Essays
The Arc of Repentance
By Helen W. Mallon
In the wake of a near-affair, a married woman recognizes a long-standing pattern
of finding her identity in other people and in her own obsessions. While turning
back to God in brokenness brings peace, she realizes that lifelong repentance
will bring a new identity.
Virginity
By David McGlynn
The concept of purity isn't one that is held in very high
esteem these days. Our spiritual lives and emotions seem to
follow our bodies into a netherworld where there is only isolation
and the destruction of the self. David McGlynn recounts the
story of a brutal crime that led to the loss of a treasured
friend, and how that loss has changed his view of the body.
Studies
The Death of the Book
By S. David Mash
Rumors of the demise of printed matter have been wildly exaggerated. In
the 1980s, pundits predicted that books would be replaced by
computer screens, digital media, even "book-reading robots."
In this study, the author examines the e-books phenomenon, seeking a
synergy between electronic and traditional publishing.
Fiction
Line of Duty
By Albert Haley
Friday Night in Kizmack
By Carrie Sherman
Nonfiction
On Another Road: Pilgrimage to Fátima
By Charles Edward Brooks
Poetry
The dark
By Luci Shaw
The Woodlands Have a Rank and Moldy Smell
By Susan St. Martin
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The dark
Luci Shaw
I look through the door in the evening gloom.
Inside it's oppressive--a dim, stale room
Where the dark is like smoke, and all unseen
an insect blunders against the screen.
How can I know what lies beyond?
The night's an inscrutable, moon-skinned pond,
a resistant shimmer that guards its deeps
and promises nothing. Mystery keeps
on being mysterious. What God knows
God keeps to himself, and all that shows
is a scatter of clues, like the glistening spoor
of stars on sky. But I want more.
What is your more, my God, for me--
your questioner seeking reality?
With the sharp truth of a hefted spear,
in the panic and sweat of the tortured fear
of abandonment, and the pain of nails,
the logic of doubt within me fails.
The vividness of the blood you pour
into my chalice tells me more,
and when your bloodied hands reach out
they draw me from my dark and doubt.
I'm forced toward faith, in stubborn fright,
but, unlike Thomas, I forego sight.
Like him, though, when I touch your wounds'
reality, my trust rebounds.
Luci Shaw is a poet, essayist, and
teacher. She is author of a number of prose
books and seven volumes of poetry, including
Polishing the Petoskey Stone, Writing the River, and
The Angles of Light. Writer in residence at Regent
College, Vancouver, British Columbia, she lives
in Bellingham, Washington.
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