The Temptation of Minimalism and Excess: A Simple Home in an...
In the discussion of minimalism, I want to suggest it’s less about what’s in your home than what your home is used for. It’s not what you don’t have in your home, but the people you do. It’s not the values you say you believe, but your disposition towards your neighbor and to things.
Last Rites for Local Parishes: On the Decline of Catholic Chicago
A church that prides itself on its universality—its catholicity—has served as a seedbed for hundreds of parishes divided along ethnic lines.
The Local Barber
I recently visited a barber in my Virginian hometown whom I had not patronized in more than a year (I’d taken to getting my...
Happy 60th, Bill Kauffman
". . . among the keenest minds in contemporary American letters." ---Allan Carlson
Pancakes with My Father
My father cried the day his stroke began, as he lay in the emergency ward, watching himself lose his speech and his strength. He cried the day after the stroke receded when my mother and I came to see him, as he looked at us looking at the wreckage.
It’s a Wonderful Film
It wasn’t enough for George to stay in Bedford Falls and do the right thing; he needed to choose which values to embrace and which to reject.
Love Is Its Own Justification: Wendell Berry and the Lure of...
Scialabba insists that our actions are meritorious and good if they are effective, if they transform society and lead to measurable improvements. Berry, on the other hand, upholds love as its own standard: human lives are good insofar as they participate in divine love’s redemptive work.
The Politics of Golf Carts
A polemic against golf carts might double as one against libertarian economics.
Old Tracks Toward New Connections
A new walking trail brings economic benefits, but its more enticing, though less measurable, value lies in the deeper, more appreciable sense of place that the rail trail should cultivate.