Time is Always Time: Christopher Nolan, T. S. Eliot, and Creatureliness
As one of very few directors billed above his stars, Christopher Nolan was almost in with a shout at reviving post-lockdown cinema. As it turned out, the late August release of Tenet was the last gasp off an overly-optimistic pandemic...
John the Baptist
Alastair, Derek, and Matt dive into a rousing discussion of the role of John the Baptist in salvation history. Is he the end of the Old Testament or the Beginning of the New? Why did Jesus call him the “greatest...
Advent II: Expectant Waiting
As 2020 has lingered on, I have watched as marker after marker of a year’s progression have been overtaken by an endless sea of sameness: one weekend blurs into the next, one Zoom call into the next. The rhythms of...
Searching for Other Feminisms: An Interview with Leah Libresco Sargeant
At the end of September, Judge Amy Coney Barrett was being considered for a Supreme Court vacancy left by the late Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg. New York Times columnist Ross Douthat wrote a piece considering the impact Coney Barrett might...
Roger Ebert’s Dying Words
I’ve recently had Clem Snide’s latest album, Forever Just Beyond (2020), on repeat. Snide, the nom de band of Jewish-American songwriter Eef Barzelay, collaborates on the album with Scott Avett of the Avett Brothers to produce an understated, folky contemplation...
When the Grass is Greener
When we returned to West Point this past July, we did not expect to end up restricted to the same five-mile radius for the rest of the semester. Yet the potent combination of COVID-19 and military force protection measures resulted...
‘The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self,’ with Dr. Carl R. Trueman
Dr. Carl Trueman has written the book of the moment for Christian intellectuals this winter: The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self: Cultural Amnesia, Expressive Individualism, and the Road to Sexual Revolution. He joins the entire Mere Fidelity cast...
Lady Bird and the Buffered Self
“Do I look like I’m from Sacramento?” “You are from Sacramento.” Greta Gerwig’s 2018 film Lady Bird explores the relationship between identity, freedom, and givenness with painstaking attention to mundane details. An homage to her hometown of Sacramento, California, the...
Advent I: The Face of God
The deepest desire of the people of God is to see the face of God. The Psalmist gives voice to this desire in the form of exhortation: “seek his face always” (105:4). The invocation of Israel’s priests answers this desire...
Markets and the Strangulation of the American Family
Maxine Eichner was a lawyer with a new baby girl. At work, she felt pressured to keep up with the long work hours of her peers, but in her heart, she longed to be home with her baby. One day,...