Social

Natural disasters, financial crises, pandemics, wars and social unrest—each striking society in increasingly rapid succession—serve as stark reminders of our vulnerability.

Mainstream culture has tried to airbrush guilt out of everyday life. It’s the ultimate social faux pas, it seems, to make someone feel guilty—How dare you judge me! Or maybe it’s the penultimate faux pas, because what’s even worse than making someone feel guilty inside is to shame them in front of others.

There has been an increase in the number of so-called "experts" in an increasing number of so-called "fields". It seems that all of life has been divided into neatly-marketable industries. No wonder then that the arrival of a new expert in something familiar to mankind for ages, is met with caution. In the case of Julia Samuel's expertise in the field of grief...

I’ll never be able to separate the memories of childhood from that of books. They intertwine like colours in fabrics, in a jumble of real and fantastical, bitter and sweet, joy and guilt.

We live in a time in history when we seem to be connected in every way possible. It seems as if there are few, if any, who have no one to socialize with.

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

“You can have any colour you want, as long as it’s black,” Henry Ford famously said, and the modern mass production revolution began. Today, however, you can customise almost anything. You can blend your foundation to match your exact skin colour. You can design your own shoes; you can personalise your car, your suit and even your M&Ms.

“Walking with a friend in the dark is better than walking alone in the light” (Hellen Keller).

Dietrich Bonhoeffer (1906-1945), author of The Cost of Discipleship and one of the remarkable figures of twentieth-century Christianity, served as a Lutheran pastor and theologian in Tübingen, Berlin, and New York, in a dark period of human history. He vehemently opposed the Nazi Party's attempt to subjugate the church to the political and ideological approach of the time. He felt the political and...

The child’s linguistic appetite must be stimulated from an early age, experts say, highlighting that the benefits the bilingual child reaps extend beyond the linguistic sphere.

No matter how much we avoid it, the day will come when our parents will not be able to get by without us, just as we would not have been able to grow up without them.

When Reader's Digest asked readers to share a time when someone took care of one of their needs, the stories poured in, proving that our world is still full of ambassadors of generosity.

You really don't realize what your thoughts about God are until you have nothing left but the conviction expressed in the book of the prophet Jeremiah: My Father, my friend from my youth (Jeremiah 3:4).

Bruce Reichenbach's book, Divine Providence: God’s Love and Human Freedom is impressive first of all due to the author’s total disinterest in impressing his readers. Instead, he has a legacy to pass on.

What I need now is stability. And that can only come through sacrifice. That's what I've heard and that's what I’m doing. My family? It can wait—dear ones, too. The little joys of life? Who has time for that? I'm still waiting.