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Tolkien the movie
The first of three annual film installments of J. R. R. Tolkien's 1,500-page epic The Lord of the Rings, directed by New Zealander Peter Jackson, has many fine qualities....
Balzac and the Little Chinese Seamstress, by Dai Sijie
Vladamir Nabokov once noted that "life not unfrequently imitates the French novelists." Dai Sijie applies this dictum to the unlikeliest of settings: 1970s China....
Feminist Reconstructions of Christian Doctrine, by Kathryn Greene-McCreight
Feminist Reconstructions of Christian Doctrine: Narrative Analysis and Appraisal. By Kathryn Greene-McCreight. Oxford University Press, 175 pp., $29.95....
The Imaginative World of the Reformation, by Peter Matheson
The Imaginative World of the Reformation. By Peter Matheson. Fortress, 153 pp., $24.95; paperback, $15.00....
The Geometry of Love, by Margaret Visser
The Geometry of Love: Space, Time, Mystery and Meaning in an Ordinary Church. By Margaret Visser. North Point Press, 323 pp., $27.00....
Imperial power: Can an empire commit itself to justice?
"In those days Caesar Augustus issued a decree . . .” With those words the writer of Luke’s Gospel acknowledged the political backdrop of Jesus’ life....
New assignment: From Harvard to Catholic Charities
He always said that he was a priest first and a dean second. J....
Farm factories: The end of animal husbandry
A young man was working for a company that operated a large, total-confinement swine farm. One day he detected symptoms of a disease among some of the feeder pigs....
Resilient hope: Stay awake! Be ready!
It is generally not a good idea to refer to one’s children in sermon or print, but I’ve concluded that when it comes to grandchildren, such rules are suspended....
God as Santa, Santa as God: A sure way to spoil a perfectly good Christmas
I was driving to work when a song on the radio caught my attention....
Who do you want to be? Ready for new adventures: Ready for new adventures
Here is some Christmas– New Year nostalgia with, I hope, a point. Scene One: A Christmas Eve in 1934 or 1935, a drought, dust-bowl, Depression year in Nebraska....
Off by nine miles: Isaiah 60:1-7; Matthew 2:1-12
Herod tells the Eastern intellectuals the truth, and the rest is history.
Off by nine miles: Isaiah 60:1-7; Matthew 2:1-12
Herod tells the Eastern intellectuals the truth, and the rest is history.
‘Workers, go home!’ The anti-immigrant movement: The anti-immigrant movement
A Riverhead, New York, jury has sentenced 29-year-old Christopher Slavin to 25 years in prison for attempted murder and assault....
Top ten religion stories: In 2001
1. Extremist hijackers wreak death and destruction, launching a U.S.-led “war on terrorism” deeply religious in roots and responses with opposing definitions of “evil” and “good.”...
Missing Harry
Many parents have little choice about whether or not to see--or at least buy tickets for--the movie version of J. K....
A french-fry culture
Fast Food Nation: The Dark Side of the All-American Meal. By Eric Schlosser. Houghton Mifflin, 342 pp., $25.00....
Speak What We Feel (Not What We Ought to Say), by Frederick Buechner
If this is not Frederick Buechner's valedictory volume it surely could be, given the pathos of his "Afterword": "If somebody a while back had offered me a thousand more years, I would have lea...
Life and liberty: Plan for military tribunals an assault on legal standards
Securing the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness has always required balancing issues of security—the protection of life—with issues of freedom....