Things recently got so bad somewhere that it looks like all hope is gone. The thing "imploded", like 'Susan' in The Buckinghams' otherwise cheery pop single. Poor Susan! Is there still hope? PZ thinks there is. But it comes from over the border! And fro

Big explosions in Church! Like at the beginning of "Cloverfield". What do they mean? s there any hope in the aftermath?

August Coda. Labor Day Coda. General Johnson Coda. Mergers Not Acquisitions Coda.

A little August summation, from one explorer to hopefully others. Rod Serling writes about an under-appreciated instance of one. Then Armando Trovajoli delivers the secret of life. The secret of life.

"So, here's the thing": You wanna know about faith? Listen to ABBA. Wanna arrest the decline of, oh, let's say, mainstream Protestantism? Listen to ABBA.

There is so much truth here. Emotional truth, I mean. It could have been somebody else. It could have been something else. But the truth was from ABBA.

The subject is reality vs. ideology. 'Pet' Clark wanted to be something, I wanted to be something, 'Helen' wanted to be something. We all failed. "Sorry, it's not possible". And yet, a little child led me -- lower case and upper case.

In which is made a principled decision to OPT OUT, of all manner of causes and notions. Yet, too, the injunction that in order to heal, you have to feel. Eric Clapton starts us out. The House Band brings it on home.

This is one to celebrate, the 170th, in which are offered some Summer reading, a concluding un-scientific postscript, and the best song ever recorded by a certain Wonder.

This is about Meister Eckhart and Rudolf Otto, and CS & N. But it's REALLY about how and whether to engage the world -- given what we now know. I'm skeptical, and was surprised to find myself dissenting from the Master. First time!