Two-thirds of the way through Patrick Radden Keefe’s 2021 Empire of Pain: The Secret History of the Sackler Dynasty, I had to take a break. I was sick and tired [...]
Summer mornings, in my West Side childhood, I would go out on our rickety second-story back porch, and, across the alley, on the worn, gray asphalt of the parking lot/school [...]
When I look on Google Maps, the neighborhood on Leroy Street along the edge of Greenwich Village, near the Hudson River, looks a lot tonier today that it must have [...]
There is much that can be, and has been, said about Martin Luther, the man who triggered the Reformation and the break-up of western Christianity into myriad sects. Consider that, [...]
Reporting Jesus Patrick T. Reardon . I wish that Jesus could be interviewed and that I was the one to question him. I wish that he would sit behind his [...]
Corpus Christi honeymoon By Patrick T. Reardon . Let us honeymoon in the Texas town with the Latin name. Let us hide out together under the sacrament’s cipher. . Let [...]
Rereading The Souls of Black Folks, I am struck by the sheer chutzpah of W.E.B. Du Bois in putting together this collection of essays and sketches. Actually, “chutzpah” is too [...]
Mal, the leader of the group of six adults, one child and one infant, is dying, and the old woman is doing what she can to keep him alive. “Be [...]
Early in her writing career, critics often chided P. D. James for what they said were slow-moving plots in her mysteries. In a way, they were right, but they missed [...]
There is something very human about the Old Testament prophet Elijah whose name means “YHVH is my God.” He is elusive like ruah (wind, spirit), writes Daniel C. Matt, an [...]
