To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here When someone else is hurting, it’s tempting to think our call is to do something amazing or to say something unusually wise. But most of the time, the need of the hour is simply to show up. In his recent bestseller How to Know a Person, cultural commentator David Brooks recounts… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Every day during this season of Lent we’re looking at the miracles of Jesus – his spectacular displays of supernatural power that are reported in the Gospels. Oxford don and Christian apologist C.S. Lewis spent most of his days as a contented bachelor. At the age of 57, however, he got the surprise… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here For the past three days, the world’s attention has once again zeroed in on one of humanity’s most enduring wounds. Israelis and Palestinians are in open conflict. Early on Saturday, without warning, members of Hamas operating out of Gaza launched thousands of rockets into Israel. Ground-based militants breached security checkpoints and poured across the… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here It’s not how you start. It’s how you finish. What you see poised on a single human finger in the image above is a pinecone. But it’s not just any pinecone. That’s the primary reproductive apparatus for the California redwood, the tallest living thing on the planet. Every one of the cone’s woody “scales” is… Read more »
To listen to today’s reflection as a podcast, click here Great musicians write killer songs. One of history’s greatest musicians wrote a composition that almost “kills” those who are courageous enough to try to play it. We’re talking about Ludvig van Beethoven’s Hammerklavier Sonata, arguably the ultimate piano masterpiece from the man who almost singlehandedly defined the technical possibilities of the keyboard. Beethoven wrote 32… Read more »
To listen to this reflection as a podcast, click here. Throughout the month of August, we’re looking at Ecclesiastes, that strange and seemingly “modern” Old Testament book that depicts what happens when humanity searches for ultimate meaning apart from God. As 2012 drew to a close, the Associated Press had already chosen its Story of the Year: the re-election of Barack Obama. Then on… Read more »
To listen to this reflection as a podcast, click here. A Scottish village of about 8,500 residents has been in the world’s spotlight twice in the past 30 years. Dunblane has become famous as the hometown of Andy Murray, the first British man to win a Wimbledon singles title in 77 years – a feat he accomplished against the great Novak Djokovic in… Read more »
To listen to this reflection as a podcast, click here. Gregory Boyle is a Jesuit priest who leads a special ministry. The guy with the snowy beard in the picture above is the founder and executive director of Homeboy Industries, a gang-intervention program in the Boyle Heights neighborhood of Los Angeles – arguably the gang capital of the world. His remarkable book Tattoos on… Read more »
To listen to this reflection as a podcast, click here. Author and sociologist Tony Campolo is frequently invited to speak about his faith around the country. A few years back he visited a church in Oregon. Following his message, Tony was approached by a man who was in the last stages of a battle with cancer. Campolo laid his hands on him and prayed… Read more »
To listen to this reflection as a podcast, click here. It was hands-down the most memorable Easter gift I have ever received. One year, when my two brothers and I were in grade school, Mom didn’t settle for colored eggs and chocolate bunnies. Just for fun she bought each of us a live baby chick. Older brother Scott named his Khruschev, the Soviet dictator… Read more »