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Texting and email are valuable innovations, but overdependence on them has left people gasping when faced with ordinary conversation. Add to that a sprinkling of incivility, and we're left with a comical – yet startling – generation of social misanthropes. So if you know someone (ahem) whose conversation has been
Massachusetts
John and Abigail Adams forged a happy, successful marriage that was as rare in their time as it is today. What was their secret? The couple's correspondence during the 54 years they were married provides many clues. They exchanged over 1,000 letters, which reveal their deep love
boston
Since their occupation of Mosul in 2014, ISIS militants have destroyed priceless museum artifacts, burned thousands of books, bulldozed churches and mosques, and demolished ancient archaeological sites. The irreparable devastation mirrors their ruthless treatment of entire communities of people.
Middle East
Recently, a group of religious leaders from different denominations in the Lowell region met to discuss the plight of persecuted Christians in the Middle East. What started as an informal get-together has become a united coalition of churches, pooling their spiritual and material resources to help some of the world&
Shakespeare
The New Year marks the 400th anniversary of Shakespeare's death. This momentous occasion invites us to explore one of his most beloved characters, Sir John Falstaff. The wayward, hapless comic character was so popular that Shakespeare included him in three plays, and mentioned him in a fourth. He
Massachusetts
It is fitting that the same house that welcomed Concord minutemen and esteemed literary figures Nathaniel Hawthorne and Louisa May Alcott also welcomed weary slaves struggling for freedom along the Underground Railroad. The Wayside in Concord was a safe house for the fugitive travelers, and is located on the same
Massachusetts
Fr. Milad Selim, dean of St. George Orthodox Cathedral in Worcester, understands firsthand what it is to be deprived of basic necessities. When his family escaped Iraq and fled to Jordan, he and his siblings were unable to attend school or find work. But after settling down in the thriving
Massachusetts
Rose Hawthorne (1851-1926) was the daughter of author Nathaniel Hawthorne and his wife, Sophia Peabody. After suffering deep personal tragedy, she found solace in serving the terminally ill and the poor. Rose eventually founded the modern hospice movement, which had worldwide reverberations for compassionate end-of-life treatment. When Rose was two