Larry McMurtry, known for his [book] Lonesome Dove, wrote another book about roads—the many roads he had driven on and the hundreds of miles he had explored across America. At last, returning in memory to the place where he grew up in east Texas, he recalls that his father had seldom gone much farther than the dusty roads near his dirt farm. Comparing his own travels to his father's localized ...

Spiritual formation is so often couched in more individualistic terms, that it's easy to forget the important role the church community plays in our growth as individuals. In her book Traveling Mercies, Anne Lamott shares a story she once heard from her minister that illustrates well the necessary presence of others in our journey of faith:

When [my minister] was about seven, her best friend got lost ...

In honor of Nelson Mandela's 90th birthday, Richard Stengel, managing editor of Time magazine, put together Mandela's eight lessons of leadership. Stengel writes: "[The lessons] are cobbled together from…conversations old and new and from observing [Mandela] up close and from afar. Many of them stem directly from his personal experience. All of them are calibrated to cause the best kind of ...

The percentage of Americans who have never known

• a Buddhist: 59 percent
  
  
• an undocumented immigrant: 54 percent
  
  
• a Muslim: 46 percent
  
  
• a homeless person: 45 percent
  
  
• an evangelical Christian: 40 percent
  
  
• a political liberal: 25 percent
  
  
• a political conservative: 24 percent
  
  
• a former inmate: 15 percent
  
  
• a wealthy person: 12 percent
  
  

NFL running back Shaun Alexander writes:

At the University of Alabama, I was meeting women from a lot of different backgrounds. My mother had taught me never to exploit women—that sex was meant only for marriage—and to treat women with respect. I knew the boundary lines it wasn't right to cross… I knew if I didn't keep my focus, I could fall. And it could occur anytime.

One time it ...