Last Sunday Via Meadia featured the first part of an essay by my father, Loren B. Mead, in which he reflected on the state of the American church.  Today I am happy to bring you the conclusion.  Please feel free to comment; the Venerable One stands ready to reflect and respond. PART III:  MINISTERING  IN […]

The usefulness of history is not one of those truths that Americans take to be self evident.  Indeed, there’s a long tradition in the United States of thinking that our job is to bury the past, not to wallow in it.“History is bunk,” said Henry Ford; the limits of the past do not and should […]

Part of any trip to Georgia getting the most out of local color: the food, the scenery, the Stalin Museum.But there’s another dimension to Georgia: geopolitics.  Divided, occupied in part by Russian troops, Georgia is one of the world’s most at-risk countries and the shadow of new crises with Russia hangs over everything in the country.Some […]

At the time of writing the outcome of a national election in Brazil is still undecided. The candidate of the left-of-center party, endorsed by the enormously popular President Lula (prevented by the constitution from running for another term) was way ahead of her right-of-center opponent in the polls. She was expected to win easily in […]

Attentive readers of these posts know that my father, Loren B. Mead, is an Episcopal priest.  Ordained more than fifty years ago in the Diocese of South Carolina, he served in the parish ministry at Trinity Church in Pinopolis, South Carolina and in Chapel Hill, North Carolina at the Church of the Holy Family.  Once […]

In its issue of October 19 The Christian Century, house organ of well-meaning mainline Protestants, reported on a summit meeting at the United Nations of religious leaders and other humanitarians on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the so-called UN Millenium Development Goals. The latter constituted a program for “the eradication of extreme poverty […]

There are many reasons that more people should visit Georgia (republic of, not state of — although, dear readers from the Peach State, there are many reasons to visit the state of Georgia also); there is the fresh fruit and the fantastic food, the beautiful scenery and the friendly people.  And, of course, there is […]

I spent all of last week in Frankfurt at the one-hundreth anniversary of the German Society for Sociology, giving the opening lecture on Monday and participating in a seminar on Friday. A great honor to be sure, but on accepting the invitation I had not fully visualized the dubious thrill of spending an entire week […]

I’ve just come back from a trip through the Republic of Georgia, giving a series of lectures at universities there and meeting with people in various policy institutes and government offices.  For me, a trip through Georgia is a trip down memory lane.  I first visited Georgia twenty years ago when it was still part […]

With the Israeli government’s latest (and in my view, misguided) decision to start construction on housing in East Jerusalem, the struggle over the future of the peace process has grown more intense.  Meanwhile, as Middle East diplomacy heats up, J Street–an organization primarily representing American Jews who disagree with the hardline policies of the current Israeli […]