First Links — 12.11.15

From First Thoughts

C. S. Lewis Was a Secret Government Agent
Harry Lee Poe, Christianity Today

Preserving the City of Tomorrow
Steven W. Semes, New Criterion

Movable Feasts:
A Farmer-Philosopher Confounds Expectations about Islam and Outsiders in the South

Staff, Economist

Father Mourad: Defeating ISIS Within a Cell of Prayer
Arthur Herlin, Aleteia

Grace Notes
Rowan Williams, Literary Review

Medication Nation
Philip Alcabes, American Scholar

Charlotte Brontë’s Most Inexplicable Denominational Burns
Mallory Ortberg, Toast

The Alarming Summons of Advent
Laura Trimble, Humane Pursuits

Prayer at Winter Solstice

From First Thoughts

Our contributor and next years' honoree for the Annual Poetry Reading, Dana Gioia, was just named California's Poet Laureate. Here's an illustration of why:Prayer at Winter SolsticeBlessed is the road that keeps us homeless. Blessed is the mountain that blocks our way.Blessed are hunger . . . . Continue Reading »

What We've Been Reading—12.4.15

From First Thoughts

In a recent address in New York, Martin Mosebach, winner of the Georg Büchner Prize, Germany's most prestigious literary award, described the metaphysical outlook of his countrymen: “In Germany we like to distinguish between the glistening surface and the deeper values.

First Links — 12.4.15

From First Thoughts

What We Fear When We Fear Terrorism
Ross Douthat, New York Times

Remembering the Soviet Union's Disappeared
Noah Sneider, Atlantic

Biotech Enhancement and the History of Redemption
Gilbert Meilander, New Atlantis

Politically Correct Holy Rollers: The New Campus Revival
Helen Andrews, National Review

How Can I Change the Conversation at my College around Gay People in the Church?
Eve Tushnet, Patheos

C. S. Lewis' Greatest Fiction: Convincing American Kids They Would Like Turkish Delight
Jesse Zimmerman, Atlas Obscura

‘You Stink' He Explained: the unending deliciousness of literary rivalries
Joseph Epstein, Commentary

‘People Need Other Things To Live By’: An Interview with the author of Laurus
Rod Dreher, Eugene Vodolazkin, The American Conservative

First Links — 11.25.15

From First Thoughts

Fighting Terrorism with Transcendence
Gracey Olmstead, American Conservative

While We Were Out
Daniel Schwindt, Distributist Review

The New Dignity: Gnostic, Elitist, Self-Destructive Will-to-Power
Roberta Green Ahmanson, Public Discourse

Forensic Psuedoscience
Nathan J. Robinson, Boston Review

How France’s Leaders Failed Its People
Michel Houellebecq, New York Times

God banished from Downton Abbey, says show's historical advisor
Patrick Foster, Telegraph

Accepting Woodrow Wilson's Failures without Erasing History
Christine Emba, Washington Post

We Value Experience: Can a Secret Society Become a Business?
Rick Paulas, Longreads

What We've Been Reading

From First Thoughts

As I rode the train to DC for Yuval Levin’s lecture last week, I read Haunted Castles, a volume of gothic stories by Ray Russell. The volume includes his famous sibilant tales, Sardonicus, Sagittarius, and Sanguinarius, as well as Comet Wine, the story of the world’s greatest unknown composer. All are memorable and finely wrought (one of Russell’s characters says “my preferences, as you know, have always been for the baroque”; so too with the author).

 

First Links — 11.20.15

From First Thoughts

What Polls Can't Tell Us about Faith in America
Jody Avirgan, Emma Green, Leah Libresco, FiveThirtyEight

English is not Normal
John McWhorter, Aeon

What Can We Do as Muslims in Wake of #ParisAttacks?
Saud Inam, Patheos

Art for All of Us? Greek Tragedy and War Veterans
Sarah Ruden, Books and Culture

The Illusion of Respectability 
Allen Guelzo, Christianity Today

Where the Safe Things Are
Rek LeCounte, Token Dissonance

All Valid Law is Analogical
Graham McAleer, Library of Law and Liberty

Dinner Invitations Yes, but also Sharing Houses
Wesley Hill, Spiritual Friendship

First Links — 11.13.15

From First Thoughts

Speaking Truth to Pain
Noah Millman, American Conservative

The Priest and the Pieces of Christ's Body he Protects
Elizabeth Scalia, Aleteia

Rene Girard Remembered
Artur Rosman, Patheos

Chicago nun wins ‘Chopped,' hopes it will help spotlight ‘issue of hunger'
Manya Brachear Pashman, Chicago Tribune

“Why Hold a Child Hostage to My Doubts?”
Ruth Graham, Slate

In Lieu of Female Deacons, a Proposal
Jenna M. Cooper, J.C.L., Crisis

If Nietzsche Wrote Batman, It Would Look Like ‘Gotham’
Brian Boyd, Acculturated

What We've Been Reading—11.6.15

From First Thoughts

Mark Bauerlein I am half-way through Anna Karenina. Everyone knows the basics of the story, but I've never read it before. It was a favorite of F. R. Leavis and Lionel Trilling, who drew large implications about humanity and the novel from it.  But for me at this point, at the end of an . . . . Continue Reading »

First Links — 11.06.15

From First Thoughts

AA Envy
Helen Andrews, Hedgehog Review

The Just War in Greek Tragedy: Euripides' Suppliants
Robert J. Delahunty, Center for Law and Religion Forum

The State Department Turns Its Back on Syrian Christians and Other Non-Muslim Refugees
Nina Shea, National Review

Watching Liberalism Flail
Nathan J. Robinson, Navel Observatory

The Gift of Singleness
Nick Roen, Spiritual Friendship

The Tangled Cultural Roots of Dungeons and Dragons
Jon Michaud, New Yorker

The Concern of a Canine
Sean Curnyn, Cinch Review