In his 1782 book Letters from an American Farmer, John de Crèvecœur asked the most famous and important question in American history: “What then is the American, this new man?” The authentic American leaves behind him “all his ancient prejudices and manners, receives new ones from the new . . . . Continue Reading »
Early in my ministry as a pastor, my mother told me she’d had an abortion. It was for medical reasons, but it had haunted her down the corridors of her mind. She knew better than most people what was involved back then because she had taught obstetrical nursing at Vanderbilt University. . . . . Continue Reading »
With the battle raging between the Little Sisters of the Poor and the Federal government on the HHS Mandate, some writers have likened their case to the trial of St. Thomas More as seen in Robert Bolt’s play A Man for All Seasons or Fred Zinnemann’s famous film adaption. Zinnemann’s film and Bolt’s play, however, inaccurately convey Thomas More’s idea of conscience. Continue Reading »
Years ago, I went twice to the snake-handling Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in Kingston, Georgia—about twenty miles from where I live. It wasn’t my unbounded personal curiosity that led me to that church the first time. I went with a group of Christian sociologists who were meeting at . . . . Continue Reading »
The Catholic Church began compiling “martyrologies”—lists of saints, typically martyrs—during the first centuries after Constantine. In the pre-Vatican II breviary, a reading from the Roman Martyrology, or what we might call the Catholic Book of Witnesses, was an integral part . . . . Continue Reading »
Pope Francis’ recent address to a conference of prosperity-preaching ministers sponsored by Kenneth Copeland has many people talking. On the one hand, there are those who have expressed deep concern and dismay about this event. They wonder what ecclesial status Tony Palmer—a longtime . . . . Continue Reading »
Perhaps it is the natural result of social evolution but as a nation, our understanding of what the word “tolerance” means or how it is to be lived has shifted within our moral GPS. We have been detoured away from the broad two-way street called Live and Let Live and are now traveling a . . . . Continue Reading »
The new sexual revolutionaries have shifted focus from the legal sanctioning of gay marriage to the elimination of dissent. Around the country, so-called “non-discrimination statutes” undercut the rights of religious believers to live according to the demands of their faith when those . . . . Continue Reading »
If Jesus came back to the Middle East today, I think he would look a lot like the Reverend Canon Dr. Andrew White, the Anglican Chaplain in Iraq and Vicar of St. George’s Church. The “Vicar of Baghdad,” as he is called, carries out his work in one of the world’s most . . . . Continue Reading »
Stephen Meredith’s “Looking for God in All the Wrong Places” in the February 2014 issue of First Things accuses Intelligent Design theory (ID) of being a variant of occasionalism, which he defines as the denial “that efficient causality occurs outside God.” . . . . Continue Reading »
Subscribe
Latest Issue
Support First Things
