Here’s an intriguing observation, learned from a book by a prominent expert on the biology of the brain and how it relates to mental disease. The book is A First-Rate Madness, and the author is Nassir Ghaemi, MD, director of the Mood Disorders Program at Tufts University.
He says that studies have shown that the average, non-neurotic person is more optimistic than he or she has a right to be. Read More »Hope, Realism, and Faith
By Rev. Dr. Fritz Ritsch
St. Stephen Presbyterian Church
Fort Worth, TX
September 16, 2012
Mark 8: 27-38
Jesus and his disciples are in Syro-Phoenicia, modern-day Syria, north of their normal stomping grounds in Galilee. They are in Gentile territory, headed to a place called Caesarea Philippi, where monuments stood to honor most of the gods honored in the Greco-Roman world. So it’s telling that this is the place where Jesus asks, “Who do people say I am?” In this place where so many gods vie for human attention, who do people say Jesus is?
Well, once again we Americans are in an election season. In a lot of ways, election season is our Caesarea Philippi, with candidates presenting all sorts of variations of God as the true candidate of choice. Everybody claims God is on their side, and the question is, which version of God will we elect?Read More »What Do Politicians Say Jesus Thinks?
