Does the Existence of Umpires Conflict With the Goodness of God?

We are excited to offer in the next issue of First Things an essay by the baseball player turned theologian David Bentley Hart on the metaphysics of baseball. If baseball does indeed possess metaphysical qualities, one wonders whether the perfect game stolen yesterday from Detroit pitcher Armando Galarraga by a blown call with two outs in the bottom of the ninth reintroduces the problem of theodicy.

Next
YOU MIGHT ALSO LIKE

Lift My Chin, Lord 

Jennifer Reeser

Lift my chin, Lord,Say to me,“You are not whoYou feared to be,Not Hecate, quite,With howling sound,Torch held…

Letters

Two delightful essays in the March issue, by Nikolas Prassas (“Large Language Poetry,” March 2025) and Gary…

Spring Twilight After Penance 

Sally Thomas

Let’s say you’ve just comeFrom confession. Late sunPours through the budding treesThat mark the brown creek washing Itself…