What I Took from ‘The New Jim Crow’

Did you think that Jim Crow ended in 1965 with the Voting Rights Act? Think again. Michelle Alexander argues in The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness that racism is so pernicious that it doesn’t go away. It just changes form.In this book,...

The Ancient Issue of Reentry

When the Israelites began their return from exile in Babylon to their native Jerusalem in the 6th century B.C., many of those who returned wept out of sorrow rather than joy. These men and women were overwhelmed by the fact that their homeland, Jerusalem, and the...

The Fullness of Humanity, Found in a Funeral

This might come across as somewhat macabre, but I love being given the opportunity to officiate funeral services. It is one of the greatest honors to be included in a ceremony that marks a person’s transition to their new life and to remember the life that they lived....