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Criminal Omissions

Matthew Martens, a career attorney and an evangelical, believes that criminal justice needs a new ethic, specifically, a Christian one. Drawing on a range of theological and biblical texts, he argues that we should “conform such a system to Scripture”—that is, to “Christ’s love for . . . . Continue Reading »

Raw Deal

Of the two million waiters and waitresses working in America,” Batya Ungar-Sargon writes, “just over half own their homes.” My wife, who worked as a waitress for fifteen years, was in the lucky half. But we have watched many of her friends and colleagues struggle. Whether they work in the . . . . Continue Reading »

Briefly Noted

If Famous Jewish Sports Legends is the leaflet in the punchline of a joke about “light reading” in the movie Airplane!, and Jewish Nobel Prize Winners would be a tome, Rabbi Meir Y. Soloveichik’s Providence and Power: Ten Portraits in Jewish Statesmanship is . . . . Continue Reading »

The Fanfic Temptation

A few months ago, an old school friend confessed that she’d been reading a lot of “AO3”—Archive of Our Own, the world’s most popular fan fiction website. I assured her that she wasn’t alone. Fan fiction—stories about fictional characters or real-life celebrities, written by the . . . . Continue Reading »

Diagnosing Disaster

“Why Did We Destroy Europe?” It’s an arresting title, chosen by Michael Polanyi for a 1970 essay that looks back on the conflagrations that consumed Europe between 1914 and 1945. (The essay can be found in Society, Economics & Philosophy, a posthumous volume of selected papers by . . . . Continue Reading »

Those People

Sometimes I will exclaim, when dealing with irritating and difficult people on the phone, “What’s wrong with these people?” Actually I do this a lot, not just on the other end of the phone, but in the face of this or that author, car driver, or person standing ahead of me in the cashier’s . . . . Continue Reading »

Pro-Life Politics After Dobbs

Dobbs v. Jackson Women’s Health Organization was a great victory for the pro-life cause. Prior to the 2022 decision, dubious constitutional interpretation by the Supreme Court had impeded any effective limits to abortion. And it had given us a Constitution that was—as William Lloyd . . . . Continue Reading »

Stay in My Heart

On a spring day seven years ago I was driving across Coney Island Avenue in Brooklyn feeling unusually right with the world. I felt peaceful and uplifted because I had, a few days before, settled in my mind a difficult, painful question: I would eventually leave my husband. We had children . . . . Continue Reading »

Letters

Matthew Schmitz aptly describes “Biden’s Collegiate Catholicism” (April 2024) in two senses. First, Biden’s agenda takes its ideological cues from, and serves the class interests of, the “most formidable redoubts of Democratic power”: the universities. Second, Biden’s politics embody . . . . Continue Reading »

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