I have loved being here in Italy this month!  I have enjoyed the sunsets, vineyard, wine and lovely Italian people.  I love the birds chirping, the wind blowing, and the air so comfortable that one does not even need air conditioning.  I love the food, the Masses, and the priests and nuns.     Ciao,…

How lovely and enriching to be here in Rome.  Our class is investigating three possible grounds for human dignity: human reasoning and the power to know objective truth (including mathematics, laws of physics, and so forth), the power of self-determination (freedom), and the capacity to love others.   

Going to San Damiano, where Francis heard Christ say, “Francis, rebuild my church,” and where Clare and her sisters then lived for 50 years, was awe-inspiring.  I sat and listened and prayed for an eternity.  It soothed and anointed my heart.

How Florence won my heart!  The majesty of the duomo, the beauty of the art, the children Florence bore–from Dante to Galileo to Michelangelo–are inspiring.        How I loved leading students through the Uffizzi, telling them about the early Renaissance altarpieces of Cimabue, Giotto and Simone Martini; Botticelli’s Birth of Venus and Primavera; Michelangelo’s…

Here we are in the ancient port town of Ostia.  I am giving a lecture on Augustine and Plotinus.  Did you know that Augustine records him and his mother, Monica, having a joint mystical vision?  It is one of the only recorded joint mystical visions in history.  They stood at a window in an apartment…