The City of Evermore: A Tale of Otherworld
“Torben is bringing someone!”
“Another stray human, I’ll wager. Tor’s a big softy deep down.”
“He’s big and scary, but he has a good heart.”
Unplanned Movie Review
As you may already know, Unplanned is the true story of Abby Johnson. She worked at Planned Parenthood for years, rising in prominence until she became the youngest clinic director in the company’s history. She was honored as their Employee of the Year. She had a husband and a daughter and what probably seemed to others as the perfect life. But, as the promotions say, what she saw changed everything.
Read MoreWhen I was on the Faculty at Notre Dame…
“The Oasis Within” can be read solely as a story, and it would be both diverting and useful, but the thinking reader will also consider the many questions about the meanings in one’s life and the nature of the good, the true, and the beautiful.
Read MoreThe Star-Spangled Story
Many sing this anthem but do not know the tale,
They do not know the dark, the unsettling suspension
As Francis Scott Key and his prisoner soldiers
Waited hoping that God, would give them attention…
A Modesty Proposal
The issue I have with the modesty argument is its feminist attitude. Sound ironic? Let me try to explain.
Read MoreA Child of God and of Long Summer Afternoons
Do you remember lying on the grassy bank
On a summer afternoon, holding very still…
Otherworld Part 2: A Lady of Shadow
The darkness was what haunted Sera the most. The darkness of the witch’s castle and the horrid hissing voices of the wraiths she kept as her servants and pets. They whispered and taunted. “You’ll never see the sun again.” “No one will remember you.” “You can never go home.”
Read MoreOtherworld Part 1: The Queen of the Flowers
The white climbing rose that stood on the east side of Keep Meridian’s garden had many names. To rose fanciers, (who came from miles around to view her splendor) she was the Scimitar Rose. To the bards, she was the noble Queen of the Flowers. But to the Elves of Meridian, she was Akasma, or at least the only part of her that remained in this world.
Read MoreThe Theory and Practice of Summer
A curious fact about Midsummer is that it does not fall in the middle of our calendar summer. However, Midsummer does fall in the middle of true summer, around the time of the solstice and of St. John’s Day. In the context of trees and grasses and flowers and agriculture, summer began months ago and is now at its peak, now declining with the sun towards Michaelmas and autumn.
Read MoreCan I Be Good and Get Into Heaven?
“If a person lives a great life, gives love to his friends, family and random strangers. If he upholds his beliefs and lives by example, but he isn’t religious, does he get into Heaven?” …First, what do we mean when we talk about Heaven?
Read MoreThe Expanse: A Book Review
Welcome to the future, where humans have colonized the moon, Mars, and much more. Where people are categorized based on the planet they come from. Where living on a spaceship for more than a month at a time is normal. Where crew becomes family.
Read MoreThe Writer, the Reader, and the Synapse Between Them
Like a 16-year-old crossing a field at noon
A little word has a lot of ground to cover in the heat
A mile of open ground to a wall and some trees
Where confusion does not want it to arrive
St. John’s Bonfire
“Filomena, Filomena! Mama says make it quick. Mama, Papa, Francisco and I are already ready!” blurted ten-year-old Fatima.
“I know; I’ll be out in a minute!” Filomena called back in exasperation.
St. John the Baptist’s Birthday
Saint John the Baptist, a man not shaken by the wind, a man not dressed in the finery of the palace, eater of locusts. Well, that last one doesn’t sound quite as impressive, but he did eat locusts as well as whatever he could find in the desert near the Jordan River. He lived the life God called him to live, and he lived it well, so he has a feast day in the Calendar of Saints….
Read MoreMidsummer Mysteries
One of the merry mysteries of midsummer
Is that midsummer isn’t midsummer at all
Maybe it was, back in the shadows of time
When Tolkien’s fairies blessed a happier world
Falling into the Black
The hell hole was vanishing. Suddenly, a black, hairy arm thrust out of the darkness and grabbed me by the vest, yanking me into the hole.
“WALTER!” Conrad cried as I fell into the darkness.
Concerning Fanfiction
The Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, The Chronicles of Narnia… There’s no doubt about it, we readers and writers love fanfiction.
Read MoreGraduation Speech Soup – Simply Stir and Serve
Have you noticed that despite all speakers’ efforts, graduation speeches sound very much alike? “Keep the torch alive to pass to a new generation with the key that unlocks the road to the future…”
Read MoreThe Mermaid of St. Eulalia
He raised his flashlight and finally caught whoever it was. It was a girl, with long brown hair that fell down her back and across her chest, and almost translucent white skin. But she was no human, she had a purple and green tail where her legs should be. The scales ran all the way up her body, ending just below her collarbone.
Read MoreAunt Nancy’s Angels
“Gather around girls, gather around! It’s story time!” Aunt Nancy, the headmistress of the orphanage, sat down in her usual chair, the rocking chair set in the corner next to the fireplace.
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LogoSophia Magazine 