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Almost a century ago, writer Virginia Woolf noticed people’s tendency to approach books “with clouded and divided minds, asking fiction to be true, poetry to be false, biographies to be flattering and history to chime with prejudices.”

A cold flash, like the strange, icy feeling after a burn, runs through his body with every breath. He feels his heart racing. It feels like it is counting down to the moment when it will explode—or, mercifully, to the moment when he will turn his pillow to the cooler side, and finally fall asleep.

How long does the protection provided by the vaccine last? Should I have a booster shot after a while, or not?

Some time ago, an older friend, now a parent, was telling me how the way his father treated him in childhood caused him unnecessary suffering. Now, as an adult struggling with anxiety, he has spent much time in a psychologist’s office.

Family conflict? The fact that not only milk and honey flow within our families, and conflicts crop up more often than we would like, is not new to anyone. Experience teaches us that people who share a roof as well as a last name clash in their opinions or behaviours in direct proportion to the number of hours they spend together.

Five hundred years ago, Luther nailed his 95 theses to the door of Wittenberg Cathedral. How are the motives that led to the Reformation viewed today?

When confronted with the pandemic, we are anything but equals.

In times of anxiety and insecurity, the ways in which we are encouraged to care for our emotional and mental health can become mere trends that come and go in waves, taking with them our money, time, and hope—and sometimes leaving us in a state which is at least as bad as what we were in originally.

One day, Jesus’s disciples—who followed Him about, observing His every word and action—asked Him to teach them how to pray.

In the heart of the Garden of Eden, where everything seems perfect, there is an ancient struggle between freedom and restriction—a struggle we have all experienced.

Change is the only constant in life, especially the kind that comes unexpectedly and makes us believe that we cannot give in to it without giving up on ourselves, or turning into something we are not.

From Europe to Asia and from Africa to the Americas and Australia, none of the culinary traditions, not even those acclaimed by scientists, generate an optimal supply of nutrients. Moreover, the food we eat daily kills 11 million of us prematurely every year. So then, what should we eat?

According to the National Coalition Against Domestic Violence, every nine seconds, a woman is assaulted or beaten in the United States. Which means that by the time you reach the end of this paragraph, yet another woman will have tragically become a victim of violence.

Last year, most of us were blindsided when we entered our local supermarket, trudged down the toilet paper aisle and were confronted with extended shelves of emptiness. Somewhat disappointed and definitely a little bit anxious (especially if we were running low on the soft, white goodness), we began to wonder how long it would be before we sighted toilet paper again.

If the death of our parents is a blow which makes “the very fabric of life…buckle and cave in,” the ageing of our parents resembles a classroom where we learn to give more than we are used to receiving.