1. How can we not lead off by talking about Robert Smith’s surprise announcement during his commencement address to the graduating class of Morehouse College last Sunday? A third party who wipes a slate clean, shoulders a burden, absolves a debt, gifts a wholeness–by surprise, without coercion, and at a cost to themselves–whatever language you […]
Another Week Ends: Breakfast of Lutherans, Celebrity Prayer Candles, Junkyard Playgrounds, All the Correct Opinions, and the X-Men Family
1. On this week’s Killing Eve, the morally obscure mastermind Carolyn Martens (Fiona Shaw) refused to eat breakfast, instead pulling from a water pipe and saying, “I can’t stand breakfast. It’s just constant eggs. Why? Who decided?” The woman has a point. Whether yogurt, cereal, waffles, or bacon, our breakfast items of choice reveal greater […]
Another Week Ends: Recovering Small Groups, the Problem with Happiness, Metrics of Judgment, Masculine #Seculosity, Love at L’Arche, and 20 Years of “All Star”
1. In the first slot this week, Christianity Today published Kent Dunnington’s reflections on small groups and AA: Small Groups Anonymous: Why the best church small groups might take their cues from the Twelve Steps. An in-depth look at how AA works and why most small groups fail to transform character and practice, Dunnington’s piece […]
Another Week Ends: The Seculosity of…Work, Pop Culture, Boutique Ice Cream, Even Doing Nothing At All, and the Perils of YEEZter
1. Perhaps it was fated that, as the Seculosity Train pulled into our hometown of Charlottesville, VA, for the book launch, there would be a whole host of articles detailing its newest incarnations. The Seculosity of Work, of Ice Cream, of Kanye, of Happiness, the list goes on. First off, here’s one from The New […]
Another Week Ends: Good Friday, a Grand Miracle, Boomers’ Death Boom, Lazarus Is Dead, Meritocracy, Performance, [chill / lofi / jazzhop], and Oat Milk
1. Today is Good Friday, which means, if ever there were a time to consider the brutal instrument of death at the center of a major world religion, that time may as well be now. Off-putting and oft-baffling, the cross carries a multifaceted meaning that can prove elusive for onlookers and skeptics (and, much of […]
Another Week Ends: Ruvolo’s Mercy, Hoos Redeemed, Techno-Adulting, Friendseagram and lots of #Seculosity
1. First up, a jaw-dropping story of “forgiveness in a vengeful world,” in the form of an NY Times obituary for Victoria Ruvolo who died this week. Ms. Ruvolo’s widely publicized kindness toward her attacker provided emotional counterpoint to a senseless act that began in the early hours of Nov. 13, 2004. She was returning […]
Another Week Ends: Chutes and Ladders, Sex Recessions, Virtue Signaling, the Final Four, and the End of Goodbyes
1. Adam Grant wrote an op-ed this week in the New York Times about the question thrown at seven year olds everywhere: What do you want to be when you grow up? Grant, who is an “organizational psychologist,” believes that the question should be thrown out, not because no child could possibly know what they […]
Another Week Ends: Shameful Leggings, Artificial Intimacy, Gangs of Ecuador, Obituaries for the Cancelled, and Why We Procrastinate
It’s been #Seculosity Week if you’ve been following us on social media, with interviews and op-eds popping up all over the place. Check out DZ’s interviews with Mbird friend Scott Jones over on the Give and Take podcast, and the 1517 crew’s Banned Books podcast. And in the ICYMI category, #Seculosity made the Washington Post last […]
Another Week Ends: Success Robots, Weed Church, Blessed Poor, Affect Theory, Scientistic Limits, Fanny, and Twin Feather
1. Don’t shoot the piano player but another week, another flurry of #seculosity… This first item comes from Peggy Noonan, who hit the college admissions scandal nail on the head in her “Kids, Don’t Become Success Robots” column in The Wall Street Journal. She writes: In the past decade or so I’ve observed a particular parenting […]
Another Week Ends: Zen Evangelicalism, Rumors of Narnia, Invisible Forces, Digital Eidolons, Liquid Bread, and Deleting Social Media
1. Say you’re jonesing for a stirring interreligious discourse this weekend — have I got the thing for you! In a great piece for the latest First Things, art historian Matthew Milliner discusses the relationship between Eastern religions and evangelical Christianity. “…it is often thought,” he says, “that evangelical Protestants have little to offer interreligious dialogue.” […]
Another Week Ends: Hipster Conformity, Mononucleosis, Greek Basketball Coaching, Curated Imperfection, and The Secular Work Ethic
1. Tis the season for sickness. B.D. McClay over at The Hedgehog Review got mono, and while the short term result was a bout of feverish nightmares, excruciatingly painful swallowing, thundering headaches, and seemingly unending fatigue, the long term result was this marvelous essay: “The Ills That Flesh Is Heir to.” Her essay is a […]
Another Week Ends: The Mass Audience, The Power of Invisibility, College Loan Evangelism, Intuitive Eating, and the Fourth United Church
1. From The Spectator comes “The Quiet Sorrow of the Instagram Blogger.” It tells the true story of one “Influencer,” who really is a caricatured stand-in for everyone these days, named Kelly Larkin, of the “Kelly in the City” brand. Larkin is known (apparently) as an “aspirational but accessible” lifestyle branding influencer. As these cautionary […]
