We use cookies to improve our services and remember your choices for future visits. For more information see our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
We use cookies to improve our services and remember your choices for future visits. For more information see our Privacy Policy and Terms of Use.
Last Year, not long before I left New York, I went to Queens to see the Virgin Mary. I went with a girl named Catherine, whom I knew only slightly, though I saw her around all the time; we had a lot of friends in common. I guess you could say Catherine and I were both part of a particular group — queer girls in their early twenties, living in New York City.
By Elissa NelsonSeptember 2000May 2000He had vowed long ago, and renewed his vow frequently, that if holding hands in a circle and singing hymns . . . was what it took to make life endurable, he would rather die.
Annie Dillard
I was laughing at myself, at twenty years of a ministry which had become, without my realizing it, a ministry of liberal sophistication, an attempted negation of Jesus. A ministry of human engineering, of riding on the coattails of Caesar, of playing in his ballpark, by his rules, and with his ball; of looking to government to make and verify and authenticate our morality, of worshiping at the shrine of enlightenment and academia, of making an idol of the Supreme Court; a theology of law and order and of denying, not only the faith I professed to hold, but my history and my people — the Thomas Colemans. For, as much as Jonathan Daniel, they were loved. And if loved, forgiven. And if forgiven, reconciled.
By Will D. CampbellMay 2000When we said, “Be a Christian,” who we really got that from was Thomas Merton: Be what you are. You are already katallagete; you are already reconciled. So behave as if that’s true. It’s a fine point to make, but it’s a very important and, I think, radical point.
By Jeremy LloydMay 2000We are walking in a ticker-tape parade. That’s all that’s going on. Some pieces of confetti read “great calves,” some “chronic sinus,” some “no noticeable hair loss,” some “multiple sclerosis,” and some “third-finger amputation.” Don’t judge your neighbor by what pieces of paper fall on his or her shoulders. Don’t think you are cursed or blessed by what pieces fall on yours.
By Hugh PratherMarch 2000October 1999Tell me what is it that you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?
Mary Oliver
A sacrament is physical, and within it is God’s love; as a sandwich is physical, and nutritious and pleasurable, and within it is love, if someone makes it for you and gives it to you with love: even harried or tired or impatient love, but with love’s direction and concern, love’s again-and-again wavering and distorted focus on goodness, then God’s love, too, is in the sandwich.
By Andre DubusJuly 1999I felt indescribable relief and a happiness so great it almost made me laugh. Confidence and gratitude came as if a prayer had been answered. I found light and joy at the same moment, and I can say without hesitation that from that time on light and joy have never been separate in my experience. I have had them or lost them together.
By Jacques LusseyranFebruary 1999I’d discovered my hideout a few months before, when I chased a hare behind a mulberry bush at the foot of a large mound, about the size of a wheat pile at threshing time. Following the hare’s trail, I found a small hole in the rock, completely hidden from view by the bush.
By Anwar F. AccawiFebruary 1999Personal, political, provocative writing delivered to your doorstep every month—without a single ad.
Subscribe Today