This issue inaugurates a new regular column, The Back Page, by our contributing editor David Hart. I have long admired the remarkable range of his learning, his perfectly balanced Ciceronian sentences, and his sometimes mordant and always sharp wit. It will be great to have his voice in First Things every month.
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The Possibility of Possibility
"Might could” is a Southern expression meaning “maybe I could” or “I might be able to,” conveying…
The False Promise of No Contact
Around the time nineteen-year-old Alice began cutting ties with her family, she announced on social media that…
Moral Certitude and the Iran War
The current military engagement with Iran calls renewed attention to just war theory in the Catholic tradition.…