Essays

“Hallelujah! Hallelujah! Hallelujah!”  The voices of dozens of big-name African-American entertainers sang for joy in the song that came on when I started my car.  It was the Hallelujah Chorus [...]

This essay originally appeared in the Chicago Tribune on 3.15.21. Well, Pope Francis, I disagree. I respect much of what you’ve done in the papacy, Holy Father, but this statement [...]

Some guy on ESPN the other day was complaining again about men who bring a mitt to Major League Baseball games, and I just don’t get it.  Maybe that’s because [...]

Jesus and the people of Judea lived under the heel of the Roman army and of Tiberius, the emperor, which is a fancy name for dictator.  The Zealots were the [...]

Back in the ‘80s, during a holiday get-together, one of the family elders, who was known for sweeping declarations, made a sweeping declaration: “You can’t be a Republican,” she said, [...]

    It makes a lot of sense to establish June 19 — Juneteenth, the celebration of the emancipation of the final group of black slaves in 1865 — as [...]

    I’ve started to think of it as The After.  I mean that time when it will be safe for me and the rest of the world to do [...]

  A conversation with a writer is, almost always, interesting and insightful. During a long career as a reporter for the Chicago Tribune, I was paid to talk with many, [...]

  I just finished one of those challenges on Facebook, this one wanting me on consecutive days to post an image of an album that influenced my musical taste, without [...]