Death and Dying
Oh, Mija!
It was after 1 p.m. when we finally made it to the crowded McDonald’s on Times Square. My parents, two younger brothers, and I were caked with stinging white powder...
Channeling the Sin-Eater
If, as Samuel Beckett wrote, all poetry is prayer, my devotions began in earnest thirty-some years ago when a habit of reading poems begat the practice of writing...
The Cost of an Obsession
The unseemly love affair of some American politicians with the death penalty is bad for justice and bad for our country's standing in the world. It inflicts a...
Tormented Witness
The life of faith finds an enduring metaphor in the notion of the soul’s journey to God. Consider the pilgrim-poet of Dante’s Divine Comedy, who successfully...
Dignity & the End of Life
Physician-assisted suicide (PAS) and euthanasia have long been the redheaded stepchildren of the prolife movement. They are dutifully included in the litany of life...
Mother Knew Best
After my mother died three years ago (see “Spare Every Expense, Except One,” October 10, 2008), my sister Lucy kept discovering interesting things she had left...
Clouds of Unknowing
Growing up in Tuscaloosa, Alabama, one knew that tornadoes weren’t just things that happened to other people. This disquieting knowledge came in the form of regular...
A Kind of Justice
“Justice has been done,” President Barack Obama told the world in announcing that U.S. commandos had raided a compound in Pakistan and killed Osama bin Laden,...
A Death to Celebrate?
During the Middle Ages—the historical context for the rise of what would come to be known as the “just war” tradition—violence under any circumstance was deemed a...
Channeling History
If you’re a fan of the History Channel, you’ll feel right at home watching Robert Redford’s recreation of Abraham Lincoln’s murder near the beginning of The...
Pass the Cudgel
We’re still debating whether what we’re doing in Libya can rightly be described as war, though bombs dropped amid an “intervention” are just as deadly. But where’s...
Trading Places
Jane Gross’s book on caring for aging parents is both an invaluable guide and a terrifying read, a book that tells you things that you didn’t even know you didn’t...
