I’ve had an email draft sitting in one of my accounts for about a year and a half. It’s a compilation of links and research summaries that would have made a very good answer to a question from a friend of a friend. I spent more than half an hour searching Google and skimming abstracts for them. I […]
The right to rest
I’ve always found this advice from Ohio’s Conservative Friends challenging. These don’t seem to be the best times in the world for “gentleness” or “self-restraint.” And the quietist impulse to pull back in times of social turbulence—well, in the spirit of Frederick Douglass, I’m a little suspicious of that. “Who would be free, themselves must […]
Bishops and kings
Last spring a large group gathered in Washington, D.C. to talk about the long shadow of poverty. The Declaration Initiative is the vision of Dr. Claire Gaudiani and aims to end poverty nationwide by 2026, the 150th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence. Americans want schools, homes and public amenities that prepare and sustain them to […]
Resistance and humane planning
In a way, I’ve felt besieged for a few years now, not in the intense ways others in major cities have. But still, in the way that one who pays attention can’t help but notice creeping crawling unease, I’ve felt besieged. I’ve joked with others who grew up fundamentalist about the opening of Revelation’s seals, but […]
Picking up the mantle
The best way to honor a mentor is to practice what they taught you. It’s the application of the message that validates their work, not the affirmation or lionization they might attract. Their contribution to us all lies in what they taught and worked for during their lives, not in how we reinterpret them after […]
Bringing social change home
Over the last fortnight, I’ve been taking some refuge in Aaron Sorkin’s early 2000s television series The West Wing. It’s one of the few shows I ever watched live before getting rid of my TV altogether, and it brims with optimism about governance, civic service, and the people who work in the public sector. It […]