How often in life does the prosaic both mimic and presage the spiritual? With what frequency does the corporeal give rise to the intellectual? Well, at least once for Albert Schweitzer. In our last blog we detailed the arduous intellectual journey Dr. Schweitzer set before himself; namely, the quest for an elemental ethical theory that was of ethereal spiritual origin but of more mundane terrestrial application. A difficult journey indeed, but as you will see, of no more comp

Before becoming our tour guide on the voyage to ethical enlightenment, Dr. Schweitzer had a much more challenging trek facing him; namely, finding an ethical theory that was spiritual in origin yet broadly terrestrial in application. Such a theory could not be man-made, as all such theories, in the view of the great doctor, disintegrated upon close examination. Every attempt failed both to maintain coherence, much less achieve complete applicability to each interaction of man

“The only man in this century who has become famous by being good.” That description of Albert Schweitzer by British journalist James Cameron applies with equal merit in our own 21 st century. Let me cite an article on Dr. Schweitzer from EBSCO Information Services as an excellent short summary of a remarkable existence: “Albert Schweitzer was a multifaceted individual known for his contributions as a theologian, philosopher, musician, and medical missionary. Born in Kaysers

Finis origine pendet. The end depends upon the beginning. Every meaningful journey begins with an explicit destination in mind, a clear concept of what constitutes a successful voyage, the attainment of the contemplated goal. Being able to define and articulate what equates to a triumphant arrival at journey’s end, of what is needed to be able say “mission accomplished,” provides the traveler many benefits, among these are: Clarity of Purpose; and Reflection and growth Our

“Because I said so!” My dear readers, I suspect each of us as children at some point received that cursory response to our favorite question: Why? That four-word conversation ender was especially trotted out when we pushed our parents to justify our having to engage in behavior whose ethical worth, while perfectly clear to them, totally detoured around our perceptions. To some extent such a response is a dismissive power play: the questioner is not accorded the requisite wo

Greetings! This is the first of what will be a series of blogs on the topic: a reverence for life. A reverence for life is the philosophy of love and compassion bequeathed us by the great humanitarian, Dr. Albert Schweitzer. It was his ethos, his philosophy of how we ought to live our lives. My hope and goal with these blogs is two-fold: First to introduce you to this philosophy; and Second, by fleshing it out and providing some examples and explanations, to convince you it i

"Prayer is an exercise to change our thought habits and our living habits, that we may set up a new and better activity, in accord with...