The Lotus Eaters
In chapter nine of Homer’s epic The Odyssey, a strange event is described: Odysseus arrived with his crew in the country of the Lotus Eaters, and chose three scouts to...
Gut Instincts: The Neurological Pathways in your Stomach
Neurological Pathways in a very Unlikely Place. By Philip Shepherd Philip Shepherd is the author of ‘New Self , New World ’, a book that among other things, looks at...
The Body’s Authority
The age we live in has earned many nicknames. It’s been referred to as The Consumer Age, The Information Age and The Digital Age, among others. Philosopher Richard Kearney has...
Radical Coherence
An opening preamble: • If the world were purely materialistic, then all of its processes would follow the cause-and-effect mechanics of forces acting on matter, and its final truth would...
The Fiction that Creates our Reality
Our culture’s idea of the human body has strayed so far from reality that it qualifies as a work of fiction. The effects of that fiction, alas, couldn’t be more...
Love and the Hidden Whole
The Cloud of Unknowing is a penetrating bit of writing by an unknown mediaeval mystic, composed to counsel a young student in his quest to seek God. The author warns...
Fantasy or Partnership?
Three little news items caught my eye over this past weekend. They were radically diverse in nature, but they sort of chimed together in my mind around a single theme....
To be wholly successful ...
What is the single most destructive influence in our society? There are so many stellar candidates out there – but in all honesty I’d be tempted to point the finger...
Divine Embodiment
In late June I went to England with my daughter for a two-week cycling trip. At the halfway mark we had lunch with Rowan Williams, recently retired as the Archbishop...