Analysis

But why do our ambitions of self-improvement rarely stick the way we hope they will?

The biggest surprise of 1989 was the speed with which the communist regimes in Europe collapsed. Their collapse occurred as quickly as their establishment. Two personalities played an undeniable role in undermining a communist regime that seemed to be eternal.

This seemingly innocent question has probably caused more unrest in the last 2000 years than any other. It is, in fact, an echo of the concern of the ancient Jews to determine whether or not Israel was God's only people on earth. It also represents the echo of history that has witnessed wars born of the desire to legitimise a supreme deity.

Broken blade. Shaking hands. Clouded mind. “I could have killed him.”

The first time he saw a living human brain, neurosurgeon Sanjay Gupta says it became “a powerful and life-changing experience."

Jessica was 19 when she had to tell her parents, both practicing Christians, that she was pregnant. That moment generated a real earthquake in the young woman’s family who, together with her boyfriend at the time, had been strongly involved in the purity movement, an ideology that promotes sexual abstinence until marriage, for religious reasons.

Hope can be palpable and elusive at the same time, both reasonable and independent of logic. Yet this independence from logic is not synonymous with indifference to reason, but a victory over it. Hope has its own logic, one that changes lives for the better.

At some point, we've all come across the phrase "back in my day," a deeply subjective expression which encapsulates a universal phenomenon: the generation gap.

"It was dark inside the wolf." Like a chef who reinterprets a traditional dish for an expensive urban restaurant, writer Margaret Atwood proposed to the students of her masterclass a reinterpretation of the story "Little Red Riding Hood", in line with the most current tastes and attention skills: a Little Red Riding Hood that lives in the present moment.

Lack of access to menstrual hygiene is the fifth leading cause of death worldwide among women. In the world, 1 in 3 girls faces the impossibility of ensuring adequate hygiene during menstruation, and many others face sometimes fatal arbitrary limitations imposed by culture.

Eskimos don't have the word "quarrel" in their vocabulary. They live in a particularly harsh climate, so no one wants to risk getting pneumonia (or dying) just to prove that they are right.

The stakes are high when it comes to homosexuality, promiscuity, alcoholism, violence, and the like. Previously seen as a result of environmental influence and moral choice, they have now become a genetical given.

In talking to pastor Cristian Modan, the religion teacher and chaplain at Mihai Ionescu School in Bucharest, I wanted to find out how we should teach children to communicate with God.

On the morning of the 15 November 2016, I awoke in a hospital bed, with no memory of how I got there. My favourite pyjamas had been torn from my body, and I lay in a hospital gown, a piercing pain in my head, impaling my brain. I was barely able to think and incapable of speech. I was scared, though this was...

One of the mind’s most pleasant and, at the same time, most tormenting occupations is to dream of a better life. How many times have we tried to generate a change for the better by means of a new purchase, new friends, new house, new job, new relationship or other ideas for a fresh start?