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Like Children?

Maybe this all-too-common loss of wonder is why Jesus (and other wise spiritual guides) told us that we need to become like children to experience God and fullness of life: A young rabbi once said to his teacher that, in the evening, he could see the angel who rolls...

Myth Made Fact, Word Made Flesh: Art and Truth

I talked this morning about how closely connected are our capacities for imagination and for faith. I also gave thanks for how great art, of whatever medium or genre, helps us to imagine a different world than this one: to see, for instance, how good could triumph...

Seeing but lacking vision?

Toward the end of Helen Keller’s remarkable public career, after a speech at a Midwestern college, a student asked her: “Miss Keller, is there anything that could have been worse than losing your sight?” Helen Keller replied: “Yes, I could have lost my vision.” Not...

Far too easy. . . and empty

It’s easy, far too easy, to lose track of what matters. It’s easy for lawyers and judges to lose track of justice. In modern-day legal systems (there’s more than one), career-building, deal-making, and system-gaming can push a concern for justice to the periphery and...

Fear and Love

We’ve all known, and some of us have been, people who are hard to love. Some people send contradictory signals: “Go away” and “Come closer.” “Leave me alone” and “Why don’t you ever call me?” “I need help” and “Do you think I can’t do that myself? I heard one man...

” Critical Patriotism”

Maybe you’ve heard it said that the United States is often caught in the cross-fire of its uncritical lovers and its unloving critics. I try for a third way: to be a loving critic—to practice what Lutheran-turned-Catholic priest Richard John Neuhaus once called...