This is exactly why I read Ross Douthat. He holds out more hope for the possibilities of pluralism than I do, though I wish I could join him. I just find it hard to see any true pluralism in a large nation to be stable long-term. The fall has so deeply affected us....
Mark Ward
Cosmos
I'm a bit late to this, but I stole a few minutes this week from my non-TV endeavors (that would describes almost all my endeavors, actually) to catch the first episode of Neil deGrasse Tyson's reboot of Carl Sagan's famous science documentary, Cosmos. Neil deGrasse...
E. Nesbit on Proof
Searching for public domain books to read to my small son, I ran across E. Nesbit's Five Children and It. I remembered that Lewis expressed some appreciation for Nesbit, and I was delighted to hear in her some of the same wit and keen observation of children's ways...
Joshua 24:19
In 1809, when he was thirty-seven, the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge paused to recall a youthful dream, a plan he had hatched fifteen years earlier to immigrate to America and start there a new society governed by his own homemade intellectual system, which he called...
Two Stories I Think About Sometimes
Story 1 Many years ago I remarked to a group of grad school friends, “One of the goals I have for my seminary education is to get myself to the place where I could write a good commentary.” One girl in the group wrinkled up her nose and said, “I can’t think of...
Excellent Reading
I found this to be a moving story told with insight and written with exceptional skill. It's not an accident that it has been one of the "most e-mailed" articles at the New York Times for days.
Better than Me or Better than I?
What's proper English: "He is a better frisbee player than me," or "He is a better frisbee player than I"? Don't answer yet! There's a key element missing in the question: Where am I? Standing on the sidelines of an actual ultimate frisbee game, watching along with a...
Consciousness and Materialism
Really good stuff from a great Christian writer and wide-ranging reader and thinker, Alan Jacobs (can't help saying it again: I loved the remarkable book Original Sin). Turns out evolutionary scientists don't really know how consciousness is possible in a...
Journalism at Its Best
Well-known New York Times religion reporter Laurie Goodstein (with Jodi Kantor) did good homework on this interesting piece about female Mormon missionaries. The authors feed the story through a distinct narrative of their own, but what comes out is still well worth...
Christian Persecution?
Ross Douthat and Rod Dreher represent two similar but different positions in a very important discussion: are American Christians being persecuted? Will we be, if current trends continue? Or is "persecuted" a label we shouldn't arrogate to ourselves considering the...