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I feel like every time I’ve tuned into the news lately, I’ve heard a story about a woman dying from intimate partner or domestic violence (DV). It is heartbreaking and sickening. 

“Hi, I’m Rebecca, and I’m a shopaholic!” This line, along with the character, though from a comedy released in 2009, is cut from the fabric of everyday reality. Shopping has become an indispensable appendage of modern life. However, when it ceases to be just an accessory to a much more complex existence and moves to the centre of an individual’s focus, the leap...

After a chance meeting of mutual friends, I was introduced to Tim and Sonia in a restaurant in central Toowoomba, Queensland, eight days before their home was washed away.

Happy couples are not spared from marital conflict, but the crucial thing is that they have simple but effective tools to strengthen their relationship in a way that does not allow the conflict to destroy the emotional connection between them.

Right at the start of the political thriller, The Post, a scene portrays military analyst Daniel Ellsberg with an empty gaze and a soul burdened by the horrors of the Vietnam war he was forced to document for the United States Department of Defense.

A lack of self confidence is like a stain that doesn't go away by itself. It is like oil dripping out of a machine, its drops collecting in the puddle of an inferiority complex. Such a problem is difficult to mitigate, even with motivational speeches or hopeful injections of fragile optimism.

"The task of the modern educator is not to cut down jungles but to irrigate deserts." (C. S. Lewis)

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.

“For the joy set before him he endured the cross” (Heb. 12: 2 NIV).

While the form and content of books may evolve, their essence and function will remain unchanged—“the book will remain what it is”. This is the view expressed by renowned literary figures Jean-Claude Carrière and Umberto Eco in their 2009 dialogue series titled This is Not the End of the Book.

The promise to live with our loved one “until death do us part" has gradually lost its meaning. Today, it is considered unrealistic to get married with the idea that the relationship will last forever.

Because life in developed societies follows a more or less regular pattern, sociologists have managed to identify the age at which conditions are most conducive to forming a friendship. It's not that people who are not of this age are unable to form meaningful connections with other people, but at other ages, life takes us on different paths, without asking for our permission.

If, biologically, a person becomes a parent when their child is born—or, civilly, when they adopt a child—from a practical and even moral point of view, a person only becomes a parent when they master a series of crucial skills.

While browsing through a folder of old documents, I rediscovered some poems written during my student years. One of them drew my attention because of a verse that resonated with me from the beginning: Only childhood makes us whole.

Isaac and Rebecca, two biblical characters, had problems in their marriage. At first they struggled to fall pregnant. Then, when she eventually got pregnant, it was a difficult pregnancy, which affected them very much—so much so that they didn't know what to do. I suppose they had all sorts of discussions about the situation, but at some point the discomfort just became too...