Issues

All of us are patrons. We are patrons, even if we might be poor grad students or young married couples barely eking out an existence. We are patrons, not just in our "charitable" giving, but in our day-to-day lives. By our decisions, we are saying "yes" to some...

In this issue of Comment we proudly profess that we believe in institutions. Institutions will sometimes be scaffolds to support the weak; sometimes fences to protect the vulnerable; sometimes springboards to pursue new innovation. But in a cynical age that tends to...

In a fragmented world, we get posturing, pronouncements, and political ultimatums. In other words, we get just the sort of public discourse we deserve: emotive appeals that shame our opponents, coupled with sabre-rattling denouncements that rally our troops. What's...

The Bible is not a compendium of doctrines, ideas, or rules. Scripture teaches, but teaches through stories, poetry, exhortation, visions, letters. It's done its proper work when it produces a certain kind of person—someone moulded by the Word of God who not only...

Our culture does not know how to deal with legacies. We either treat the dead with some combination of awe and fear, or we think of our forebears as unworthy of remembrance, to be cast behind our own pursuits and discoveries. In this issue of Comment, we reject both...

Peace, as St. Augustine says, is more than simply the absence of war. It is the tranquility of order—when all of the spheres of society function in such a way as to create wonderful music. This is a radical, prophetic notion. "The good society." To dare to speak this...

This Comment crystallizes a sensibility that might seem countercultural: that the young have something to learn, and that their elders are a source of wisdom. Central to Comment's vision is an appreciation that God calls us to a range of vocations and cultural tasks....

Making the most of grad school, of trade school, of law school, of seminary or art studio—begins when you realize where you stand: in the presence of the God who made and patterned all things slowly, according to a mysterious and often frightening design, who in Jesus...