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My nana was my favourite person in the world. From as young as three, Mum would drop me off at church, help me put my backpack on and I’d waddle in to meet Nana. During worship, we’d cuddle through the songs. She was an amazing singer; I was tone-deaf. She’d whisper to me, “You have an amazing voice . . . you’re not...

"You? Fat? No way!" "With all due respect, officer, that wasn't a red light!" Every day, billions of lies leave the mouths of billions of people. Lying is a moral pollution that we declare harmful, but seem to believe is indispensable in life.

After 27 years of marriage, billionaire couple Bill and Melinda Gates publicly announced their divorce in May, sending shockwaves across the globe.

Could it be that, beyond economic, political or geostrategic difficulties, there are obstacles to the ideal of the common good that are inherent in human nature? And if something specific to human nature stood in the way of achieving this ideal, would it not lead to failure, regardless of overcoming all other difficulties?

"Integrity without knowledge is weak and useless, and knowledge without integrity is dangerous and dreadful"—Samuel Johnson.

How much do we know about love? Enough to understand that love is not an obligation—we cannot love by force, nor be loved in this way.

"What is this life if, full of care, / We have no time to stand and stare." — from the poem "Leisure" by William H. Davies.

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

Izzeldin Abuelaish wrote a book titled I Shall Not Hate, now translated into 13 languages, about the hatred that led to the death of his daughters. "Hate is a poison, a fire which burns you from the inside," he writes.

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.

"The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s and 1980s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death... It cannot be overemphasised, however, that no changes in behavior or technology can save us unless we can achieve control over the size of the human population." Despite seeming to come from a dystopian novel, these ideas belong to biologist...

Making any choice denies the possibility of at least one other choice. When confronted with this truth, young people often find themselves unprepared for life’s big choices.

I was a young student looking for a good paying job to support my family and my studies. On that day, I found myself in the head nurse’s office at the nearby nursing home for the elderly.

One can see today a growing concern among people who seek spirituality for relief, solutions and healing, both individually and collectively. It is an interest that arouses optimism about the role and impact that the Christian message can have on society, but also a concern for an accurate transmission of the biblical message.

Meetings with people and books have shaped the space for a sometimes unequal, sometimes unsatisfactory growth between the human I am and the one I would like to be.