Plough Quarterly

Let the Children Rage A father reads Katherine Rundell’s The Poisoned King, the second book in the Impossible Creatures series, to his twelve-year-old and six-year-old.

“Rundell is aware of the weight of anxiety borne by young people today. She is concerned about the ways our world of violence and corruption, ecological neglect and Big Tech have failed young people and stolen their attention from healthy avenues to navigate the world.” —Reynolds Chapman

From the Annunciation to the Visitation After an angel tells Mary she will bear the Savior, she sets out to visit her cousin Elizabeth. Both encounters are rich in meaning for Advent.

After an angel tells Mary she will bear the Savior, she sets out to visit her cousin Elizabeth. Both encounters are rich in meaning for Advent.

@joelclarkson.bsky.social

www.plough.com/en/topics/cu...

Blank Pages in the Family Book When probing my Korean grandmother about my roots, I learn to listen to her silences.

“Between me and my Korean identity lies a perpetual lacuna. I am forced to interpret as both heir and imposter. Halmoni passed down Korean food names to her children, but she kept the rest of the language to herself.” —Amelia Buzzard

Consider the Birds Birdwatching, George Orwell suggests, makes a peaceful and decent future a little more probable. Calvin and Hobbes would agree.

“Many Westerners are afflicted with what has been described as an “allergy to #sincerity.” We avoid discussing topics of depth or lace them with irony to avoid discomfort.”: buff.ly/5doY4dM

from @plough.bsky.social
#BirdWatching #humanity #nature #society

An Abortionist Changes Her Mind The birth of my daughter confronted me with the competition between my autonomy and her demand to be loved.

“There are two questions on which the abortion debate hinges. First: When do we become a person? Second: When is it permissible to take a person’s life?” —Nafeesa Dawoodbhoy

Finding Gratitude In this excerpt from his book Seeking Peace, Johann Christoph Arnold argues that hardship need not stop us from giving thanks. In fact, he writes, it may even be the best time for an attitude of grate...

“As long as we keep dividing our lives between events and people we would like to remember and those we would rather forget, we cannot claim the fullness of our beings as a gift of God to be grateful for.” —Henri Nouwen

When Faith Hardens When threatened, we humans naturally choose rigid certainty and clarity over remaining open to the truth. Ephrem the Syrian can help.

www.plough.com/en/topics/fa... - English

Consider the Birds Birdwatching, George Orwell suggests, makes a peaceful and decent future a little more probable. Calvin and Hobbes would agree.

“While I love the winter ducks, the season I most eagerly anticipate is spring migration. It starts with a trickle: the robins staking out the lawns, the killdeer in the fields, and red-winged blackbirds around the ponds.” —Caleb Scholtens

When You Believe in a Living God What happens to your life, church, and marriage when you actually believe in the Holy Spirit?

“The thing that I’ve come to realize about marriage is that just like with the gospel, it’s love that changes you. You can’t get there by your efforts. You can’t get there by talking yourself into it. But actually, the thing that changes us as human beings is encountering love.” —Sarah Killam Crosby

The Angel Who Wanted a Hamburger Karl Rahner helps us take angels seriously, even if they are admittedly hard to pin down.

Probably my favorite @plough.bsky.social opening sentence this year:

"It’s 1980 Berlin, the Berlinest of years."

I wish the two angels traveling around Berlin could check in on Jackson Lamb and Smiley's people.

www.plough.com/en/topics/fa...

The Love I Could Not Give Caring for an elderly neighbor with a prickly personality taught me some hard truths.

“During the many hours I spent with Sally, I struggled with what I thought was a strong inner resistance to her. Now I realize that the resistance was to Christ, who was knocking insistently on the door of my heart.” —Patricia Barber

Sit There and Shut Up Zac Koons on the best way to support a suffering friend.

“Instead of considering whatever crisis is hanging in the air as a problem that needs to be solved, like a puzzle on a coffee table between you, we ought instead to be with the suffering more in the manner of gazing at a complex painting together.” —Zac Koons

“An extraordinary, unique, informative and fascinating read from start to finish. It is an especially and unreservedly recommended pick for personal reading lists, as well as community and university library collections.” —Midwest Review of Books

www.midwestbookreview.com/rbw/nov_25.h...

We read this book in Theology classes. It's fairly short, but very impactful.

The Early Christians: In Their Own Words Includes excerpts from Origen, Tertullian, Polycarp, Clement of Alexandria, Justin, Irenaeus, and others — and equally revealing material from their critics, detractors and persecutors.

“If any proof were needed of the enduring power of Christianity, the fact that these ancient texts speak so directly to our situation almost two thousand years later would more than suffice.” —Justo L. Gonzalez

Free download of *The Early Christians* by Eberhard Arnold here:

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The Spirit of Early Christianity The catastrophe of the final battle must be provoked, for Satan with all his demonic powers can be driven out in no other way. Jesus’ death on the cross is the decisive act

“Jesus calls, urging a divided humankind to sit together at one table, God’s table, where there is room for all. He invites all people to a meal of fellowship and fetches his guests from the roadsides and skid rows.” —Eberhard Arnold

The Politics of Pagan Christianity Today’s nationalist Christians should heed the message of the anti-Nazi theologian Henri de Lubac.

Als men in de Presbyterian Church of America (PCA) grijpt naar RK-theoloog #HenrideLubac om de alarmbel te luiden over #WhiteChristianNationalism, is er niet alleen iets aan de hand, maar is er ook hoop (schitterend geïllustreerd met Piet Mondriaan): www.plough.com/en/topics/ju...

Your Friends Are Not in Your Phone by Mary Townsend

New PloughRead from Mary Townsend: “Your Friends Are Not in Your Phone”

📻 Listen here : open.spotify.com/episode/1v04...

Read Your Enemies Know your enemy is always good advice, but knowing your enemy may include knowing in what ways they’re not enemies but allies.

“We should know our enemy. But that means knowing who our enemy really is, and who is a friend in disguise, and the only way to know which is which is to read nearly everyone with sympathy.” —David Mills

Watch for the Light: Readings for Advent and Christmas Selections from the world’s greatest spiritual writers provide inspiration for the most widely celebrated holiday of the year.

“For a book that sets you in the strong, clear light of Advent as a season of preparation, even of penitence, this is the best. ... For ‘preparing a way for the Lord’ in my heart in this season, this book has long been a brave and resourceful companion.” —Sarah Clarkson

The Beauty of Dissonance Music has a variety of jobs to do, as the other arts do. It can calm, soothe, and delight. It can also provoke, disturb, bite.

For @plough.bsky.social, I have written a little essay on beauty in music -- and unbeauty, too (though such things are in the eye, and the ear, of the beholder, and listener). See what you think. www.plough.com/en/topics/cu...

The Reckless Way of Love: Notes on Following Jesus (Plo… In this guidebook Dorothy Day offers hard-earned wisdom…

“Dorothy Day was one of a kind. Not a self proclaimed theologian but some of her insights on faith and love and suffering left me with a deep yearning to know the Lord as well as she did. Will have to read again.” —Jose Ovalle

The Politics of Pagan Christianity Today’s nationalist Christians should heed the message of the anti-Nazi theologian Henri de Lubac.

www.plough.com/en/topics/ju...

The Beauty of Dissonance Music has a variety of jobs to do, as the other arts do. It can calm, soothe, and delight. It can also provoke, disturb, bite.

“Music has a variety of ‘jobs,’ as the other arts do. It can calm, soothe, and delight. It can also provoke, disturb, bite. No one expects the other arts to be beautiful and soothing, only. (Think of theater!) But some people have that expectation of music.” —Jay Nordlinger

Made Perfect Peter Mommsen asks: whose lives count as fully human? The answer matters for everyone, disabled or not. As the Bible says, my strength is made perfect in weakness.

“What kind of human being did Christ become when he was made flesh? Not someone, scripture hints, who was valuable by virtue of his physical beauty, credentials, social status, or freedom from dependence and vulnerability.” —Peter Mommsen

Yes in My Spare Room What would a truly Christian response to America’s housing shortage look like? I have some ideas.

“The American vision of success is clear: a cavernous, private home with a massive yard. For churches, maybe it’s a sprawling, massive complex built on a big, empty hill. These things aren’t necessarily bad. But Jesus invites us into something better.” —Andrew Berg

A Broken but Faithful Marriage Dori Moody relates the story of her grandparents marriage. Even though they separated, they remained faithful to one another.

Just discovered this older (but beautiful) essay by @dorimoody.bsky.social :

www.plough.com/en/topics/li...

When Migrants Land in Britain A journalist heads to Dover to gauge local reactions to an influx of migrant dinghies – and discovers that the headlines get it all wrong.

“Where have you read Dover proudly welcomes refugees? And if the media are not reporting what is actually happening, then the pundits do not know what they are talking about, and the interviewers are not asking the right people the right questions...” —Horatio Clare

Illustrating History: An Evening with Jason Landsel Join New York-based author and illustrator Jason Landsel for a history of the radical reformation through the lens of his graphic novel trilogy Heroes of the Radical Reformation.

Illustrating History: An Evening with Jason Landsel

📍 Lancaster Public Library
📆 Nov 26, 2025

Join NY-based author & illustrator Jason Landsel for a history of the radical reformation through the lens of his graphic novel trilogy, Heroes of the Radical Reformation:

www.plough.com/en/events/20...