The Haxtun-Fleming Herald - What can we reason but from what we know? -Alexander Pope

Heavy snows and cloudy skies highlighted a rather difficult week of getting out and about. Driving was an exercise in caution regarding the drifting and blowing snow. The whites and grays of...

Shelves in religious book sections (virtual or otherwise) are overflowing these days with enticing titles on how to fix Protestantism and the state of the overall church. Few arguments remain untried...

Every few months or so a rather government-ish looking letter fueled with urgency arrives in the mailbox. The wording and appearance of this and similar letters mimics something more insidious,...

It was time for something to change regarding a worn and splintery edge-grain fir floor. Options were rather simple but limited: tear out and replace, sand and refinish or lay new prefinished...

This Advent season finds our social fabric a bit tested and threadbare. That reflects neither complaint nor critique, but rather a shared consensus view that things are not all they could be. Is that...

It is not easy some days to stay above the fray and avoid being consumed by events immediately surrounding us, particularly when they include current politics, economic realities and a cultural...

Once again Thanksgiving is upon us before most of us are ready. This year has felt more last minute, in part due to inflationary food and travel expenses. And it sounds as if ‘over the river and...

A wild-tending world view is described by nativist author Randy Woodley as “one that maintains a careful watch on the whole community of creation, assuring everything stays in balance for...

One of the simpler digressions in faith building in recent years has been to ask, “What would Jesus do?” While emulating Christ is generally a safe bet, the concept runs deeper and is more...

The word “gnarly” has undergone a renaissance of sorts in recent decades from a rather uncomplimentary adjective to something celebrating a unique accomplishment or particular look that is in...

After only a few months of operation, the James Webb Space Telescope is arguable the most important research tool ever launched into space. Its primary mandate, to observe the early universe in the in...

Aussie dogs are amazingly bright and loyal. In the quest to protect from all manner of threat, their instinct sometimes results in moving them to guard other objects as well … water bottles, sweat s...

Garden-wise, early fall sometimes takes short shrift when it comes to impressing people. It is a time when things begin to look fairly tough in the stalk and dry on the edges. The flowers that gave...

A sure sign when someone adamantly disagrees with another person is to hear them acknowledge that one or both of the parties are on different wavelengths, not on the same page but in another place...

It’s been a trying summer for gardening. Between the drought, a thriving crop of tomato worms, the dogs playing in the raised beds and a few hungry bunnies, things still turned out rather well in...

There are lots of ways to hide behind faith when it suits our purpose. The reasons are varied and broad, but the bottom line is that whipping out the Christian label sometimes becomes a way to...

Eighty-seven cents of taillight bulb, six dollars of waiting. Anyone who frequents auto parts counters knows that that is part of the price for a truly remarkable capitalist system in which one can...

A seldom visited but sturdy hymn, “Jesus, the Light of the World,” has as part of its refrain a reference to dewdrops of mercy that ‘shine all around us by day and by night.’ The mercy within...

It’s hard not to be defensive when someone challenges you by declaring, “Well, that’s not very Christian!” If fruits of the Spirit bolster one’s faith, then perhaps a more appropriate...

Many of us feel shackled when pondering what to do with hundreds, even thousands, of photos and slides accumulated over decades. It only takes a few minutes of perusing old images for nostalgia to...

It’s our nature to pay attention to the latest interesting news or fad. If it is something out of the ordinary, something beyond our everyday activity, we are naturally drawn toward it. Such is the...

Some of the best pollinators in the world include hummingbirds and bees and insects of various kinds. Without pollinators, the earth would be hard set to produce the amount of food that is required...

Must of us at one time or another have found ourselves at the mercy of someone offering up a prayer, invocation or similar entreaty to The Divine. Prayer is an important part of living a spiritual...

In the church’s politically revitalized rush to impart Christian principle and accountability toward governance of the nation, a burden can be placed squarely at the feet of our country’s...

The old adage about the grass being greener on the other side of the fence still speaks as loudly today as when it was first coined around the time of Christ. Attributed to the poet Ovid, it speaks...