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Articles by Thomas Lynch
NO PRISONERS | Kirkus Reviews
An insistently unlikable main character and redundant storytelling add up to an unsatisfying novel. A 90-year-old man’s life story is told, and told again. This novel opens with musings about the memoir its protagonist meant to write, then abruptly switches to his funeral. Doyle Shields of Michigan—retired embalmer, Marine veteran, widower, and recovering alcoholic—has died at age 90, in the shower, while receiving oral sex.
An Accidental Study of Mark and an Unlikely Christian Convert
Thomas Walker Lynch · Follow 43 min read · -- This is a dialogue that unfolded over a few days between Thomas and Aeon, with contributions from Shiru, Peter, and Mary. It arose informally and is recounted here with the participants' permission. The discussion explores the historical context of the Gospel of Mark, its philosophy, and the nature of belief. The most surprising discovery? Who, in the end, found themselves agreeing with the message.
The Permanent Parish of Ceasing to Be: On Suicide as a Negation of the Self
This essay deals extensively with suicide. If you are considering suicide, you can call or text the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline at 988 any time to speak with a trained crisis counselor and be connected to resources. * My daughter leapt to her death off the Golden Gate Bridge. It was early July in that first godawful summer of Covid and the last cankerous year of the Trump presidency. It was the summer of George Floyd and John Lewis and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
A Poem by Thomas Lynch: 'Father Andrews'
A poem by Thomas Lynch, published in The Atlantic in 2008 By Thomas Lynch Illustrations by Miki Lowe Thomas Lynch has written six poetry collections, five books of essays, and one volume of short stories; in 1997, he was a finalist for the National Book Award. Writing isn’t even Lynch’s day job. Since 1974, he’s been a funeral director in the town of Milford, Michigan.
A funeral without a body is no way to mourn
The first week of April 2005 was dominated by images of Pope John Paul II’s dead body vested in red, mitred and laid out among his people with bells and books and candles, blessed with water and incense, borne from one station to the next in what began to take shape as a final journey. The front pages of the world’s daily papers were uniform in their iconography: a corpse clothed in sumptuous vestments from head to toe, still as stone and horizontal.
Covert Christians
I take an attribute of strong preaching to be the ability to take a cliche or convention and upend it. Here, my Jedi Master, Robert Dykstra, takes John 3 and counterintuitively makes Nicodemus the hero of the story.
Why Pastors Fear Death More than You
I spent the day with a couple nervously standing vigil by their boy’s bedside in the PICU. Their son, confirmed by me years ago, is only a few sizes and grades ahead of my eldest. I can’t say much more than that, pastoral privilege and all. What I can reveal: Right after I left that family, I collected my youngest son, Gabriel. We got in the car. Closed the doors. Buckled our seat belts (‘I beat you Daddy’). I turned on the ignition.
What's Heaven Like? | Jason Micheli
In the last few years, thanks largely to the work of NT Wright, the Church has recovered the understanding that going to heaven when we die is not the point of believing in Jesus nor is it, even, a primary concern of scripture and seldom do our notions of heaven resemble anything in our scripture or tradition. However, to say that Christianity is not about going to heaven when we die is not to say that reflection on and belief in eternity is inappropriate.
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