The Last Shall Be First
In Bronx
Back in the 90s, when he was just out of school, Ed Tom worked as an associate buyer for Saks Fifth Avenue. Now he runs one of the most innovative high schools in the country, sending his unlikely South Bronx graduates on their way to Dartmouth, Penn, and Bryn Mawr. The son of Chinese immigrants…Read More
A Long Path to Perfection
In Brick Presbyterian Church Christianity
We don’t make much of a fuss about saints in America. We talk more about movie stars, rock gods, media darlings, and YouTube celebrities. Heroes are another matter. We do believe in heroes. Saints? Not so much. I wonder if it’s partly because our game is often about elevating someone only to pull them down…Read More
Defeat, Humility, Joy
In Christian Monasticism
A remarkable book about Russian monks, published last year by Pokrov Publications, reads like something from the middle of the 19th century. You feel transported back in time to the era of Russian faith that gave birth to Tolstoy and Dostoevsky, partly because it takes place almost entirely within a Russian Orthodox monastery. Yet, the…Read More
When God Talks Back
In C.s. Lewis
When I read “Strength to Love,” a tremendous collection of Martin Luther King Jr.’s sermons, I was surprised and moved on its last pages by this particular passage, which described God in ways that feel foreign to me. While I think of God as a kind of spiritual energy, Martin Luther King Jr. related to…Read More
From Africa to Harvard
In A Dream So Big
After their third child, Stephen Wrigley, died only eight days from birth, Steve and Nancy Peifer decided to leave their American lives behind and move to Africa. At the time, he was a corporate manager with Oracle who oversaw 9,000 computer software consultants. They moved with their children to Kenya, where they eventually became educational…Read More
