Roger Meyer

When I was a child in the 1950s, I remember the shocked look on my mother's face when she heard the news of a neighorhood couple who were getting a divorce. Divorce wasn't so common back then—at least not in the rural Midwest where we lived. And a man and woman didn't live together unless they were married, or if they did, they were shamed and shunned.

There is a lot to be said for being grateful. In fact, it has been a subject of research at universities by psychologists during recent decades. This research has concluded that those who are grateful are happier. They also earn more money, are better students, have more friends, and enjoy better health, to name a few of the benefits derived from an attitude and practice of gratitude.

Is this just so much "pop" psychology, or is it for real?

What is time? Why is it important? What do we need to know about it? And will time end? The answer to these questions depends on whether you are a physicist, a writer of science fiction, a writer of songs, a philosopher, or a poet.

A Yale University astronomer recently suggested that the estimate of the number of stars could be as much as three times more than previously estimated. The new estimate is 300,000,000,000,000,000,000,000. This number is called 300 sextillion in the United States, or 300 trilliard in Europe. Did you know that the Great God calls them all by name?

We have all seen or read tragic news stories about a child being killed by this or that means, or dying of a dreaded disease like cancer or leukemia. Somehow death seems worse when it is a child or young person who had all their hopes and dreams ahead of them. But the death of any loved one, no matter whether young or old, is emotionally painful.