Description
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This issue of The Mockingbird is about the gift of friendship. We delve bravely into what it means to find, build, destroy, long for, and mourn a friendship—into the way it can soften and harden, and into its propensity to heal and hurt.
Lydia Sohn whisks us away to the French town of Taizé and tells us of all that she lost and found there; Robbie Griggs ponders the role of friendship in a transactional age; Luke Turpin introduces us to his beloved elder friend Johnnie. Josh Hinton cracks open the friendship between Paul McCartney and John Lennon, letting all the light and darkness flood out. Lauren Windle lays her soul bare, revealing how recovery from addiction has shaped—and is still shaping—her friendships. Victor Lee Austin lovingly takes us to the heart of the book of Job, while Robert Myallis takes us to his college reunion. Sam Guthrie tells us about the NERF balls and video games at the heart of his Dad’s decades’ long friendships. Jason Mehl muses over the comparison game that is choosing a ‘BFF.’ Heidie Sensemen tells us the story of two believing daughters and their relationship with their slightly-less-believing mother. And Henna Cundill explores why those with ADHD may need the gift of God’s friendship more than most.
The issue also features a conversation between two power-house thinkers, Elizabeth Oldfield and Sarah Stein Lubrano, as well as two interviews. Christian Wiman is, as I’ve heard him so wonderfully titled, your favorite poet’s favorite poet; he’s heard here in conversation with his Yale colleague and friend Miroslav Volf, a theological heavy-weight and a voice of seemingly unceasing wisdom. Malcolm Guite is, of course, a poet, priest, and teller of the most magnificent tales.
Adding to this, we have an annotated playlist by the David Zahl, a film list by Josh Larsen, and humorous lists by Mockingbird’s own Emily Newton and Meaghan Mitts. You can also rest easy in the knowledge that both The Confessional and Dear Gracie are awaiting you in these pages.
May this issue be a place where the lure of cocooning withers. Our aim is that these pages act as both window and mirror, providing the type of escape that makes you all the more present in your own day. As we read about friendships woven into the lives of others, may we relish the ones woven into ours. As we ruminate on the ways God has bent low and befriended others, may we be newly astonished that he calls us friends, too. After all, “greater love has no one than this…”
