Posted by Rev. David on November 7, 2011
My dear friend, Chaplain the Rev. Seanan Holland visited us this weekend, and as usual he and I got into one of our hours-long rolling discussions about Life, the Universe, and Everything. This time in particular, we were rolling around the origin and nature of religion, the fundamental flaw in Friedman Economics, a mathematical definition [...]
Categories: Faith, God, History, liberal faith
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Tags: Christian, faith, fear, fear of death, fear of humans, fear of nature, fear of people, fear of uncertainity, four great fears, fundamentalism, great fear, History, Jesus, liberal, liberal faith, liberalism, meaning of religion, politics, relationship, religion, religious fear, responsibility, theology, types of religion, war
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3 comments
Posted by Rev. David on May 30, 2011
This Sunday, I preached a “sermon-in-dialog” with Roy Wedge, a member of the UU Fellowship of Midland, a Vietnam era Air Force Veteran, and a singer/songwriter. Below is the final section of that sermon, written and preached by myself, telling the story of the last time I visited the National War Memorials in Washington DC. [...]
Categories: History, Military, Veterans
| Tags: chaplain, fear, History, hope, Korean War Memorial, lincoln memorial, Memorial Day, Military, military chaplain, national war memorials, unitairan, Unitarian Universalism, Unitarian Universalist, Universalist, UU, Vietnam memorial, vietnam wall, war memorials, WWI memorial, WWII memorial
| 5 comments
Posted by Rev. David on May 4, 2011
These last few days, I have been on a trip to attend a U.S. Army Chaplains training conference in Scottsdale, Arizona. I have been in hotels, airports, and restaurants in my military uniform, sometimes with other Army Chaplains, but often on my own. For these several days, I have had an experience happen over and [...]
Categories: History, Military, Patriotism, politics, Turnings
| Tags: 911, al Qaeda, bin Laden, chaplain, David Pyle, death, death of Osama, fear, hope, killed, liberal, Military, military chaplain, Ministry, Navy Seals, Osama, Osama bin Laden, politics, Prophetic Voice, responsibility, Seal Team Six, soldier, terror, terrorist, Usama bin Laden
| 6 comments
Posted by Rev. David on March 9, 2011
I regularly have conversations with conservatives, both political and religious conservatives. Sometimes that is through my work as an Army Chaplain, sometimes through my work as a liberal minister in a fairly conservative town, and sometimes it is through people from my past who seek me out to ask me the question… “what happened? How [...]
Categories: History, politics, Turnings
| Tags: activism, becoming a liberal, becoming a progressive, Bosnia, Christian, conservative, conservativism, faith, fear, God, History, hope, Jesus, journey, justice, liberal, liberal faith, liberal to conservative, liberalism, politics, progressivism, Prophetic Voice, relationship, religion, responsibility, transition, unitairan, Unitarian, Unitarian Universalism, Unitarian Universalist, UU
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Posted by Rev. David on January 14, 2011
I have chosen never to carry or use a firearm ever again. I made that choice not because of a fundamentalist attitude toward guns, but rather because I am entirely too good with them. I reached a place in my faith journey where I realized that I would rather die than be responsible for taking [...]
Categories: Military, Patriotism, politics, Prophetic Voice
| Tags: American, american soul, assault weapons, chaplain, culture, David Pyle, fear, firearm control, firearms, gun, gun control, guns, liberal, liberal faith, liberalism, milita, military chaplain, national guard, people control, pistols, politics, Prophetic Voice, reserve, responsibility, rifles, second amendment, society, soldier, state militia, war
| 15 comments
Posted by Rev. David on January 11, 2011
Last Saturday, when our nation learned of the tragic shooting in Tucson Arizona of 20 people, including the killing of Federal Judge John Roll and the wounding of U.S. Representative Gabrielle Giffords, I was in a Board Retreat with my congregation’s Board of Trustees. None of us learned of the shooting until the early evening, when [...]
Categories: History, politics, Prophetic Voice, Social Engagement
| Tags: activism, adaptive change, Arizona shooting, assassination, Church shooting, fear, Gabriele Giffords, gun control, Jared Loughner, John Roll, liberal, liberalism, mass killing, mass shooting, responsibility, school shooting, soldier, technical change, Tucson shooting, Unitarian, Unitarian Universalism, Unitarian Universalist, university shooting
| 6 comments
Posted by Rev. David on November 23, 2010
This weekend was a military drill / Battle Assembly for me, and it taught me something… that I’m not as young as I once was. Nor am I as young as I would like to be. Nor am I as young as I like to think I am. I was actually “counseled” by my Battalion [...]
Categories: Humor, Military, Military Chaplaincy, Turnings
| Tags: age, airborne knees, chaplain, death, decline, fear, hope, Military, military chaplain, Ministry, old soldier, PT Test, ruck march, rucksac, soldier, Spiritual Practice, UU Military
| 1 comment
Posted by Rev. David on May 27, 2010
I have come to the belief that what makes our culture so afraid of grief is that we often have buried within us layer upon layer of losses, one piled on top of another, the way that sand piles up upon the ruins of ancient cities, gets packed down, and turns to dirt, clay, and [...]
Categories: Care of the Soul, Ministry, Pastoral Care
| Tags: bereavement, berevement, death, dying, fear, grief, griefs, grieving, hospice, loss, mourn, mourning, relationship, sadness, stages of grief
| 1 comment
Posted by Rev. David on October 10, 2009
Those who are my “friends” on Facebook already know this, but on Thursday I was diagnosed with H1N1, or the “Swine Flu”. For me, it has been, well… it has been the flu… and a pretty mild flu at that. I have had some deep chest congestion (but not nasal), some sneezing, body aches, fatigue, [...]
Categories: Care of the Soul, Prophetic Voice, Social Engagement
| Tags: fear, flu, H1N1, healthcare, healthcare worker, hospital, leper, lepers, sick, stay home, swine flu
| 1 comment
Posted by Rev. David on August 7, 2009
“Fear leads to anger, anger leads to hate, hate leads to much suffering.” — Yoda I want to thank all of the public and private responses to the more than slightly tongue-in-cheek article I put up a few days ago calling for Code Pink to go after those disrupting town hall meetings. One of the [...]
Categories: Patriotism, politics, Prophetic Voice
| Tags: 9-11, anger, fear, hatred, hope campaign, national therapy, politics of anger, politics of fear, politics of hate, town hall, yoda
| 6 comments
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