Though I was born prematurely, I’ve begun to think that I was really born late, about ten years too late, because I was born with a love for films in which the most pressing issues are high school graduation and how to talk to girls, and consequently I missed all the best ones. This genre,…

The year is 2048 and the nation of Israel has all but collapsed in an overnight power vacuum brought about by the double-headed disaster that coincides with its centennial: a downward spiral in foreign aid from a much weakened America, combined with the demographic liability of an exploding Palestinian population, leaves the Jewish state ripe…

Sharing cigarettes, two boys recline on a sun-baked rock high above their village. Here, close to heaven, they’re able to forget their troubles and enjoy the view. A gunshot jolts them from their reverie. Down among the technicolor trees, a hunter blasts at a bird with his rifle. He hits his mark, but then wanders…

Recently, I attended an “Eco-Christianity” class at an area congregation. It was not for me. The minister who led it was well-intentioned, trying to bring the sacred alive. A dozen or so of us attended the first meeting—a couple who ran an organic farm, an elderly woman, a therapist. It was cold in the spartan…

Take, Lord, receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will, all that I have and possess. You have given all to me; to you, O Lord, I return it. All is yours; dispose of it as you will. Give me your love and your grace, for this is enough for me.…

NOTE: The following (including the comment thread) contains spoilers about scenes in the film Let the Right One In. Blood on her lips, eyes wide with lust, Eli stares at Oskar and commands him to run. Oskar is confused. To seal a child’s contract of friendship—a “blood bond”—he’s carved open his hand with a knife.…

There’s a reason I’m not a journalist: It is quite possible that I have the worst “news judgment” ever. More than once, during those periods that I’ve actually done a few essays or reviews for news organizations, an editor has gently had to explain to me that you can’t really write about something once its…

Upon seeing Mickey Rourke as has-been mat star Randy “The Ram” Robinson in The Wrestler, I became nostalgic. When I was a boy, you could get the TV wrestling matches from Memphis on Saturdays, wherein Jerry “The King” Lawler took on the likes of Tojo Yamamoto (managed by the dastardly Saul Wiengeroff). Me and my…

Laura Miller announces her nonbelief right in the subtitle of her recently published The Magician’s Book: A Skeptic’s Adventures in Narnia. And the explicit premise of her book is that an avowed non-Christian can love The Chronicles of Narnia despite their Christian sub-text. So I must confess that I opened Miller’s book with some skepticism…

Why was it love at first sight when, accompanied by my boyfriend, Blake, I first saw Bruce Springsteen perform in 1977? Was it because of my up-and-down relationship with Blake? He hadn’t even wanted to go to the concert at the Augusta (Maine) Civic Center. Or was it because I just loved Born to Run…