Mr. Gobley sez:

• Mr. Gobley is not a fan of fatwas, no matter what religion they issue from. Be they Christian ministers or Islamic clerics, or any other matter of spiritual leader, spiritual leadership would better serve its flocks by not calling for the executions of political leaders.
• After all, the tables could be turned.
• There is no retreat quite so peaceful as a bookstore, on a weekday morning, within a half an hour of its opening.
• An interesting meditation: contemplate yourself through the eyes of an adversary. What do you see? What do you learn about yourself?
• Is a hurricane just a physical manifestation of the larger forces to which we're all, always, subject? Do these forces have seasons, as hurricanes do? Are we just living weathervanes?
• The more information to which we have access, the more we realize the subjectivity, the mercurial and evasive qualities of what we call "the Truth."
• A daily challenge: help someone with whom you're intimate to confront a fear of theirs -- without their realizing that this is what you're doing.
• Say a prayer for Richard Cohen, and for his departed mother's soul: may it find the rest it did not find in life.

--Mr. Gobley