Faith Matters

Faithful responses to work, family and everyday life

A manner of speaking

Sep 27, 2000 by Barbara Brown Taylor

I am a longtime fan of public radio. It began years ago with Garrison Keillor, whose weekly monologues on Lake Wobegon became a regular feature of my Saturday evenings. With my transistor radio perched on my kitchen windowsill, I would put supper together during the first hour of the show.

Short rules to perfection

Sep 13, 2000 by Carol Zaleski

Andy, five years old, is standing on his chair at the dinner table and using his fork to make the sign of the cross. Having coated his spaghetti with grated cheese until it is a lovely paste, he is now draping a strand over his ear. From where I sit, I can see piles of junk mail on the radiator and peeling linoleum in the kitchen.

Geographies of memory

Aug 30, 2000 by L. Gregory Jones

It just didn’t seem right, reflecting on my father’s life and death in the midst of a city where neither of us had spent much time. There were no familiar places that stirred memories of time together, no specific places where I could go to recall the significant events surrounding his death. I was thousands of miles away from his grave.

Diminished

Aug 16, 2000 by Miroslav Volf

Our hopes are a measure of our greatness. When they shrink, we ourselves are diminished. The story of American hope over the past two centuries is one of increasing narrowing—or so argues Andrew Delbanco in The Real American Dream.

The sacred well

Aug 02, 2000 by Barbara Brown Taylor

When I bought the land where I now live, there was nothing on it but trees, cows and fescue. The first question the builder asked me was, “Where’s your well?” I tried to hide my surprise. I had temporarily forgotten that water comes from the earth, not the sink. Of course there would have to be a well.