My colleagues and I awoke Nov. 29 in Nashville, Tenn., to startling news and video of fire ravaging homes and resort structures toward the east in Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge in the Great Smoky Mountains. When messengers to the Tennessee Baptist Convention held their annual
On a recent weekend, my wife, son and I were readying what will be our retirement home in our native state of Illinois. We have not lived in the southern part of the state since traveling off to seminary 39 years ago. We’ll live closer
Wells Fargo, banking and investment giant, is on the hot seat, to say the least. News-watchers are inclined to think that if they looked up ethics violations in the dictionary, they would see the company’s logo. After all, the Wells Fargo employees created millions of
Since I was a youngster, I have watched television coverage of the Olympics, both summer and winter versions. I do not follow many sports competitions regularly, but I enjoy following some of the story lines in various individual and team competitions on this world stage.
A visit with a Social Security staffer a few weeks ago turned out to be instructive for me as I gathered information to make informed decisions in anticipation of formal retirement in a few months. The staffer was both very well informed on the ins-and-outs
Recent deaths of black men at the hands of authorities — Alton Sterling in Baton Rouge, La., and Philando Castile in a St. Paul, Minn., suburb — and the murders of Officers Patrick Zamarripa, Brent Thompson, Lorne Ahrens, Michael Smith and Michael Krol by a
At this time of year, when various weather conditions exist at seemingly opposite ends of the spectrum, homes, businesses and residents in some parts of the U.S. deal with contrasting natural disasters. News from the western edge of American right now focuses on wildfires —
Heroes come in many forms, and so do heroes’ farewells. The news carries a photo of an aging Golden Retriever named Bretagne (pronounced “Brittany”), believed to be the last surviving 9/11 Ground Zero search dog. (See story at http://austin.blog.statesman.com/2016/06/07/watch-last-living-911-search-dog-saluted-while-walking-into-texas-vet-office-for-the-last-time/.) The story announced that Bretagne was
The cnn.com headline was compelling: “Boy who grew out hair for cancer patients faces stage 4 diagnosis.” And the true story lived up to the headline. A 7-year-old named Vinny Desautel had indeed let his red hair grow long — shoulder-length — with the blessing
The news just days ago that a massive earthquake had left nearly 500 people dead and even more than that still missing caught my attention. Catastrophes happen regularly all across the globe and most of us barely notice such news alerts. Some are manmade calamities