First Thoughts

The Tragedy of the Resurrection

Pace common wisdom, the resurrection makes human life truly tragic.
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Titles We Didn't Choose — April 2016

Have you had a chance to look at the April 2016 edition of First Things on our website yet? Like last month, I am offering up some behind-the-scenes bonus content here in the form of also-ran titles: headings for pieces that were suggested at our titles meeting but nixed for being too punny, too . . . . Continue Reading »

“Holiness is not for Wimps”: Remembering Mother Angelica

Mother Mary Angelica of the Annunciation, a Catholic nun and the only woman in the history of television to found and a lead a cable network for twenty years, died yesterday, Easter Sunday, at age ninety-two.After entering the Poor Clares of Perpetual Adoration, a Franciscan religious order, in . . . . Continue Reading »

First Links — 3.25.16

Winter's Tale: The Icy Pang of Contrition and the Gift of Thawing Grace
Alexi Sargeant, Aleteia

‘This doubtful day of feast or fast': Good Friday and the Annunciation
Clerk of Oxford, A Clerk of Oxford

Building the Virtuous Neighborhood
Matthew Loftus, American Conservative

Why I'm Becoming a Catholic at Easter
K. Albert Little, Patheos

How Hieronymus Bosch Defied the Ideals of an Age
Michael Prodger, New Statesman

Personal Love and the Call to Chastity
Samantha Schroeder, Public Discourse

God's Hidden Call
Rabbi Lord Jonathan Sacks, Rabbi Sacks

Alas, Poor William Shakespeare. Where Does His Skull Rest?
Christopher D. Shea, New York Times

Davenant House, Christian Community, and the Work of Study Centers
Jake Meador, Mere Orthodoxy

What We've Been Reading—3.25.16

Mark BauerleinLife Magazine, September 6, 1948—It was on the coffee table at a friend's house, and I have just spent the last hour poring over it. There is Joe DiMaggio under the lights slamming a double to beat the Athletics. A few pages later there's an editorial entitled “How Red a . . . . Continue Reading »

Exposure Therapy and the Way of the Cross

This Holy Week, I am feeling the need to participate in some Catholic extremism.Now of course, we live in a time when religious extremism is a major threat to the world. That’s why I find it all the more distressing that so may Americans have a warped view of what constitutes extremism. The Barna . . . . Continue Reading »

Calling Student Writers!

Do you want to see your writing on the First Things website? If you are currently enrolled in college, a graduate program, or seminary, be sure to enter our second annual Student Essay Contest by June 15.

First Links — 3.22.16

Religion's Place in a Religiously Violent World
Miroslav Volf, Christianity Today

In Fear and Trembling
Br. Hyacinth Grubb, Dominicana

How Will Young People Choose Their Religions?
Emma Green, Atlantic

Not Jew-ish but a Jew
Mark Oppenheimer, Tablet

‘The Passion': Jesus' Final Hours as a Halftime Show
Mike Hale, New York Times

Terrence Malick’s Frustrating Film Theology
Tim Markatos, Acculturated

It's the Character
Mona Charen, Townhall

Why Cooking Matters
Gracey Olmstead, American Conservative

Photographs of a Life

Félix Nadar was not a man easily pinned down. Though he’s on the books as one of the most ­important photographers of the nineteenth century—both for photographing the leading French writers of his era and for making advancements in camera technology—Nadar’s life spanned a number of diverse occupations, from caricaturist to balloonist. Continue Reading »

Malick's Masterpiece

Knight of Cups is a masterpiece, Malick’s greatest and most moving film. Continue Reading »