I'm reading an old volume of sermons by theologian Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now -- see previous entry with bibliographic info. I picked it up for two bucks in Terrell, Texas, while visiting with old friends Mike and Susan Landon. He and I stopped in at a used bookstore and I came away with several good prizes.

Tillich's existentialism and "ground of being" shines through -- and I'm only on the second sermon, "Forgetting and Being Forgotten." But he takes some angles on texts and ideas that bear further thought. I'm really enjoying the read so far.

He's completely wrong on what the "last judgment" is all about, "to separate in us, as in everything, what has true and final being from what is merely transitory and empty of true being." Some true beings will be finally and completely separated from God. As such, one cannot even say he is truly Christian. But so many good thoughts!

He says, "Life could not continue without throwing the past into the past, liberating the present from its burden."

Mull it over.

Loneliness can be conquered only by those who can bear solitude.

--Paul Tillich, The Eternal Now (New York: Charles Scribner's Sons, 1963), p. 21.

I finished up an old (1954) Andre Norton SF novel last night, The Stars Are Ours. Got my drivers licence renewed yesterday morning, had to go back and pick it up two hours later. Family was going to take in a $1 p/person movie yesterday afternoon, but that didn't work out. Paid my rent, tweaked a brand new list some of us started Saturday called Christian Poets. And I think I actually did some work yesterday too.

Was hazy this morning, but it's clearing off (8:55 a.m.), gonna be another hot one. Finally deciding it's spring around here. Weather has been vacillating between warm and cool weather, but the temp seems to be edging upwards now.

While having to do some waiting in the shopping center, where I was renewing my license, I stuck my head in the bookstore. Noted that Hillary's book had been published in Portuguese. (No wonder we leave such a good impression abroad.) And The Walmart Decade, I think it's titled in English, had also been translated, but titled simply Walmart. Some of you will be excited to learn that. ;-)

Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a total mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm. Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

A fnried snet me teh smae tnihg as avboe, but in Prtougeuse. Wroekd jsut as wlel.

Whew! Hard to do. But I didn't scramble the first paragraph, one of those things you see on a discussion list or circulates around the emails.

In Portuguese, it worked just as well, was quite readable. I was encouraged -- lefthanders like me are notorious for switching letters. It's some physiological trait. Too bad switching numbers isn't as innocuous as the letters.

I'm still studying to see what spiritual lesson can be drawn from this. Hmm.

Yes, I realize that by admitting that only now have I read The Hobbit, I have left myself open to ridicule. Joel asked me last night how many times I had read the book. "First time," I answered. He was incredulous.

Nancy (Wyers) Robb had recommended it to me in college; it was one of her favorites, as I remember. I picked it up once and started it, but somehow I didn't get into it.

Am I ready to start the Trilogy, then?

First, a wise word from Bilbo Baggins: "Never laugh at a live dragon."