Knausgaard’s Mephistopheles
Back in college, one of my literature professors once remarked that the first hundred pages of a Balzac novel are often boring, but the ones that follow are the most gripping you have ever read in your life…
April 2026
Print Edition
April 2026 Print Edition
America’s Most Influential Journal of Religion and Public Life
How Hipsters Gave Us Trump
Epstein’s Revelations
Far from a mere sordid distraction or an endless supply of tabloid slop, the Epstein files may…
Gen Zeal
Everyone assures us that we enjoy the blessings of progress: Capitalism has produced great material wealth, modern…
How Kanye Went Nazi
Last year, Kanye West—sometimes known as Ye—released a song titled “Nigga Heil Hitler.” The music video featured…
When the Bells Stop Ringing
Some years ago, I was a resident at Conemaugh Memorial Medical Center in Johnstown, a small postindustrial…
The Twisted Consequences of Chatbots
How to Write a Russian Novel
The Prodigal of Leningradby daniel taylorparaclete press, 256 pages, $21.99 There is of course no generic “Russian…
Knausgaard’s Mephistopheles
Back in college, one of my literature professors once remarked that the first hundred pages of a…
Introducing The Jew From Nowhere
Longtime readers of First Things will probably be able to guess the third in this sequence: Catholic,…
The Debates that Shaped Dei Verbum
Since the start of 2026, Pope Leo XIV has embarked, in his Wednesday audiences, on catecheses about…
Goodbye to the Postwar Consensus
The debates of the past year or two surrounding the Second World War have exposed fault lines…
How to Bring Back School Prayer
Though it was overshadowed by the reversal of Roe v. Wade the Friday before, the Supreme Court’s…
The Qur’an’s Christians
Hollywood released quite a few movies about Jesus in the 1960s and ’70s. Not all got rave…
Mainlining Nostalgia
Ryan Burge is unignorable. A political scientist known for his “graphs about religion,” Burge is required reading…
Living with Wittgenstein
In the autumn of 1944, Ludwig Wittgenstein noticed a young doctoral student in attendance at his lectures…
Witch Hunt
In the musical Wicked, the familiar story of The Wizard of Oz is retold from the perspective…
That by which we rise
That by which we riseis that by which we fall. This comes as no surprise at all.But paradox…
Homer’s Childhood
When Homer was a little boy,He never had a single toy.All his play was in his mind;In…
A Small Hotel in Florence
Two twin-like English sisters ran the place. When we checked in, one asked, “Is it the case .…
An Offer We Must Refuse
In his masterwork, Thus Spake Zarathustra, Friedrich Nietzsche’s mythic hero carries a message—“God is dead!”…
Constitutional Freedom
Vincent Phillip Muñoz (Phillip to his friends, among whom I count myself) is a rising star at…
The Book of Judges
Recent events have brought the ordinarily neglected subject of judicial duty to the front pages…
Freedom By Association
In New York City, about one hundred and fifty churches and religious groups—many of them serving poor…
Breaking the Law, Bending the Law
Federal Judge John E. Sprizzo will never again be promoted or advanced, for he has committed an…
Taking Religious Freedom Seriously
Passage of the Religion Clauses of the First Amendment (“Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment…
