Analysis

Kent Hansen kindly agreed to talk to us about the most painful episode of his life, the loss of his wife. Beyond the sadness, it is a discussion rich in emotion and lessons for us all. 

We have trouble understanding and accepting the image of a loving God, as we have grown too familiar with the type of love that offers itself only when it finds in a person the qualities that make them easy to love.

It is hard to remain indifferent to a life story like that of Terri Roberts, the mother of a young man who, in a still-unexplained moment of madness, stormed into an all-girls Amish school and began shooting, killing five of the students before killing himself.

For the chained man, there were now only two options: unreserved submission to the council or condemnation; recantation or death. Outside, the stake was already prepared.

Making any choice denies the possibility of at least one other choice. When confronted with this truth, young people often find themselves unprepared for life’s big choices.

One of the most powerful pieces of literature illustrating the proper preparation for a financial crisis comes from antiquity. More precisely, from the Bible.

Is it worth fighting for a better world? Is it worth believing that, in a world relentlessly subject to the laws of entropy, hope, good thinking, beauty will still have the chance to develop and enrich our life horizon through education? Can tomorrow's world be better than today's, when everything we hear seems to be so catastrophic, and everything we do seems to...

I never expected my work to affect my mental health. At first, like most people just starting a new job, I was thrilled about my new class, the kids I would be teaching and the environment I wanted to create for these young minds. I had a real passion for children and couldn’t wait to be the best teacher I could be. I...

Do we need to wait for the results of longitudinal scientific studies, extending to decades, to know if vaccines are safe?

In February 2008, English theologian NT Wright made headlines—at least on the website of Time magazine, among others—with comments associated with the launch of his book, Surprised by Hope: Rethinking Heaven, the Resurrection, and the Mission of the Church.

"I'm driven with a mission from God." God would tell me, 'George, go and fight those terrorists in Afghanistan.' And I did, and then God would tell me, 'George, go and end the tyranny in Iraq.' And I did..."

What we think about ourselves, over time, becomes our reality. This is a good enough reason to identify thinking errors left running in the background and to seek out strategies for healthier thinking.

During the COVID-19 lockdown last year, I lived with some messy people. I’d moved into a house that I shared with a wonderful couple of brothers. They were almost everything you could ask for in a set of housemates. Friendly, funny, respectful of your privacy . . . genuinely great people in almost every respect.

An ordinary wooden chair is a metaphor that’s often used to talk about the key dynamics of faith. But it’s worth exploring further. Perhaps we could describe this as a process of developing the theory of a chair.

Life is a stage that we enter without a script, although we are constantly influenced by forces of varying visibility: social, educational, religious, economic, and political.