As I was writing The Constant Choice, I began to wonder if my tolerant, ecumenical views on religion would disqualify me as a Christian — at least in the eyes of many readers. In my appreciation for what all the great religions have in common — God, obviously, but also the Golden Rule — I wondered…Read More
We have a major, serious health crisis. It’s called obesity. We need more fruit and vegetables. We need more lean protein. We all know this. But we also need fast food. Wait. What? In the new issue of The Atlantic, David H. Freedman has a proposal for how to lower America’s weight problem. His solution: processed food. He…Read More
I’ve spent most of my life pondering the significance of good and evil. The origin of evil became something of an obsession for me as an adult, after having seen its face close-up during my childhood in Romania under the Communists. Decades later, here in America, I came to a sense of resolution about what…Read More
Changing the World, One Meal, One Post at a Time
In blogging
Martha Payne, a nine-year-old Scottish schoolgirl, wanted to make a difference and learn what it meant to be a journalist, so she started a blog about her school’s dinners, which were in her view . . . unsatisfactory. She developed her own rating system including a hair count called “pieces of hair” and ranked her…Read More
Defeat, Humility, Joy
In Christian Monasticism
A remarkable book about Russian monks, published last year by Pokrov Publications, reads like something from the middle of the 19th century. You feel transported back in time to the era of Russian faith that gave birth to Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, partly because it takes place almost entirely within a Russian Orthodox monastery. Yet, the…Read More
