Latest Articles
On falling
Twice in the past two years I've taken a hard fall on ice: once at night walking on a dimly-lit sidewalk and another time on black ice in broad daylight....
Friday digest
New today from the Century: The art of puttering, relationships and ethical formation, more.
Designer mittens: Mine for the giving
I gave the woman a Dunkin Donuts gift card and told her to get something hot. She didn't thank me. She said, "Those mittens look warm."
Episcopal bishops agree not to help breakaway congregations
The Episcopal Church has a new commandment for its bishops: thou shalt not assist former Episcopalians who are trying to take the church’s assets....
Gordon Cosby's essence
Gordon Cosby, the prophetic founder of the Church of the Savior, passed away yesterday. I interviewed Cosby in the fall of 2009 in the library of the Festival Center, one of the many buildings in the Adams Morgan neighborhood of Washington D.C. where the (un)church that Cosby founded in the 1950s has thrived.
In our interview, Cosby—at 91 dynamic and impassioned—talked about how ministries have an “essence.”
Adoption is not a "second-best option"
National Organization for Marriage board chair John C. Eastman recently called adoption a “second-best option” for children. He was speaking to the Associated Press about Chief Justice John Robert’s position on the rights of same-sex couples: “Certainly adoption in families headed, like Chief Roberts’ family is, by a heterosexual couple, is by far the second-best option.”
The comment reveals less about adoptive families than about Eastman’s willingness to jettison religious tradition for political gain.
Thursday digest
New today from the Century: Debra Bendis on an encounter with a homeless woman, Jason Byassee on Homeland, more.
Caught in the middle: On abortion and homosexuality
Nowhere has our callow politics asserted itself more thoughtlessly and noisily than in the politicization of personal or private life.
My deliverer is coming (but only on weekdays)
With no white smoke to herald its decision, the United States Postal Service announced in early February that beginning in August, American homes would no longer receive mail delivery on Saturdays. Several weeks later, the House passed a funding bill requiring that Saturday mail delivery continue.
Through the off-again, on-again plans for the Saturday mail, religious leaders and organizations remained quiet. Perhaps they had too many other pressing concerns. What was missed was any discussion of the postal service’s importance in American religious history, a history that has been marked by religious frustration and innovation.
Wednesday digest
New today from the Century: Wendell Berry on abortion and homosexuality, Nicole Kirk on the postal service and religious history, more.
The Obama thing isn't the point
I for one am not sure the actor who plays Satan in the History Channel documentary looks all that much like President Obama. But I don't find this quote from the miniseries producer especially heartening:
Mark Burnett said the actor who played Satan, Mohamen Mehdi Ouazanni, "is a highly acclaimed Moroccan actor. He has previously played parts in several Biblical epics –including Satanic characters long before Barack Obama was elected as our President."
Wm & H’ry, by J. C. Hallman
The letters that flowed back and forth across the Atlantic Ocean between William and Henry James are voluminous....
Prayer for the pope
If we take the Christian story seriously, the pope's burdens are not his alone to bear. They are shared by everyone united with him in prayer.
At inaugural Mass, Pope Francis calls for defending environment, poor
c. 2013 Religion News Service...
The Bible producers deny its Satan resembles President Obama
The producers of the History Channel’s The Bible have fended off claims that the actor who plays Satan in the miniseries resembles President Barack Obama....