5 Comments

Love this. Prompted a conversation between my priest and me about visitation and leisure in “Pride and Prejudice.” We think that a good portion of our clerical ministry is teaching the Sabbath by engaging in unstructured time with our parish.

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Thanks for the thoughtful words. Also, never heard of “keeping the text clean.” That just to create a space free of distraction?

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Thanks—yeah, pursue the main thought above and chase the rabbits below.

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"“Dating with the intention to marry” doesn’t entirely work because you’re intending someone, not just marriage. And apart from having open-ended time to know the someone, how can you intend them and not just an idea of marriage?" - I have seen the same problem in university students over the years. Many are very keen to get married but don't know how to find the someone.

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...“kids love their digital devices...because they were given them by adults eager to not face up to the constrictions of time: that it takes time to parent, to teach, to learn, to become a social creature." Too true. Sadly my young kids were gifted their own personal electronic devices, against my better judgment. I have a love/hate relationship with my kids' screens, which keep their attention so fully engaged that they don't even fight with each other(!), giving me time to get things done in the house and on my own screen; yet I can see the long term negative effects of this and the additional challenges to teaching them empathy, social skills, basic manners, just love of the neighbor, not to mention the more advanced skills of courtship in a screen-saturated society.

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