My local VW dealer’s service department is busy this morning. I’m one of many waiting for my car. It’s an oil change and other 120k basic maintenance. Yes, I have one of those TDI’s that needed a recall fix to cease spewing so much pollution into Oklahoma’s air and the planet’s ecosystem. Fixed now. Took two days. I don’t practice what I call monetized dominion theology. A prime example of that theology is current EPA director Scott Pruitt.
As the sun broke the horizon this morning I began the day with The Daily Question from Gratefulness.org.
What Sincerity Looks Like
David Brooks, The New York Times “Back in the 1950s, sincerity seemed treacly and boring, and authenticity, in the form of, say, Johnny Cash, seemed daring and new. But now rebellious authenticity is the familiar corporate success formula, and sincerity, like Chance the Rapper’s, is practically revolutionary.”
When I travel for retreats to be with friends, peers, and colleagues I often alter my morning routine. Sleep is needed after late nights discussing the issues of the day, and at this retreat, ideas about outdoor ministry and my denomination, the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ). Luckily, my routine doesn’t include exercise right now, but it does include reading of news and information. I found these three compelling this morning.
From Axios, reporting on some words from the Commander of the Air Force Academy that were first reported by the Colorado Springs Gazette.
“Lt. Gen. Jay Silveria, superintendent of the Air Force Academy, yesterday “stood all of his 4,000 cadets at attention … [c]hins in and chests out … to deliver a message on racial slurs found written on message boards at the academy’s preparatory school,” The (Colorado Springs) Gazette reports.” Click here to read more.
“Follow the money.” These are the words most closely associated with Deep Throat, Bob Woodward’s famous Watergate source, as memorably portrayed by Hal Holbrook in the movie version of “All the President’s Men.”
“Is the society we want one in which it is acceptable for some people to have tens of millions or billions of dollars as long as they are hardworking, generous, not materialistic and down to earth? Or should there be some other moral rubric, that would strive for a society in which such high levels of inequality were morally unacceptable, regardless of how nice or moderate its beneficiaries are?”