijuana legalization has become a rallying cry for many of us, though even the states where it’s already legal may have a complicated battle ahead of them to keep that privilege.

Two NYC cops, and their killer, joined an average of 82 Americans killed today, and every day, by guns. Brinsley apparently also shot his girlfriend before departing Baltimore for NYC. She survived. If you have seen some web comments you have probably seen the wingnuts of the right are out in force. In interviews on TV they are implying and/or blaming this tragic crime on, Obama, Al Sharpton, Democrat Mayor deBlasio, blacks in general, and of course 'liberals'.

New York joins a small but growing conglomeration of states and cities which have instituted bans on fracking, including an astounding decision by the city of Denton, in North Texas, about fifty miles from where I live. The bans are highly significant and give me a shot of optimism here at year end especially because citizen activism has played such a huge roll in these bans. I can remember watching Mark Ruffalo on T.V. a few years back elucidating the health dangers of fracking in his native upstate New York, and truthfully, I thought he was a voice in the wilderness---but his involvement changed things.

There's been a ton of ink spilled recently about the dearth of women in STEM fields and there's no shortage of people advocating strategies for significantly increasing the number of women who enter these fields. I was thinking about this yesterday while reading Jeff Guo's Washington Post article about the expanding gender gap in the attainment of college degrees and the theory that it's due to career choice. He mentions the speculation (from Goldin, Katz, and Kuziemko) that this is just a result of natural differences making themselves evident. However, like those who discount the idea that the STEM gap is attributable just to 'boys are better at math,' I've always considered it highly doubtful that this is what is really driving the disparity.

“You can do many things with a bayonet, except sit on it.” (Talleyrand)

                There is never a good or easy time to argue that the United States should begin to completely reset the character of its foreign policy, especially when the argument being made – as here – is that a key element in that resetting must be a reduction in the scale and role of American arms abroad. Anyone making that kind of case invariably touches a deep American nerve, so that any resulting rebuttal often moves quickly from an argument about facts to one about patriotism.