The world is watching as Beijing hosts the XXIV Winter Olympiad. There is something about the Olympics that elicits national pride. But is sport a form of patriotic action?

Till We Have Built Jerusalem is a challenging book for daring to discuss the connection between ethics and aesthetic theories of architecture and urban design, what Bess calls our “built environment.”

It is childish to demand the real world conform to one’s fancy; it is childlike to learn about the real world by playing in an imaginary one. Both the idealist and the cynical realist are childish. The Christian realist, by contrast, should be childlike.

Pure partisanship—or political sectarianism—consists of commitment to an uncontested view of reality and fidelity to one’s ideological compatriots over the whole of one’s polity. Christian realists should not be such partisans.

Do not be too hard on politicians who struggle with and differ on their answers to these questions about the COVID-19 and the lockdowns. These are very hard things, and there is no indisputable right answer.

Of course America will survive the coronavirus. We’ve many times survived far worse.

The first of a five-part epistolary exchange between the actor Richard Dreyfuss and Providence associate editor Susannah Black exploring such issues as the potential of civics education to combat the appeal of groups like ISIS, the place of religion in public life, and the roots of the ideas of the American founding.