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Since 1900, the Christian Century has published reporting, commentary, poetry, and essays on the role of faith in a pluralistic society.
© 2023 The Christian Century.
James Cone looked evil in the face and refused to let it crush his hope
Antiblackness is outrageous, but it does not have the last word.
Take & read: New books in ethics
What does hope look like in the face of racism?
selected by Jonathan Tran
Miguel De La Torre’s ethic of hopelessness
De La Torre has little use for hope in a God who only seems to show up for Christians, never for their victims.
by Kyle Rader
Proclaim the hope but proclaim it slant
Consolation comes to me at unexpected angles.
by John Wilson
The difference between wishing and hoping
Wishes are about what we want. Hope is about what God wants.
What does it mean to hope?
Hope holds us in our time. Without it, we have no place in our own history.
This year, as I meditated on my longing, my pregnant hope, I located it on that table, somewhere between the salad and the ravioli, when our imperfect lives came together.
Yaa Gyasi's novel reveals the freedoms and captivities we all inherit.
Elie Wiesel has died. Reading the obituaries, the thing that astounds me is the thing that has always astounded me: how young he was. Eighty-seven now, in 2016. I’ve been burying World War II veterans throughout my years of pastoral ministry. How could Wiesel only be 87?
This slim volume of poetry gives voice to the women of the Bible, named and unnamed.
This provocative book portrays hope as a virtue, a moral orientation that can be cultivated actively, a matter of will.
My words feel small. Like I’m trying to beat back the ocean with a stick. I could command the waves to stop, but the sea will keep pounding the sand. Recent world events have generated a lot of fodder for preachers and writers, and yet I have nothing to say.
It is at this point that Jesus reminds us that God completely throws off our human calculations of what will be constant and what will change, for “what is impossible for mere humans is possible for God” he insists.
Christmas is more complicated now, with its layers of meaning. Joy can no longer be wrapped up with a tidy bow. But, for me, this year, since I cannot have the world as it ought to be, I’m determined to find beauty in the yearning.
Years ago I was very good at hope. I could hope for a more celebrated position, flatter abs, or to cross the finish of Ironman. I was also good at setting goals to achieve these ends: I put my head down and knocked them off.
The elation of accomplishing these goals and garnering a little attention for my efforts was a great high, but unfortunately it did not usually last long.
By Patrick Prag
As I read the headline yesterday, my heart began to pound and my throat closed up: “School Clerk In Georgia Persuaded Gunman To Lay Down Weapons.” This was a good story—ultimately a hopeful one—but all I could see was “school” and “gunman."
Those of us in violence-plagued neighborhoods look forward to winter's reprieve. Our teenagers understand Advent waiting all too well.
Here’s the thing about Jürgen Moltmann. Almost everything he says, you feel you’ve read somewhere before. Now there could be two explanations for this. One, that he’s a creature of fashion: that, like everyone, he speaks out on the environment; on the analogy between the discourse on human rights and the relation to soil, sea and sky; on justice for the oppressed; on God’s coming future. Or two, that he’s a creator of fashion.
reviewed by Samuel Wells
I'm particularly eager for Advent this year. Perhaps it's because recent world events have been so relentlessly grim.
After her bleak diagnosis, Julie Anderson Love learned that hope has nothing to do
with passivity. She was, she writes, "the patient from
hell."
reviewed by Marilyn McEntyre