The Corner

Culture

Ten Things That Caught My Eye Today (October 12, 2018)

1.This Jamal Khashoggi business is awful, needless to say.

2. Are we ready for the end of Roe v. Wade?

3. Naomi Riley reviews a new book on international adoption.

4. Kentucky governor Matt Bevin on adoption:

5.

6. BBC: The Skate Girls of Kabul

7. An exchange in Providence magazine:

You are a devout Roman Catholic who works for a secular government in the Islamic world. How has your Christian faith equipped you to deal with the challenges of diplomacy in such a complex and dangerous environment?

In at least two ways. First of all, believing in the truth of the Gospel and in the fallen nature of man should give one a sense of humility in dealing with the realities of the Middle East. All too often Westerners come to the East with a built-in sense of superiority of postmodern liberal society over a supposedly benighted and fanatical East. The reality is rather more complicated than that. Second, being a believer can and should help you understand people’s motivation, what touches their heart and spirit, what is most precious to them, more than life itself. Westerners, especially highly secularized elites who tend to staff Western foreign ministries, have sometimes forgotten, if they ever learned, that man does not live by bread alone. This dismissal of the spiritual (or if you prefer, ideological or inner) dimension of the human condition can be worse than folly. It can be deadly. This is not to present a simplistic clichéd image of a spiritual East and material West, but the world is broader and deeper than the jaundiced view from Foggy Bottom or Brussels or the island of Manhattan.

8. Christopher Scalia on his father and what just happened.

9. Praying in prison.

10. An early-hour thought that lingers:

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