The desert mothers and fathers have much to teach Catholics about contemplation and prayer. In the third- to sixth-century desert landscape of Egypt, Syria...
Articles
I took a class on “ecowriting,” and the first assignment was to pull some weeds. It was an unseasonably hot and humid October, so I chose not to pull the weeds...
I’ll tell you a story. My wife is an art teacher for kids who are really really sick, a job filled with hilarity and pain, a job she loves, a job that makes...
Our feet crunch as we tramp through the woods, two Christians on an impossibly pristine New England autumn day. My host, Dominic Cassella, 23, leads the way...
You may have seen the meme on social media: “A Muslim, a Jew, a pagan, and an atheist all walk into a coffee shop. They laugh and joke, drink coffee, and...
Do you ever notice what you don’t see? Hang with me—I know the question seems strange. Those of us gifted with the ability to see count on our eyes to alert us...
In a stroke of luck, I once found a cookbook that I had been planning to purchase—Beard on Bread (Knopf)—in a box labeled “free” along the curb. The best part...
On January 1, all over the country, people jump into freezing bodies of water in celebration of a new year. While “polar bear clubs” involve bravado, good cold...
At 32, novice Maria Anna Dela Paz is the youngest sister in her congregation, the Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia, by about 20 years. She was drawn to...
I don’t have a pet. This puts me at odds with the 65 percent of U.S. citizens who choose to share their homes with animals. Forty-four percent of us coexist...
