By JIM NICHOLS The newspaper, radio, and television headlines speak about returning to normal when this pandemic wanes. It is worth asking what this means. What is the definition of “normal”? One of the curious aspects of the early Genesis stories is that God tells Adam to “name” all the other creatures. A reasonable explanation is to understand this was
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By LORETTA FULTON Good leaders get ahead of the game as soon as an opportunity arises, or even begins to emerge. And that is exactly what the leaders-in-training at ACU’s Lytle Center for Faith and Leadership did when “coronavirus” and “COVID-19” first emerged in our vocabulary. As soon as that happened, students put on their thinking caps and came up
Read moreBy DANNY MINTON I remember a story from my childhood about a magic ice cream bowl. Some of the facts are vague, but the moral of the story has remained with me over the years. There was this young boy and his mother, who had helped a person with magical powers. They were poor and could barely take care of
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Editor’s Note: The following article is reposted with permission from Episcopal News Service, where it first appeared on April 15. The Rev. Robert Pace is a former McMurry University history professor and former rector of St. Andrew’s Episcopal Church in Amarillo. Abilene and Amarillo both are in the Episcopal Diocese of Northwest Texas. By EGAN MILLARD Episcopal News Service When
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By NATHAN DRISKELL Abilene filmmakers Nathan Driskell and Timothy Palmer this week released their debut documentary Where Is Palestine? online for free, at whereispalestine.film. While the filmmakers had originally intended to submit the film to festivals this year, they said the coronavirus outbreak had changed things. “We decided the right thing to do was to release this film as widely
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By LORETTA FULTON Looking for a good excuse to get out of the house without endangering anyone’s health? Jay Moore, Abilene’s favorite historian, has the solution. He has put together a drive-by tour of historic churches for the Grace Museum. Moore will compile several historic tours to keep us sane during the coronavirus shutdown. The first tour was of historic
Read moreBy JIM NICHOLS These are perplexing times for a scientist, at least they are for me. First, we have lived through a decade when a few otherwise perfectly logical people have questioned the value of childhood vaccinations. To virtually every medically connected scientist, vaccine availability has been one of the top two or three most important and, frankly, wonderful historical
Read moreBy NANCY PATRICK Weird! Weird! Weird! That word describes my world during this pandemic. I thank God that danger, exhaustion, sacrifice, and life-threatening do not describe my daily life. This period of COVID-19 isolation, illness, shortage, and death has invaded my life in an unprecedented way. The closest similarities, World War II and the Great Depression, differed greatly from the
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The Abilene Interfaith Council has canceled its April and May programming due to the coronavirus pandemic. The 2020-2021 programming will begin in September. Details will be released when programs are finalized. A tour of the Hindu Temple on North Mockingbird Street had been planned for April 18, led by Om Ghimirey. The annual National Day of Prayer Interfaith Observance had
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Spirit Of Abilene 