Latest Posts
He Came to Bring Us Home
There is a Home that is truly our home. And the Father in that home bends all His energy to make possible our taking up residence there. Permanently. It really is that simple. It is simple, but it is also somewhat involved—because life there is so rich. This is not…
Three Ideas for a Richer Christmas Celebration
There is a specific virtue of running a household well. For me, discovering it was one of the great fruits of studying ancient and medieval thinking. According to Aristotle and Thomas Aquinas, “domestic prudence” arranges everything in one’s home life toward the true…
We All Live in a Perfect House
**Special Message—followed by Wednesday Reflection** Dear Reader: Over the weekend, my wife, Sofia, sent a reflection on our journey with LifeCraft and announced some exciting plans for the future. If you aren’t subscribed to our emails or didn’t see it,…
Glory Hidden in the Home
We all want to be seen and approved. Indeed, if we are not seen and approved by someone then we will not only feel but actually be quite alone. It is understandable, then, that a proverbial human temptation is to seek approval or glory for its own sake. We might think…
Gratitude Without Limit
The place of gratitude in human life is at once obvious and remarkably complex. Great pagan philosophers (such as Seneca) as well as Christian theologians (such as Thomas Aquinas) have treated it at some length. This much is clear: learning both to be grateful and to…
The Love That Sees Everything in My Life
There is nothing like the experience of being seen by eyes that love you. Here, and perhaps here alone, we feel truly seen. But actually our happiness is grounded in, and indeed requires, an astounding, unique instance of such love: a love that not only sees…
Learning to Call the Physician
Already Plato used bodily health as a helpful analogy for understanding health of the soul. The entire complex realm of cultivating and restoring bodily health is rife with truths applicable to spiritual health, which two healths, of course, while distinct are not…
What Keeps a Father Up at Night
Sleep deprivation is recognized as a form of torture, with good reason. Being kept up at night or inability to sleep is often a serious suffering. Yet being kept up, sometimes in the form of choosing to stay up, is a part of parenting. The arrival of a newborn in a…
Aquinas on What To Do With Fear
We know that each kind of passion has an important place in human life. Contrary to the ‘Stoic’ position, passions are not simply to be squashed or set aside. But discovering and enacting the proper place of passions is anything but straightforward. Thomas Aquinas…
Never Call Your Wife By Name Alone
One of the great Fathers of Christianity exhorts husbands in a most touching way. Indeed, it is so touching we must be careful not to miss the deeper point—that husbands have a unique obligation always to be tender in addressing their wife. St. John Chrysostom…
The Home of Responsibility
The crisis of responsibility, which is obvious to anyone today, first took root in our homes. We should then address it in our home life. For, of course, home is the ‘home’ of responsibility. There is no context that so clearly demands taking responsibility for others…
Suffering in Heaven
With classic insight into what it is to be human, St. Thomas Aquinas notes that in a sense there will be anguish in heaven. It is there as something remembered. “The saints in glory will remember the afflictions they endured,” yet “they will not experience them with…