The takeaway message of the Book of Jonah is that the sky god known as Jehovah is no longer a local god found on Mount Sinai.

“Well, guys, didn’t really ask for the death sentence. But if that’s all you’ve got, I’ll take it in black.”

Being the parent of someone who struggles with serious addiction must be a living hell.

If you were at the Mount Royal lookout 12,000 years ago, you’d be standing on a beautiful little island looking out upon an ancient sea filled with whales.

Tony Hoagland’s poetry has been a central feature of my adult life, a kind of theme song playing in the background.

Loyalty, like any virtue, can become a vice when it’s not balanced by the demands of other virtues, such as justice, integrity, and honesty.

“We don’t choose partners the way that we choose furniture. Because furniture doesn’t have to choose us back. But partners do.”—Benjamin Karney

Pretty much everything you think you know about the alpha male is wrong.

The hypocrisy of Gary Hall’s Pirate Philosophy (2016) is nothing short of breathtaking.

Review of “My Effing First Amendment,” This American Life (May 4, 2018).

It was January 12, 2000. My new girlfriend Anna-Liisa and I had recently consolidated our book collections (that is, moved-in together).

“When it comes to death,” Epicurus maintained, “all men live in a city without walls.” When the innocent die, we’re forced to remember this.