Faith
Thoughts about how Christianity affects our every day lives
When I first met my husband I was 16 years old. I would have said I fell in love with him immediately. We stood in the darkness of an October night and talked and talked. Two months later we exchanged those words—I love you—also whispered in the dark of night. But it took five more years ...
Fifteen months ago, this blog began with a conversation with Katelyn Beaty about my hopes and dreams for Thin Places. As I conclude this blog, we thought it fitting to have a concluding conversation as well. Katelyn and I had a chance to talk about the most exciting and most challenging aspects of ...
One of the wonderful aspects of blogging is that I get to write about pretty much anything that is on my mind and might connect with readers. Over the past 15 months of blogging for Christianity Today, I've written or edited nearly 200 posts. As I wrote last week, many posts soar to the top of ...
I hope that if I counted myself as a member of a “liberal” denomination, I would be writing a post about my gratitude for the contributions of evangelicals to proclaiming God’s glory in the church and in the world. Instead, as an evangelical, I am here to say thank you to the Catholics ...
“Mindfulness” is a buzzword these days. As a recent article in the Sunday New York Times points out:
. . . mindfulness has come to comprise a dizzying range of meanings for popular audiences. It’s an intimately attentive frame of mind. It’s a relaxed-alert frame of mind. ...
I read and listen to a lot of news. NPR plays in the background as I’m making breakfast and dinner. We subscribe to Time, The Atlantic, and The New Yorker (as well as to Christianity Today, Books and Culture, and Critique). I scroll through The New York Times’ headlines and most-emailed ...
In March, we went on vacation as a family. It was a beautiful trip—clear skies, blue water, white sandy beaches. The resort where we stayed offered a “kids club” in the morning, so I had time for walks by myself and with Peter, for naps in the shade of a palm tree, for times of ...
My grandmother died ten days ago. She was 88 years old. By all accounts she had lived a colorful life, with three husbands, three children, six grandchildren, and seven great-grandchildren. She routinely stated her intention to live another decade. Even though her body was failing her through arthritis ...
Professor and writer Karen Swallow Prior’s biography of Hannah More—abolitionist, poet, and reformer—came out last fall. March is Women’s History Month, so it seemed like a perfect opportunity to ask Karen to reflect upon More’s life and legacy:
Although I hadn't learned ...
When I was in high school, I learned about this practice of many evangelical Christians called quiet times. Quiet times didn’t only involve an absence of distracting noise, but also a Bible and a journal and maybe a book about something spiritual. I read through the New Testament during my ...
As I mentioned in last week's post with Eleven Books to Help You Embrace the Snow, I have had a hard time enjoying the reality of living in the Northeast this winter. When I saw my friend Katherine's status update on Facebook about loving this winter, I reached out. Katherine is also a pastor ...
Last night I joined at least 111 million other Americans in watching the Super Bowl. Despite years of indifference to organized sports in general and professional sports in particular, I managed to follow the game’s drama, especially in the fourth quarter. I marveled at the athleticism on display, ...
In the modern world, measurements matter. Newspapers and magazines offer infographics. Congress passes legislation mandating measurable results. And Christians are no strangers to the modern tendency to provide a chart or graph, a documented data set, to demonstrate effectiveness (or lack thereof) ...
In 1970, a group of African Americans in the small US town of Mount Laurel, New Jersey petitioned township officials to build low-income housing. Led by a young woman named Ethel Lawrence, the group was otherwise forced to live in the crime-ridden metropolitan environment of nearby Camden. The township ...
Despite some recent economic good news—the unemployment rate is dropping and the economy as a whole has been growing for a while now—plenty of people in America have reason to worry about money. Fifteen percent of the nations live below the poverty line. Nearly 48 million people receive ...
A few years ago, I sat in a church service in Richmond, Virginia, and I listened to a rendition of "There’s a Wideness in God’s Mercy," a hymn I had never heard before. The rich theology within the words, and the beauty and simplicity of the music that accompanied them, lingered ...
I’m probably not alone in entering the Christmas season with some combination of eager anticipation and dread. I won’t go on and on about the shopping and the baking and the parties, but I will note that this celebration also falls at the beginning of the sick-and-snow season. We had ...
I read Rob Moll’s newest book, What Your Body Knows About God with interest and wonder. It’s filled with fascinating tidbits of information about our bodies and spirituality, and Rob writes in a way that easily connects data points to stories. The book as a whole stands as an encouraging ...
Released in late October, Disquiet Time: Rants and Reflections on the Good Book by the Skeptical, the Faithful, and a Few Scoundrels is the brainchild of Jennifer Grant (a fellow contributor to her.meneutics) and Cathleen Falsani (an award-winning religion writer and journalist) who co-edited the book. ...
It felt kind of like the Oscars, well, like the Oscars for book nerds. An evening with awards in different categories, a host who made witty remarks, and palpable excitement in the air. Two nights ago, I sat in an auditorium at the New School in Manhattan, for the privilege of listening as the twenty ...
