community 222

The rift isn’t just about politics. It’s about pace, and place, and respect.

You have to cut through the glitzy, loud elements—the carnival rides and the tractor pulls and the cotton candy—to see the heart of the fair...

For most people, that’s where their focus on their image ends—they’ve made themselves presentable. But for some, that morning routine was only the beginning.

Impressed by this unusual way of cultivating community in a city—NYC, that is—known for its “alone together” anonymity, I decided to reach out

Trust in rural places isn’t built on virtue; it’s built on visibility. It’s knowing you’ll see the person again.

Those who had previously greeted me with smiles and handshakes find ways to hint through word and deed that I am no longer one of them ...

The lessons of murmuration are clear. There is power and safety in community

Bilbro’s book is a careful study through profound literary texts about how we live in a world that has no patience for careful study through profound literary texts.

Because of coffee’s popularity, coffee shops can draw people together like very few other modern institutions.

And so, feeling blessed by the rich experiences of my ministry, I stand at the start of a new year in the dying days of the old one.

Decades of sorrow and searching for clinical evidence have strengthened his resolve, tempered now by experiences that add up to more than disparate bits of empirical data.

He took the words of Jesus to heart—he rarely judged others. When he passed this year, he left a memory not of condemnation, but of mercy.

College football is a local endeavor that should be enacted by those with a connection to that place.

Are we capable of that on a scale that will regenerate our political life? Perhaps not, at least for now, but we can take heart from the knowledge that, over…

But I suspect that this stirring book will strike a chord with many readers of Front Porch Republic.

I am not sure if Garfield ever made chili for his supporters. The men and women who descended on his property were there to meet a future president. What Garfield…

I mourn the storm. It’s far from over. But I also do not mourn without hope.

Our need for privacy has been accentuated by the way we live, in which goods and services arrive seemingly out of the ether, things we’ve bought to consume, throw away,…

Between these extremes, however, is free choice within reasonable limits, which I believe makes the value of community and its deliberative fruits still possible, even within the reality of the…

Like the very young and the very old among us, we must forget the learned delusion of independence that revolution prefers and accept the radical dependence of the human condition.

One of the novel’s achievements is the way that it unfolds this centuries-long story with both clarity and subtlety, establishing a clear feel for right and wrong while casting no…

When Christ died on the cross, the disciples did not know he was going to rise again. But for Christians today, we see the full picture, and these are not…

Zoning laws, housing codes, and a culture marked by suspicion and antisociality make it difficult to revive the boarding house, a living arrangement that once applied to nearly half of…

Organized community events bring people together and are an integral part of forging strong communal bonds in a place. Like the law, they serve a purpose in a community’s ecosystem…