Analysis

In a world of many predetermined things, friends are the family we choose for ourselves. Often, their presence is what keeps us going. In Vital Friends, Tom Rath says that many of those who end up on the streets, divorced, or addicted to overeating, struggle with inner demons precisely because they are alone. They feel excluded, abandoned, unloved.

Advertising makes the teenage years seem like the best years of life. However, adolescence is a time of great emotional turmoil for both children and their parents. It's a time when many important decisions are made, with life-changing consequences.

Rudyard Kipling referred to ants in his famous poem, recommending these fragile creatures as a kind of didactic exhibit. What can one learn from ant colonies?

In the heart of the most powerful man in Judea, a greater fear than any other was born: the fear of losing control. Herod's story could be our story.

Many years have passed since I last lived with my brother. Recently, I decided to go and stay with him for a while. One day we both decided to visit a place in nature that neither of us had been to before. When we got there, it started to rain—while not very heavy, rain was not what either of us had wanted. But...

When it was close, when I first saw its truly hideous face, I realised that I would never get used to it. And, no matter how hard I tried, no matter how much hope I tried to gather, I found nothing bright or inspiring about death. I know I will never find such a brightness, because it doesn't exist. But I saw the...

Although we may not like everyone, we want everyone to like and accept us. We raise our eyebrows suspiciously if someone treats us with indifference or, worse, with hostility. We feel misunderstood and rejected. And the feeling of rejection is as intense as physical pain.

Christopher Hitchens was not merely an atheist but, as he described himself, a militant antitheist. It was in his home, at his invitation, that the group known as “The Four Horsemen of New Atheism” first convened. Born in 1949 in postwar England, Hitchens was shaped by the politics and intellectual currents of the 1960s.

With God's help, little guys can do big things too...

Temperance was once upheld by philosophers, saints and stoics. In a world dominated by indulgence, its call to balance feels more relevant than ever.

Louis Braille said: "God was pleased to hold before my eyes the dazzling splendours of eternal hope. After that, doesn't it seem that nothing could keep me bound to the earth?"

The veneration of saints is a very old tradition in Christianity. Many Christians cannot imagine their religion without appealing to saints for guidance, protection, healing and intercession. Less concerned with theological correctness, people seek the company of saints out of loneliness, hardship, sickness, fear, guilt, or disappointment.

Several simple experiments have shown that certain neural processes that are activated when performing an action increase in intensity with fractions of a second or even whole seconds before conscious thinking is informed about the performance of that action.

When we want to position ourselves for or against voluntary euthanasia, we must first be aware that, in addition to the subjective dimension of the issue, there are also important objective aspects to consider.

The field of science was flourishing, and amid its youngest and brightest, one student in particular consistently topped physics and chemistry courses, took its academic prizes and was courted with offers of scholarships by prestigious universities. His trajectory was toward the heights of the scientific world.