December 13, 2024
This essay explores the themes of compassion and anger through the lens of the Gospel of Luke's Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus (16:19-31). It emphasizes the significance of canine compassion in the parable, contrasting it with human tendencies toward retributive anger. The author argues for a commitment to compassion beyond societal judgments of worth, advocating for a collective respect for equal dignity.
November 18, 2024
The 2024 U.S. presidential election revealed a surprising Republican victory, driven by fear among voters, particularly regarding immigration and social changes. This fear can lead to manipulation and threatens democracy. In contrast, hope, faith, and love present pathways to overcoming fear and fostering a more compassionate political landscape.
August 22, 2024
Mother and Child – Egon Schiele, 1914 A quick thought: One way to think about injustice (what Christians often call “sin”) is as what happens when we deny what is intractable, insistent, human: violence/sexuality. One way to think about the “conversions” of both Saint Paul and Saint Augustine is as types of fleeing from one or another of those things or “the thing.” What would happen if we started where Ibram Kendi does in Stamped from the Beginning, with the refreshing assumption that nothing is wrong with us? In this context, what would happen if we acknowledged, soberly and honestly,
July 18, 2024
Political desire into democracy will not go. Political desire feeds on the ideal. It does not compromise. It hates frustration. It must have exactly what it wants, its ideal, or . . . else. Democracy is perpetually threatened by a people’s political desire. Saint Paul offers us something different: a redeemed political desire.
May 3, 2024
Lori Lightfoot’s tenure as Chicago mayor is the subject of Gregory Pratt’s The City Is Up For Grabs, which critiques her leadership as chaotic and ultimately bad for the City of Chicago. Using Lightfoot’s ill-fitting suits as a metaphor, this analysis examines her portrayal as a complex political figure, both empowered and constrained by intersecting social perceptions of gender, race, and authority.
March 24, 2024
* In her recent book, Who Is Afraid of Gender?, Judith Butler asks us to think critically about gender. Thinking critically about gender entails actually reading texts that seriously investigate and explore the (dis-)contents of gender. Butler explicitly defines what is at stake in the practice of reading, namely “democratic life”: Reading is not just a pastime or a luxury, but a precondition of democratic life, one of the practices that keep debate and disagreement grounded, focused, and productive. Judith Butler, Who Is Afraid of Gender? (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 2024), 18-19. The specific point Butler is making
July 7, 2026
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