I have risen at 5:30, determined to make wind-free miles on a glass-surfaced river. Perfect dawn sifted her purples and ochres behind a dynamically surging solar disk, rising in promise that this will be a good day. A promise that was kept! The full ebb tide pulled Tiger Lily down river strongly, boosted by the still upwelling James. I feel the push of myriad tiny, stream-drained valleys bestowing good energy upon my wet highway.
In his poem, “Fishing on the Susquehanna in July,” Billy Collins emphasizes the power of art and discusses the importance of experience. Collins uses powerful, lifelike imagery when describing a painting to blur the line between real and manufactured experiences. Collins uses powerful diction that references multiple senses to describe a painting, as though he has experienced the image in question, even though he has not. Starting with the title of the poem, “Fishing on the Susquehanna in July”(1), Collins gives the impression that he has, in fact, had this experience even though he never has been, implying in the title the ability to live through other people's paintings. He goes on to state that the nearest he ever comes to fishing
The Screwtape Letters is a book about C.S. Lewis’ insight into the human mind from the perspective of two demons, Screwtape and Wormwood. Screwtape sends his nephew, Wormwood, words of advice on how to stray the “Patient” away from the “Enemy” and towards “The Father Below”. Lewis had to put himself in the place of the elder demon, Screwtape, as an experienced tempter for Christian men. The Screwtape Letters is a book that uses Christian morals and values and takes the opposite side of them to try and condemn a young man to an afterlife in Hell.
Les Murray’s beautifully written poem, Away Bound Train, is clearly identified with the main character encountering new ideas. An assumption of a journey is that they bring change and this certainly holds true for Away Bound Train. Murray has used the train ride as an extended metaphor of travelling through life. Away Bound Train seems to be a reflection of Murray’s life as he has
For 12 years the three of us have immersed ourselves in the river together. Plunging in, swimming down, enjoying every bead of water covering us. Walking among the trees, dancing, playing, letting music wash over us just as the water does. It is the river, the woods and all of these fine details and engaging stories in my memory that have shaped my life and my heart. As a woman, as a mother and as a tribal, galactic human
Suddenly I was in a different world. The euphoric melodies of a nightingale filled my ears. Water seeped from the soils, forming a creek along the grass filled forest; schools of vibrant fish revealed themselves from the rocky crevices, darting about with unnatural vigour. An overwhelming feeling of joy swelled within me, the sublime beauty of this new world tapped into my soul, and the happiness I had been denied for so long came back to me. Hearing the sound of crashing waves in the distance, my childhood instincts took control of me.
Martin Niemoller: Former U-boat commander and Nationalist yet split from the Reich Church and created the Confessional Church. Famous for the poem, When They Came, which shows his feelings toward the behaviour of the Nazis and the way they dealt with opposing ideals. First they came for the communists, and I didn't speak out because I wasn't a communist. Then they came for the
The publication of Luther’s German translation of the New Testament in 1523 democratized religion. This was one of Luther’s motives for his beliefs in Germany, for everyone to read and place the Bible front and center as an act of Christian worship. King Henry VIII was the king of England and when his personal matter of wanting to get divorced became a political issue, a huge break with Rome resulted. His motive was to divorce Queen Catherine for no other reason than that of lust for another woman. Henry VIII, having earned the title “Defender of Faith” for a pinning response to Luther’s attacks on the sacraments, had no interest in religious reform, whereas Martin Luther did.
Lincoln is instructive in how religion can become inclusive. “Both read the same Bible, and pray to the same God,” he said, telling an audience angry at the deaths of so many sons that the South read the Bible as much as the North. Lincoln made a final move that also set him apart. Inaugural addresses can be exercises in self-congratulation, both of the candidate and the nation. In his second Inaugural Address Lincoln, quoting Matthew 18:7, lovingly scolded America.
Roger Williams Roger Williams was basically the first rebel against the divine church order. During his life he was labeled as a spreader of intellectual infections. Afterwards he has been hailed as the first “flower” of Enlightenment’s spring. Most of his ideas were mainly in a religious context, but some were also engaged in debates on political liberty that would eventually fire the American Revolution. When Puritans saw good and evil, Williams saw people, usually friends with intelligence, moral sense, and a workable political system based on consensus.