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April 2015

April 07, 2015

Saving the World: A Reflection on Germanwings Flight 9525

A couple of weeks ago, a German man decided to kill himself. There are thousands...

April 03, 2015

It Is Finished: Christ’s Words from the Cross

When Jesus had taken the wine, he said, “It is finished.” And bowing his head,...

February 2015

February 19, 2015

After the Killings in Chapel Hill

It’s less than forty-eight hours since Craig Stephen Hicks shot and killed three Muslim students...

February 12, 2015

The Collision

All I saw of the deer at first was the eye: domed, amber and pellucid,...

January 2015

January 29, 2015

The Sublime and Beautiful

From antiquity to the Enlightenment, one of the great aesthetic dichotomies involved the sublime and...

July 2014

July 17, 2014

Ovarian Cancer and a Circumcised Heart

Circumcise therefore the thickness about your hearts. —Deuteronomy 10:16 Her dying and death circumcised...

July 08, 2014

Quitting the Cancer Battle

I am not a hero. After my last post, some readers wanted to know how...

May 2014

May 29, 2014

At a Loss for Words

I’m told there are words in Romanian (“dor”) and in Portuguese (“saudade”)—those two outposts in...

December 2013

December 13, 2013

An Almost Human Happiness

A typical plot complication on reality shows involves the unexpected twist, a challenge that the...

October 2013

October 21, 2013

The Long Wait

My mother’s quavering voicemail was right: I hadn’t called in a long time. I justified...

October 08, 2013

When a Friend Dies

I received this group email not long ago: Our beloved Beth has passed away. We...

September 2013

September 18, 2013

The Choir: Children of Krakatoa

On August 26, 1883, the people of Perth, Western Australia, paused to register what historians...

July 2013

July 23, 2013

The Impossible Shows Us How To Live

If you were to live a day as though you’d be dead at the end...

June 2013

June 03, 2013

Spared not Blessed

In the West we have forgotten how the world devours children because mostly when our...

May 2013

May 31, 2013

Lamenting an Imperfect Friendship

Walking on the sidewalk of Spokane, I read an email that made me stop still....

May 23, 2013

Why We Can’t Look Away

The morning I learned about the women in Cleveland, I knew from a single headline...

May 15, 2013

A Corporal Work of Mercy

I was nearly two weeks late, so I already knew the answer, but I took...

May 14, 2013

Deliver Us from Evil

Guest Post By Nancy Nordenson The day after the massacre at Sandy Hook elementary school...

March 2013

March 28, 2013

We Are Not Forsaken

My daughter’s teeth were clenched from the brain tumor and so I would hold her...

March 27, 2013

How to Visit a Grave

Guest Post By Shannon Huffman Polson 1. Drive down unmarked road in rental car to...

March 26, 2013

A Story About the Horrible Glorious Truth

I want to write a beautiful story. I want my reader to cry when the...

February 2013

February 22, 2013

Haunted by Phantom Limbs

One such patient, under my care, describes how he must “wake up” his phantom in...

January 2013

January 06, 2013

The Anniversary of My Father’s Death

“After the first exile, there is no other.” —Rosellen Brown, The Autobiography of My Mother,...

December 2012

December 11, 2012

Alone at Christmas

By Shannon Huffman Polson I went alone that Christmas to a place far away from...

December 10, 2012

Seasons of the Soul

Every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday morning since August I’ve walked a long wooded path to...

November 2012

November 15, 2012

My Grandmother and the Hurricane, Both Gone Now

To live in the mercy of God. Awe, not comfort…. And awe suddenly passing beyond...

October 2012

October 29, 2012

Sleeping in Slave Quarters at Sweet Briar College

From my office window I can see the pale yellow plantation house, its sharply pitched...

August 2012

August 16, 2012

Gethsemane Companions

To David T., David R., Anna, Tyler, Jamie, Jenny, Jake, Jillian, and the rest Over...

August 10, 2012

The Final Chapter in a Promising Young Life

I was driving when it occurred to me that it has been twenty years since...

July 2012

July 26, 2012

Heading Home on the Back Roads

Today Good Letters welcomes back former blogger Dyana Herron as a regular contributor. Dyana is...