I've been watching some of Ken Burns' PBS movie, "The War." He's been doing a good job of interweaving personal stories, including those of African Americans and Japanese Americans, who suffered great discrimination.

It's made me think of how far we've come in social relations from what many think of as "the good old days." For instance: this past Saturday I attended a wedding. The bride was born to a Jewish mother who later divorced and married a Lutheran man. As a pre-teenager, the bride decided to be baptized. This past Saturday, she married an Irish Catholic at a ceremony presided over by an African American female United Methodist minister. It was a joyous event!

Can you count the societal prejudices that would have made the above unthinkable 60 years ago? In many ways, these are the good new days!