“Between stimulus and response there is a space. In that space is our power to choose our response. In our response lies our growth and our freedom.”
― Viktor E. Frankl
Viktor Emil Frankl (March 26, 1905 – September 2, 1997) was an Austrian neurologist, psychologist, philosopher, and Holocaust survivor, who founded logotherapy, a school of psychotherapy that describes a search for a life’s meaning as the central human motivational force. Logotherapy is part of existential and humanistic psychology theories. Wikipedia
WASHINGTON—Claiming that 100% of users experienced dangerous side effects as a result of wearing the contraceptive device, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. reportedly paused an amorous moment Thursday to issue a dire warning to his mistress about condoms causing autism. “All of the increased cases of autism over the last decade can be traced to condom usage—at least from what I’ve been reading,” said the nude health and human services secretary, insisting the 32-year-old woman go wash her hands after touching a still-packaged Trojan-brand condom she had retrieved from her nightstand. “Something about the latex or maybe the friction encourages autism growth in the genitals,” he continued. “Or, it goes into your bloodstream and straight to your brain—and also into your sperm, which then becomes your future children’s brains. I don’t remember exactly what it was, but I know it’s really bad. The media has been suppressing the evidence, since the major publications are basically run by condom companies these days, but it’s all out there if you know where to look. There’s even a medical journal called Condoms And Autism that publishes stuff all the time about how they’re so bad for you. Once put on, they stay in your penis system for, like, years, so I think it’s better not to risk it. Dental dams too, sorry.” Kennedy later announced that the U.S. Food and Drug Administration would be revoking its approval of condoms and banning their sale nationwide.
A deeply irreverent and Biblically correct takedown of the far-right and their co-opting of religion, and guide to engaging them in effective conversational combat
For more than two centuries the United States constitution has given Americans the right to live in a society where church and state exist independently and without conflict. So why is Christianity suddenly being co-opted by far-right groups, politicians, friends, and family members to justify oppressive and unequal policies? And how do we fight back against those acting—literally—in bad faith?
Separation of Church and Hate, by comedian and TV and radio host John Fugelsang—himself the child of a former Catholic nun and Franciscan brother—finally offers the answers. In this informative, perspective-shifting guide, Fugelsang takes readers through common talking points and arguments—God condemns abortion, gay marriage is a sin, guns are an ordained right, and more—and exposes their hypocrisy and inaccuracy through scripture, philosophy, and plain old common sense.
Told with Fugelsang’s trademark blend of radical honesty, relevant humor, and deep political and religious knowledge, Separation of Church and Hate is the book every American today needs. It’s a return to civility, a rallying cry for compassion and clarity, and a reclamation of the values and truths Americans hold dear. It’s for anyone raised Christian but now disillusioned by organized religion; for Democrats, progressives, liberals, and moderates fed up with the right wing pretending to own Christianity; for atheists, agnostics, and any one of any faith who’s sick of fundamentalists cloaking hatred in religion. It’s for everyone who’s realized that one doesn’t have to subscribe to a religion to be a good person.Show more
John Joseph Fugelsang is an American actor, comedian, writer, television host, political commentator and television personality.
In addition to his appearances on the late-night political talk show Politically Incorrect (1993–2002), Fugelsang has been a contributor to HuffPost weblog.
He is a regular commentator and guest on nationally syndicated progressive radio program The Stephanie Miller Show, and has served as guest host on occasion. His usual guest spot on the show is called “Fridays with Fugelsang.” He also tours alongside Miller and comedian/musician Hal Sparks as part of the Sexy Liberal Comedy Show. For 2017, the tour is now called “Sexy Liberal Resistance Tour” along with Frangela (Frances Callier and Angela Shelton). The first show for the new tour was at the Barrymore, April 22, 2017, Madison, WI.
He’s been featured on CNN, Fox News, Dennis Miller, The Young Turks, Air America, CNBC, and MSNBC. He served as the host on the Current TV political talk show, So That Happened. Additionally, he has contributed to Current TV’s coverage of the 2012 presidential campaign. In an appearance on CNN in 2012, a question of his prompted the Romney campaign’s Etch-a-sketch gaffe. On January 6, 2013, he replaced Eliot Spitzer as host of Viewpoint on Current TV; however, Current TV was bought by Al Jazeera America later in 2013. Since January 12, 2015, Fugelsang has been hosting Tell Me Everything, a talk show on Sirius XM Insight.
Physician-scientist David Fajgenbaum was dying from a rare disease that didn’t have a cure — until he discovered a lifesaving drug that wasn’t originally intended for his condition. In an astonishing talk, he shares how his near-death experience led him to cofound the nonprofit Every Cure, which is using AI to uncover hidden treatments in existing medicines in order to save lives. (This ambitious idea is part of The Audacious Project, TED’s initiative to inspire and fund global change.)
The original epiphany was the manifestation of Christ to the Magi (celebrated on Jan 6 in Christian tradition). Since then the word has broadened to mean any sudden insight or revelation. Think of it as that “Aha!” lightbulb moment.
USAGE:
“The Italian poet Filippo Tommaso Marinetti had an epiphany after an automobile accident in 1908, which led him to Futurism and then to fascism.” Timothy Snyder; American Fascist (Permalink); The New Yorker; Nov 18, 2024.
“They started writing a chorus, and [Grace] VanderWaal had an epiphany: ‘Maybe we cut out all the instruments, cut the lyrics, and just do one word: You.’ They recorded that, and VanderWaal added harmonies. Maury laid down some ethereal guitar, and Sim added a distorted whistle sound. ‘So sick!’ VanderWaal said.” Andrew Marantz; Camp Songs; The New Yorker; Aug 21, 2023.
In the spiritual universe, only love is real, and nothing else exists
SEP 9, 2025
Dukas / Contributor
In the spiritual universe, only love is real, and nothing else exists
While the appearances of the three-dimensional world would deceive me into the false belief that there are powers more powerful than God, In fact, only love is the kingdom, the power and the glory. My physical senses are useful tools, but they are not the arbiters of ultimate truth. Only the love in my heart is the knower of all things.
The world has trained me to believe in the illusions of fear and separation and to disbelieve in the truth that lies beyond them. Today, I take a stand for truth as I extend my perceptions beyond what my physical senses reveal to me to what I know to be true in my heart. I commit to the realization that only love is real and I recognize the illusory nature of anything else. This way, I gain the power of the miracle, the power of conviction, as my mind becomes a conduit for the power by which only love prevails.
No matter what situation I am in today, I will remember that only love is real. I will not be waylaid by false appearances. When I cannot find my way to true vision, I pray to be reminded that false appearances are powerless before the will of God. I pray that my inner eye be opened to the love within all things.
In the spiritual universe, only love is real and nothing else exists
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“…if the greedy person thinks only of money and possessions, the ambitious one only of fame, one does not think of them as being insane, but only as annoying; generally one has contempt for them. But factually greediness, ambition, and so forth are forms of insanity, although usually one does not think of them as ‘illness’. ”
-Spinoza quoted in The Sane Society
“A case in point is the person whose aim in life is to attain power and fame. While this aim is, in itself, a pathological one, there is nevertheless a difference between the person who uses his powers to attain this aim realistically, and the more severly sick one who has so little emerged from his infantile grandiosity that he does not do anyhting toward the attainment of his goal but waits for a miracle to happen and, thus feeling more and more powerless, ends up in a feeling of futility and bittertness.”
–Erich Fromm i The Sane Society
“There is only one passion which satisfies man’s need to unite himself with the world, and to acquire at the same time a sense of integrity and individuality, and this is love. Love is union with somebody, or something, outside oneself, under the condition of retaining the separateness and integrity of one’s own self. It is an experience of sharing, of communion, which permits the full unfolding of one’s own inner activity. The experience of love does away with the necessity of illusions. There is no need to inflate the image of the other person, or of myself, since the reality of active sharing and loving permits me to transcend my individualized existence, and at the same time to experience myself as the bearer of the active powers which constitute the act of loving.”
“What Owen and Proudhon, Tolstoy and Bakunin, Durkheim and Marx, Einstein and Schweitzer talk about is man, and what happens to him in our industrial system. Although they express it in different concepts, they all find that man has lost his central place, that he has been made an instrument for the purposes of economic aims, that he has been estranged from, and has lost the concrete relatedness to, his fellow men and to nature, that he has ceased to have a meaningful life.”
“Building such a society means taking the next step; it means the end of “humanoid” history, the phase in which man had not become fully human. It does not mean the “end of days,” the “completion,” the state of perfect harmony in which no conflicts or problems confront men. On the contrary, it is man’s fate that his existence is beset by contradictions, which he has to solve without ever solving them. When he has overcome the primitive state of human sacrifice, be it in the ritualistic form of the Aztecs or in the secular form of war, when he has been able to regulate his relationship with nature reasonably instead of blindly, when things have truly become his servants rather than his idols, he will be confronted with the truly human conflicts and problems; he will have to be adventuresome, ourageous, imaginative, capable of suffering and of joy, but his powers will be in the service of life, and not in the service of death. The new phase of human history, if it comes to pass, will be a new beginning, not an end.
“Man today is confronted with the most fundamental choice; not that between Capitalism or Communism, but that between robotism (of both the capitalist and the communist variety), or Humanistic Communitarian Socialism. Most facts seem to indicate that he is choosing robotism, and that means, in the long run, insanity and destruction. But all these facts are not strong enough to destroy faith in man’s reason, good will and sanity. As long as we can think of other alternatives, we are not lost; as long as we can consult together and plan together, we can hope. But, indeed, the shadows are lengthening; the voices of insanity are becoming louder. We are in reach of achieving a state of humanity which corresponds to the vision of our great teachers; yet we are in danger of the destruction of all civilization, or of robotization. A small tribe was told thousands of years ago: “I put before you life and death, blessing and curse—and you chose life.” This is our choice too.”
Erich Seligmann Fromm (March 23, 1900 – March 18, 1980) was a German-American social psychologist, psychoanalyst, sociologist, humanistic philosopher, and democratic socialist. He was a German Jew who fled the Nazi regime and settled in the United States.
Yes, the pelvis sacral bone is called the sacrum due to a historical belief that it was the seat of the soul
. The name derives from the Latin os sacrum, meaning “sacred bone,” which is a translation of the ancient Greek term hieron osteon.
While the “seat of the soul” theory is a prominent explanation, it is one of several historical theories about why the bone was considered sacred.
Other theories for the name’s origin
Sacrificial rites: In ancient Greek sacrificial rites, the sacrum and tail of the animal were sometimes offered to the gods, making the bone itself “sacred”.
Resurrection: In some ancient traditions, including among the Hebrews and Egyptians, the sacrum was believed to be so hard and durable that it would be the last bone to decompose. This led to the belief that it would serve as the nucleus for resurrection in the afterlife.
Protection of reproductive organs: The sacrum protects the delicate reproductive organs and was seen as a “holy” structure because it held the organs of procreation.
Possible mistranslation: The Greek word hieron can also mean “strong” or “large” in addition to “sacred.” Some scholars suggest that the Romans may have mistranslated the Greek, and the original meaning simply described the sacrum as a large, strong bone.
