The brain is remarkably small, but stress can make it even smaller. Recent research has revealed that cumulative stress can shrink the prefrontal cortex, the part of the brain responsible for managing emotions, impulses, and social interactions. This shrinkage is linked to anxiety and depression, highlighting the toll that a lifetime of stress can take….
As a young man, journalist Sebastian Junger traveled the US and wrote about it. One day in the 1980s, he entered a restroom in the Florida Keys and found hateful graffiti scrawled on the walls. Most of it targeted Cuban immigrants. But one message, apparently from a Cuban, stood out. It read, “Thank God the…
As I opened the bookshelf assembly instructions with piles of boards and tools strewn on the floor before me, I viewed a set of instructional diagrams of what to do and what not to do. One diagram—with a large X on top—depicted a person staring at a pile of boards and tools with a bemused…
Pedro became a follower of Jesus at fifty. He’d been an angry, vindictive man who hurt those around him. As he received counseling from his church, he felt remorse over his past. “I now have less years ahead of me than behind me,” he said. “I want to live them well. But how?” Pedro found…
Born Mary Flannery O’Connor, she’s best known as Flannery O’Connor, one of the American South’s most celebrated writers. Her stories brim with suffering and grace. When her beloved father died of lupus when she was fifteen, a devastated O’Connor threw herself into writing her first novel. Soon she herself was diagnosed with lupus, an incurable…
On May 29, 1925, Percy Fawcett sent a final letter to his wife before he ventured deeper into the unmapped jungles of Brazil. He was seeking a fabled lost city of great splendor, determined to be the first explorer to share its location with the world after years of searching. But his team of explorers…
One Thanksgiving I called home to greet my parents. As we talked, I asked my mom what she was most grateful for. She exclaimed that she was most grateful that “all three of my children know how to call on the name of the Lord.” For my mother, who’d always emphasized the importance of education,…
When I was a little girl, I loved the old hymn “Count Your Blessings.” The song encourages those who are “tempest-tossed” and “thinking all is lost” to “count your blessings, name them one by one.” Years later when my husband, Alan, was discouraged, he would often ask me to sing that simple song to him….
When I was younger, I thought it improper to ask God to help me meet writing deadlines. Other people have greater needs, I told myself. Family problems. Health crises. Job letdowns. Financial needs. I’ve faced all those things, too. But meeting a writing deadline seemed too small to take to God. I changed my view,…
Alida took a DNA test in 2020 and discovered a strong match to a man living on the opposite coast of the US. Later, she and her daughters found news articles from the 1950s that led them to conclude that the man was Alida’s long-lost uncle, Luis! He’d been abducted from a park in 1951…