Most Read from past 24 hours






Who would sympathize with the Roman official who had Jesus crucified? Even among many who don’t consider themselves Christian, Pontius Pilate is a cultural symbol of an abusive, authoritarian power. But there are a few movies, such as Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ, that present him as an almost sympathetic figure. That’s not
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Heroes. Webster’s Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary defines a hero as “a man admired for his achievements and noble qualities.” That “man” doesn’t fit the zeitgeist these days, so I looked up “heroine,” who is “a woman admired and emulated for her achievements and qualities.” Because I prefer the latter definition for my purposes here, I
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Rewarding children for good behavior has become commonplace in the American family. But in a recent piece for The Atlantic, Psychologist Erica Reischer cautions that reward systems can be surprisingly harmful to children and their families. Using the example of the ubiquitous sticker chart, Reischer writes that the system of children earning their way to
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(Image: Jack Kerouac’s copy of Dostoevsky’s An Unpleasant Predicament) I truly appreciate the existence of libraries, which provide many people access to books that their budgets would not allow them to purchase. But the thing is, I rarely check out books from them. The reason why? I love to mark up books. Since high school—thanks to
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I ran across a short video from The Perennial Plate the other day which gave me pause. The video featured a woman named Ana Navarro who operates a ranch in Colorado with the help of her children. As the video shows and Navarro attests, the family does not have a lot of material wealth. Yet
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“Acquire a peaceful spirit, and then thousands of others around you will be saved.” This statement was made by St. Seraphim of Sarov, a Russian Orthodox monk who lived in the 18th and 19th centuries. And though it was addressed to a Christian audience, I think the concept behind it is very relevant to everyone
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