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Over the weekend, I presided at my father’s funeral. My father’s name was Tom, and he was a unique character. He never met a stranger. He would talk to anyone anywhere any time about anything. One of the most embarrassing moments of my childhood was…
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As a child, one of my absolute favorite books was “Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.” As you might guess from the title, the book details a (very bad) day in the life of a red-haired, teen-aged boy named Alexander. From the…
The walls are bright, the rooms are spacious. The food at the Madison Market is always delicious – fresh fruits and vegetables, eggs and milk, meat and bread, along with canned goods and yummy treats, too. This summer, the market, which serves the fa…
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In the past few weeks, we’ve seen images of women in wheelchairs as their Houston area nursing home flooded. We’ve watched video of the streets of downtown Miami full of water flowing like rivers. We’ve looked at pictures of the British Virgin Island…
When Hurricane Harvey hit a couple of weeks ago, the flood waters came within feet of Christ the King Church in Houston. The church building probably would have fared OK in the massive storm that unleashed a torrent of rain and wind on the city. Howe…
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I know many people who take comfort in a just world. “People get what they deserve,” these ones say. Most of us develop and refine our ethic of fairness as children. It’s in childhood that we experience that vicious argument in the back seat of the f…
KATIE CASEY, Jubilate children’s choir director, is the music teacher at Pleasant Valley’s Hopewell Elementary School in Bettendorf. She has a bachelor’s degree in music education from the University of Illinois and a master’s degree in special educa…
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The news this week has been dominated by images of individuals and families who, in the most literal way we can imagine, can’t survive on their own. The photographs and videos coming to us from southeast Texas are heartbreaking: nursing home resident…
One day, Christine Vincent was walking on campus at Augustana College. She is a religion major, and hopes to work in Lutheran youth ministry in the coming years. In the college’s coffee shop, staff from Sky Ranch were there, talking with students abo…
Muriel Johannessen’s portrayal of Katharina von Bora Luther began a few years back, when she was serving a Lutheran church in North Carolina as a deacon. “We started talking about the fact we hear a lot about Martin Luther, but we don’t hear much abo…
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He remembers almost everything about the crash. On May 15, Peter Baril and a friend headed south on Harrison Street in Davenport on his motorcycle. Just a few blocks north of church, a car pulled out in front of them. “I remember making choices on wh…
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It’s been the topic of conversation for weeks now. People planned parties or traveled hours to find themselves in just the right spot. Specially designed sunglasses were sold out everywhere. The total solar eclipse that took place on Monday afternoon…