Truth and Cupcakes

  Last December it was reported that the United States Supreme Court had left in place a Kentucky law requiring doctors to show fetal images to patients before they abort. This would be in line with the informed consent section of the 1992 Planned Parenthood v. Casey ruling....
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Coronavirus, Conspiracy Theories, and Continued Pro-Life Witness

  My wife and I met 31 years ago, when we were both arrested in front of an abortion clinic during an Operation Rescue protest. Over the years this has become part of family lore, and the coincidence of pro-life activism and romance has not been lost on our children. All of...
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My Romantic Desk

  I am my father’s daughter in one very specific way—I have an eye for discarded, curbside furniture. When, upon close inspection, I discover that a piece is still serviceable, I wonder what the possible back story of its rejection could be. Was the fate of that Queen...
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Two Ideas of “Common Sense”

  My friend listened, neither smiling nor frowning, as I explained why abortion was an injustice. She waited until I finished. “That’s logical,” she said. “But it doesn’t make sense.” Never discount “common sense.” It’s what wins the day in politics and policymaking. Your...
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Unfinished Writing

  Spring, 2019: I started off the day with a rather reluctant middle-school Sunday School class. The hour was early for them, and they had not yet fully realized their daily resurrection from the dead. At some point, in a moment of attitude (adult version, I can be almost as...
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Let the River Run

  On December 15, 2017, Eminem released an album called Revival. He and singer Ed Sheeran collaborated on the song “River,” which I heard for the first time last December. A music video of “River” was released on February 14, 2018.  Here I would like to address...
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Virtually Nowhere

  In February, a South Korean television program called Meeting You featured a segment that was devastating to watch. A woman named Jang Ji-sung, who had lost her seven-year-old daughter three years before, was asked to don a virtual-reality kit—goggles, earphones, and...
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Aquinas in the Park

  I’ve never been much good at giving up anything. To temper my spiritual steel during past Lents, instead of sacrificing an indulgence—pizza or chocolate or a Hollywood melodrama of the 1930s—I have added to my daily routine a meditative or, since the Lord has chosen to...
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Our Lives as Uncontrolled Experiments

Our fickle age usually welcomes the new, the original, the untried. But no one I know places the “novel virus” Covid-19 in a happy category, and rightly so. The pandemic has led us to live—and sadly in some cases, end—our days in modes novel to us, but to paraphrase Yeats, with...
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Corona Time: Notes from My New York City Block

The panhandlers have organized. On the corner, there’s a sign taped to a street lamp urging people to: “SHARE YOUR CHECK- Give generously to NYC panhandlers.” Ambitious, but I suspect it’s mostly the dearth of trusting tourists that’s causing their loss of revenue.
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