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liturgical year

Unless a Seed Falls: John 12:20-36

Even I have to admit, it looks terrible: broken, rotting stalks, bare dirt, no happy winged visitors. I tell myself there are over-wintering insects in there, that native roots are strong, that spring is coming. But right now: stillness, death.
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February 24, 2024
artstheology

Blessed Unrest

We often wonder what God is calling us to do in a particular moment or passage of life. Could we ask ourselves, in such moments, “What is my blessed unrest here?”
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January 27, 2024
review

Introvert, Be Free!

But here is one of Quiet’s most important insights. Cain insists—quietly and persistently, in true introvert style—that these “problem” traits are only the flip side of strengths. Introverts tend to experience them as disadvantages or faults because we live in a culture that has thoroughly…
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October 20, 2012
cultural commentary

Get Off My Lawn, Thou Knave

By an odd coincidence, the late William Hazlitt has been haunting my steps this week. The old gent showed up by previous arrangement in my creative nonfiction class, as the syllabus called for my students to read his essay titled “On the Pleasure of Hating.”
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October 6, 2012
college lifecultural commentary

Cruise Ship College

Hundreds of majors, access to professors, research opportunities, really awesome sports, a zillion student organizations—everyone seems to have it all. Beautiful, diverse students and beautiful, historic (or perhaps LEEDS-certified) buildings on rolling, umpteen-hundred-acre campuses. Honestly, it’s hard to imagine that my son wouldn’t just thrive…
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September 22, 2012
politics

Woo Me With Facts

It’s been a rough couple of weeks for the cause of good rhetoric: two national conventions with a wearying parade of over-fluffed speeches, the ensuing frenzy of talking-head analysis and petty push-back between the parties on every little point, and the ongoing plague of super-PAC-sponsored…
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September 8, 2012