There were three things I wanted to get done before I left Kansas City for twelve weeks in New York for work at First Things . I wanted my sixteen-year-old daughter, Joanie, to get her driver’s license. That would be a help to her mother in my absence and insure getting the younger girl . . . . Continue Reading »
As we clean up formatting errors in the archives, occasionally we find amusing tidbits. Here’s another one, this time from the August/September 2006 Public Square : This is, I suppose, a Louisiana turn on Hilaire Belloc’s little rhyme: “Wherever the Catholic sun doth shine, / . . . . Continue Reading »
What do you know. Dr. Steinberg has changed his mind: “Though well intended, we remain sensitive to public perception and feel that any benefit the diagnostic studies may offer are far outweighed by the apparent negative societal impacts involved.” In other words, he’s nixing the . . . . Continue Reading »
Relativism is the bane of our times, although it is still selectively applied. We tell teenagers to try not to have sexual intercourse, but if you do—which we know you will—then please use a condom. Yet, we still know how to be unequivocal in some areas: We tell kids, “Don’t smoke,!”, not, . . . . Continue Reading »
Win some, lose some: The Daily Mail today reports that Lindsay Lohan proposes to convert to Judaism. According to Ha’aretz this morning, Actress Lindsay Lohan is planning to convert to Judaism to show her committment to her Jewish girlfriend D.J. Samantha Ronson, according to the British . . . . Continue Reading »
A group of unhappy professional academic philosophers have submitted a petition to the American Philosophical Association. What are they up in arms about? The opening paragraph of the petition tells it all: Many colleges and universities require faculty, students, and staff to follow certain . . . . Continue Reading »
From the Wall Street Journal : The physician-assisted suicide law that goes into effect today in Washington State allows hospitals and doctors to refuse to participate, creating a difficult decision for those who deal with end-of-life care. Voters passed the measure last fall. There are lots of . . . . Continue Reading »
In his recent book, Imagining the Future, Yuval Levin succinctly identified the source of so many of our cultural problems today. It was a real “Bingo!” moment for me: Society has ceased to be primarily about promoting virtue. Rather, our primary drive as a culture today is to prevent . . . . Continue Reading »
For years evangelicals such as Ronald Sider, Jim Wallis, and David Gushee have taken upon themselves the mantle of “prophet”speaking the truth to power and all that. They have made a career of distancing themselves from the “religious right” because, the story goes, . . . . Continue Reading »