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Defining moments
In Undaunted Courage, Stephen Ambrose describes the pivotal day when Meriwether Lewis, William Clark and their tiny band of explorers sent their large keel boat back down the river to St....
Living into our histories
Once upon a time, there was a woman who discovered she had turned into the wrong person.” So Anne Tyler begins her latest novel, Back When We Were Grownups....
Lessons in loss
On april 19,1995, Julie Marie Welch died in the Oklahoma City bombing at the age of 23. Her father, Bud Welch, remembers earlier discussions with Julie about the death penalty....
A little bit awed
Frank Slaughter, M.D., was a pretty good, which means not really bad, novelist who often dealt with biblical themes....
Poor Martha: Sunday, July 22. Luke 10:38-42
Then she was my high school sweetheart, now she is my wife of 25 years, but we still laugh about that evening when, sitting close on the couch in my living room, we were momentarily startled by a r...
Empty technique
Transforming Our Days: Spirituality, Community and Liturgy in a Technological Culture. By Richard Gaillardetz. Crossroad, 158 pp., $15.95....
Death in Holy Orders, by P. D. James
What was it . . . about this place that made him feel that his life was under judgement?" Adam Dalgliesh wonders during a sleepless night at St. Anselm's Theological College, the setting of P. D....
In Discordance with the Scriptures, by Peter J. Thuesen
The versions of the Bible we choose to carry, display and read are good indices of who we are....
An Uncommon Friendship
As Bernat rosnar and Frederic C. Tubach become acquainted, they learn something about each other that challenges their growing friendship....
Designing the city: Reflections on the New Urbanism
In the spring of 1976, I took my New Hampshire youth group to Philadelphia for the bicentennial celebrations....
Putting the tax cut to work: A proposal
In a few months, most taxpayers will be getting a check from Washington —up to $300 for single people, up to $600 for couples....
The invention of lethal injection: Confessions of a former legislator
From 1974 to 1980, William J. Wiseman Jr. served three terms in the Oklahoma state legislature as Republican representative of Tulsa’s district 69....
Counting stars
Lacking a good filing system, I sometimes put things I want to remember into books, articles or columns, where I can retrieve them by using an index....
The Samaritan spends the night: Sunday, July 15. Deuteronomy 30: 9-14; Luke 10: 25-37
Sometimes the point of scripture is the transcendence of the Holy One. This was something Isaiah knew well—“Truly, you are a God who hides yourself” (45: 15) —as did the long-suffering Job....
Namaan's no-nonsense cure: Sunday, July 8. 2 Kings 5: 1-14
Traditional Christian appropriation of the Hebrew scriptures often flattens them. Stories become precursors of later New Testament events rather than genuine events in themselves....
Help from our friends
I love the story of the four men who carry their paralyzed friend to see Jesus and can’t get close because of the crowd....
In Lockdown America: The corruption of capital punishment
I finish this review in the shadow of Timothy McVeigh’s execution....