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Wednesday, September 10, 2008

With New York Friends ~ Books

An interesting comment made about books: America doesn't have a national literary culture. About the only book that we have in common is the Bible and we use it as the key to all literature, art, to living. It is the book that offers us vision of the whole.

Tuesday, September 09, 2008

Breakfast ~ Central Park West

You went down five steps into a little shop run by an Turkish-American who had just bought the place. So polite and friendly. He would be toasting bagels and making pancakes for us for the rest of the week. Sat right by the counter and watched all types of people come in, most of whom just wanted the morning paper.

Monday, September 08, 2008

Central Park ~ The Great Hill


Just had to cross the street from our hotel and walk up the stairway entrance and I was in Central Park at the so-called Great Hill. On the flat circle at the top that Sunday morning at half past seven there were at least 50 people with their dogs and they had them chasing balls thrown in all directions.

What a spectacle: the sight of those dogs, legs extended, in flight . . . in the morning sunlight.

Sunday, September 07, 2008

Central Park ~

The really forward looking men of New York were the ones who conceived of the idea to build Central Park. It is a veritable refuge, an escape into nature right there in the heart of New York.

Saturday, September 06, 2008

Arrival ~ New York

It was at sunset as we winged into New York flying in from the tip of Manhattan, up along Central Park and out to La Guardia.The sky was all ablaze in fiery red, and there were the tall buildings, lit up, as if they had come out to greet us.

Friday, September 05, 2008

Home Again ~

I first saw my country from the porthole of an airplane. Down where the ocean touches the land. . . and out beyond, the great expanse.

Saturday, August 30, 2008

Autumn Leaves ~

Today I saw a cherry tree, almost bare already, as if daring winter to come, and coaxing it in.

Monday, August 25, 2008

Trust ~

Does the pilot who loses control of his aircraft remain calm until it crashes?

Thursday, August 21, 2008

Grandchild ~

He sits beside me when I play. Then makes his first attempts. Perhaps these little fingers will soon be substituting mine . . .

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

Holy Old Monk ~

I said: I never see anything without seeing God in it.

He said: I never see anything but God.

Thursday, August 07, 2008

Easing Pain ~

He was old and bent over so badly that all he could see on his walks were the flowers along the path.

Saturday, August 02, 2008

Music ~ The Accidentals

As long as I am involved in the externals like tempo, rhythm, intonation, fingering etc. I am still miles away from the music itself.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Weed among the Roses ~

In the middle of our roses a weed has grown tall and exotic to become my most prized flower.

Wednesday, July 23, 2008

Indirect Speech ~

In I Kings 3 I read that Samuel thought he was hearing the priest's voice when the Lord was calling to him. After hearing the voice a second time the priest told Samuel, if he would hear the it again, to say: speak on Lord for Thy servant is listening. What struck me was the indirect way the Lord took when He spoke. It is not dangerous, perhaps fatal, to think that the Lord might speak to me directly? How often I wait for His direct way and overlook the indirect completely.

Sunday, July 13, 2008

The Search ~

Oh God, my God — I come closer to You when I search with my heart rather than with my intellect. Oh, strengthen my heart.

Thursday, July 03, 2008

My Self ~

Why was I wearing a shirt, tie and jacket in the heat last Sunday when our choir was invited to sing in the cathedral in Freiburg, Germany. The others were in sport shirts, some in shorts. . . I wonder why I did that. I think Dad would have been dressed like that, and Grandpa and some people I looked up to and respected when I was a child. Now somehow it is in me, that bit of formality, that respect for our traditions, that wanting to carry on in the old footsteps.

Friday, June 27, 2008

European Soccer Championship ~


It is different than the World's Series or the Super Bowl. Every four years a whole nation gets caught up in the European Soccer Championship and fevers through it, day after day,
for three whole weeks of spectacular, exciting sport. And in Germany where they still refrain from flying their colors, flags start to apprear everywhere. The spirit churns and overflows. It were almost as if Pentecost were happening all over again.

Monday, June 23, 2008

Paradox ~

The old monk was telling me how bright light and complete darkness can exist simultaneously . . . and somehow I understood.

Sunday, June 15, 2008

Waiting ~

During the year I look at this tree every time I pass remembering how it once blossomed. But now, for this sight I have learned to wait, one full year.

Sunday, June 08, 2008

Mother Theresa ~ Love Affair

She carried on a love affair with Christ. Later she complained that He had forgotten her completely. But she went on loving . . .

Tuesday, June 03, 2008

Before Class ~

Oftentimes when I meet former students of mine they insist on reciting the prayer for me that we used to say in the morning before class:


Father, we thank Thee for the night,
and for the blessed morning light,
for rest and food and loving care,
and all that makes the world so fair.


Help us to do the things we should,
to be to others kind and good.
In all we do, in all we say,
to grow more loving every day.

Friday, May 30, 2008

Wonder ~

Why did this beautiful, single red poppy blossom right in front of my study window without my planting it there?

Sunday, May 25, 2008

To be a Carthusian Monk ~


Watched a film entitled The Great Silence about Carthusian monks. I had once wanted to be one of them. All through the film I noticed that not one of them ever smiled.

With all that happiness inside, how can one help but smile?

Thursday, May 22, 2008

Sounds from on High ~

This morning as I walked across the fields I heard a lark up high, trilling. . . or was it Him?

Sunday, May 11, 2008

Love Affair ~

Glory be to the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost . . . words I prayed on the morning walk. I stopped and thought for a moment. Why, why all that formality? Aren't we on a much more intimate basis? It was like pushing Him off into the distance, losing Him in mystery.

Monday, May 05, 2008

Chance Meeting ~

A BMW sport convertible pulled up beside me and one of my old students jumped out. We chatted. He lit a cigarette. Yah, it was nice in your class, all those stories about Pennsylvania. And you really went light on us when passing out the grades. Yah, thanks. Leaving, he tossed off a wave and stepped hard on the gas.

Thursday, April 24, 2008

What words ~

What words are needed— to strike the chord? To say the meaningful?

Saturday, April 19, 2008

From Whence? ~

Without even thinking I took my pen and circled a notice for my wife to read . . . and when I looked, there was this perfect ellipse. I was dumbstruck. Was that I?

Thursday, April 17, 2008

Class of '82

Nikolaus Markus Mechthild

We were there when Nikolaus appeared alone onstage as cabaret artist and kept the crowd on the edge of their seats for an hour and a half.

Sunday, April 13, 2008

Deus Obscurus ~

I spend so much time praying to You, telling you my innermost secrets, begging for help . . . but often times I stop and ask myself if I have any idea Who You are.

Wednesday, April 09, 2008

The Will of God ~

How do I know what the Will of God is, other than by what is . . .

Monday, April 07, 2008

Thinking Back to Washington, D.C. ~

Lightheartedly I walked up to the Capitol from Union Station, singing, already seeing myself under the dome paying homage as I always did when there. . . but was stopped at the bottom of the stairs by two men armed with vicious looking rifles who, rudely, turned me away.

Friday, April 04, 2008

Friends ~

The crows have been following me around. They sit in the trees, swoop across my path. When I stand at my window they land on the roof next door and look down at me. I am not afaid. I have come to see them as friends.

Tuesday, April 01, 2008

Day Clock ~

Strange, but in the afternoon after lunch just at the instant when I set the espresso pot on the radiator to dry, I am suddenly fully aware that another day of my life has passed.