Words 1.9

 Words Twice a Week        1.9

If you are more into listening than reading, Words Twice a Week is available, along with other good stuff, as a podcast from St Paul’s Episcopal Church.  Click here.

And it seem like we need a poem or a prayer or something for the week – I’ll think about it.  

Some days from the church calendar -

Jan 10  William Laud  He was a bishop and even archbishop of Canterbury from 1633 to 1645.  Caught up in the politics and church struggles of the day, he was arrested for treason in 1640 and imprisoned in the Tower of London.  Five years later parliament passed a “bill of attainder” and Laud was beheaded, despite the fact that he was granted a royal pardon.  There was a joke - “give great praise to the Lord, and little Laud to the devil" attributed to the court jester.  (Apparently Laud was short and sensitive about it.)

Jan 11  Mary Slessor  Born in 1848, she became a Scottish Presbyterian missionary to Nigeria.  She quickly learned to the local language, and was well respected by the people.  She was instrumental in stopping the common practice of infanticide of twins.  A variety of things are named in her honor, both in Scotland and Nigeria, including a women’s hostel, a road, a roundabout, and main-belt asteroid 4793 Slessor (1988 RR4).  She was featured on the 10 pound bank note from Clydesdale Bank in 1997.

Jan 12   Caeseria of Arles –  Not much is known about her.  She was the first abbess of the St Jean Convent, founded by her brother, the location of which is unknown.  The nuns there “spent their time in prayer, caring for the poor by washing and mending their clothes, doing menial work such as needlework, weaving, and transcribing books. They ‘lived in permanent enclosure’, were not allowed meat except during illnesses, and did not bathe during Lent.”  Ok.  She might have died around 525.

Jan 14  George Berkeley  He was a bishop in the Angelican Church of Ireland  He was a philosopher primary achievement was the advancement of a theory he called "immaterialism" (later referred to as "subjective idealism" by others). This theory denies the existence of material substance and instead contends that familiar objects like tables and chairs are ideas perceived by the minds and, as a result, cannot exist without being perceived.  “Berkeley's razor” is a rule of reasoning that represents an extreme, empiricist view of scientific observation that states that the scientific method provides us with no true insight into the nature of the world. Rather, the scientific method gives us a variety of partial explanations about regularities that hold in the world and that are gained through experiment. The nature of the world, according to Berkeley, is only approached through proper metaphysical speculation and reasoning.  (I’m not sure I understand that, but it sounds a little weird to me.  I don’t think I’d want to have him as my doctor!)

He spent some time in America, where he purchased a plantation and several enslaved Africans to work it.  Hmmmm.  Apparently his thought was precursor to Mach (Austrian physicist and philosopher - “Mach 1, Mach 2, Mach 3…) and Einstein, but still I’m not sure I’d put too much energy into celebrating his day!

Jan 16   Richard Benson  Born in 1824, he was a priest in the Church of England and founder of the Society of St. John the Evangelist, the first religious order of monks in the Anglican Communion since the Reformation.  The form of religious life Benson instituted was not purely contemplative—its members engaged in active external ministry—but they recited the Divine Office together daily in choir.

Some days from the world/earth calendar -

Jan 10

+ Swedish botanist and taxonomist Carl Linneaus died on this day in 1778.

+ The first General Assembly of the United Nations opened in 1946.  51 nations were represented.

Jan 11

+ Aldo Leopold was born on this day in 1887.  Settle in by the fire and read a few chapters of A Sand County Almanac.

+ Amelia Earhart flew solo from Hawaii to Oakland Ca in 1935.  She was the first one to do it.

+ Edmund Hillary one of the first two to stand on top of Mt Everest, died in 2008.

Jan 12

+ an earthquake in Haiti in 2010 killed 316,000.  Doesn’t seem like the country has ever recovered.

+ Jack London was born on this day in 1876.  He lived a varied life – too much so to really come up with a short summary here.  You’ll just have to click the link and read the article.  On the positive side, he bought a ranch and tried to run it with sustainable practices, on the negative side he supported the eugenics idea.  It’s a little too dark and cold to read To Build a Fire, maybe just remember it from high school.

+ Agatha Christie died in 1976.  No matter how dark or cold it might be, one of her books is always a good read.

Jan 13

+ George Fox died in 1691.  He was a founder of the Society of Friends – the Quakers.

+ James Joyce died in 1941.  I’ve tried several times to read Ulysses, haven’t made it more than a chapter or two so far.  You?  I did read Dubliners.  So here’s something else to try – the James Joyce Ramble – a 10 k race around Dedham MA, where actors read works of Joyce along the course.  I don’t know if that makes sense or not!

+ Johnny Cash sang at Folsom Prison in 1968.

Jan 14

+ The European Huygens space probe landed on Saturn’s moon Titan in 2005.  It was the first landing in the outer solar system.  Did you know about that?  I didn’t.  Have there been others?

+ Humphrey Bogart died in 1975.

+ In 1943 Churchill, Roosevelt, and de Gaulle met in Casablanca to discuss WWII strategy.  Did they meet at Rick’s Place?  Did Sam play it again?

+ Alan Rickman died in 2016.  You may know him a Severus Snape, but he actually played a variety of roles.  He played the Lt General in Eye in the Sky, and the caterpillar in Alice movies.

+ Speaking of which, Lewis Carroll died in 1898.  So I don’t know – does that all make Jan 14 kind of spooky, or could you come up with connections like that for any day if you dig a bit?

Jan 15

+ Wikipedia went on line in 2001.  Did you believe it would work?  Did you try to make an entry for yourself?  Have you ever tried to add to an entry?  I haven’t.  I will say that this Words Twice a Week would be quite a bit different without it.  Probably should send $10 their way.

+ Martin Luther King Jr was born in 1929.

Jan 16

+ The League of Nations held it’s first meeting in 1920.  The US refused to join and many of the powerful nations tended to disregard it’s decisions.  It disbanded in favor of the United Nations in 1946.

+ Prohibition begins in the US in 1919.

That’s what I got for now…..We’ll see about a prayer or poem later

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