Social

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.

In the February 2023 issue of Signs of the Times, I wrote an article titled Gambling’s Dark Underbelly. Here in Australia, gambling is a multi-billion-dollar industry with a few very rich winners and millions of losers. In the article I concluded that “Gambling in any form is designed to bleed you for as long as you’re willing to bleed, with no regard for...

Tim Urban knows that you're reading this article instead of dealing with that project for which the clock is ticking relentlessly towards the deadline. But Tim Urban understands you. The blogger who founded the long-form platform Wait But Why gave a TED presentation on procrastination a few years ago, and most of us will recognise ourselves in it.

Our number of friends tends to decrease as we get older, but this trend, which has many negative effects, can be actively combated even when old age has already set in.

For the first time in US history, the majority of Americans believe that even moderate alcohol consumption is detrimental to health. Just 54% of Americans say they still drink alcohol. This is the lowest percentage in nearly 20 years. However, it has taken a long time to reach these conclusions.

In the age of the internet and the “global village,” an irrational fear taking hold in a small American town can easily go viral, reaching and affecting us all. Once online, news—whether true or false—can have a corrosive effect, leading us to feel cynical about the future and to hold low expectations for our leaders.

Social upheaval, an identity crisis, the sexual revolution, experimentation with drugs, and Eastern philosophies distanced entire generations in Western Europe from conservative values and faith. However, in the same 1960s and 1970s environment, Marijke and Bernard Beranger found something better and more lasting.

He had played the lottery for years, using the same numbers every time. But on the one day that he forgot to buy a ticket, the draw revealed the winning numbers to be exactly his "lucky" numbers.

Money . . . It’s the grease that makes the world go round, yet it’s one of the least chosen table topics of choice. With the rising cost of living, the price of lettuce being tripled and a seemingly never-ending list of things to pay for, many are worrying about their financial future. So long as we continue to ignore the conversation, the...

In 2016, I noticed advertising for a new quiz show called Hard Quiz coming to ABC TV in Australia.

The year 2022 was perhaps richer than previous years in events that affected the whole world.

During the holidays (but not only then), our budgets often go off the rails as we exhaust ourselves searching for gifts that will at least make a good impression, if not unlock the deep joy of the recipient’s heart. In this frenzy, however, we must not forget that we are teaching our children, consciously or unconsciously, valuable lessons about the meaning of giving.

Problem gambling in Australia and New Zealand is an issue seldom talked about, but we ignore it at our peril.

Compromise is always present in relationships. It may pull us down, but it can also be a good reconciliation exercise when there are differences that cannot be resolved in any other way.

Every experience we live teaches us something about the world and God. These lessons are always perfectible. From the pain of other people, however, we learn the wrong lessons so easily.