In 2014, Slate magazine released a series of essays collectively called “The Year of Outrage” and described, “From righteous fury to faux indignation, everything we got mad about… and how outrage has taken over our lives.” Essay titles included “The Outrage Project,” “The Life Cycle of Outrage,” “What ‘Outrage’ Means,” “Identity Outrage,” “The Cultural…
Loving Others at Their Worst
When Saturday Night Live comedian Pete Davidson crudely mocked Congressman-elect Dan Crenshaw because of his eye patch and flippantly remarked, “I know he lost his eye in the war or whatever,” no one expected the former Navy SEAL and decorated war hero to respond to the insults in the way that he did. The mockery…
Life-Giving Words
Reversing the Negative Verdicts I once saw a television interview with Mariah Carey, one of the most successful artists in the history of pop music, in which she said that if she hears a thousand words of praise and one word of criticism, that one criticism will eliminate the thousand praises in her mind. Can…
Why are We Lonely, and What Can be Done About It?
Novelist Thomas Wolfe said that the central and inevitable fact of human existence is loneliness. Whether we are introverts or extroverts, married or single, standing on the stage or sitting in the cheap seats, preaching sermons or listening to love songs, we all share the struggle to connect. But why is loneliness a thing? According…