Support First Things by turning your adblocker off or by making a  donation. Thanks!

Annunciation

From the March 1994 Print Edition

What can I say to her? No Gabriel, I drive under an arch of trees dead in late winter and down a rock-graveled driveway littered with riding toys but still too quiet. Wanting a cigarette and the flowers that I forgot, I ring the doorbell and am admitted empty-handed and still without words that I . . . . Continue Reading »

Messianic Secret

From the October 1993 Print Edition

At a parish council meeting, some women clustering together decide, whispering so as not to be overheard and hurt his feelings, that the priest’s shirt, decidedly dirty (for God’s sake a smear of fast food and the brown burn of cigarette on one pocket) is but the latest sign of domestic . . . . Continue Reading »