Scientists say they have discovered a drug that overcomes shyness and boosts confidence. The new drug “reduces anxiety levels in users,” said one researcher, and “facilitates social contact. . . .” And here I thought alcohol was discovered years ago.

The way to write edifying fiction is to write what is. The way to write bad fiction is to write what is edifying. I just read a line by Flannery O’Connor that explains why this is so: “what is written to edify usually ends by amusing.” The word “amusing” is what triggered the realization. Humor is often produced by incongruity, contradiction, and paradox. The fool is comic because man is not supposed to be foolish. The wise man is good for a platitude, the idiot for a laugh. (more)

Tales of tragedy, crime, and corruption have value for several reasons. One is that those that read them do not usually lead tragic, criminal, and corrupt lives, at least not the extent portrayed in such stories. (more)

I have my children every other week. At night we pray. I’m not as consistent about it as I should be, but I find praying together valuable. Most often I use a prayer book, usually The Book of Common Prayer. Sometimes it’s the 1662 version. Other times the 1979, which is what we use at church. (more)

In her essay “The Grotesque in Southern Fiction,” Flannery O’Connor writes that readers desire and even need something uplifting in the books that they read. “There is something in us,” she says, “as storytellers and as listeners to stories, that demands the redemptive act, that demands that what falls at least be offered the chance to be restored.” (more)

I wrote earlier about the fact that everyone wants to be published. The deluge of proposals washing over my desk indicates the truth of this. It also indicates something that Flannery O’Connor said about writing: “It’s not an activity that waits upon talent.” Sad but true. And it gets at something Thomas Nelson’s CEO Mike Hyatt has been dwelling on a lot lately. Check out his posts on the number of books being published annually and the importance of rising above the fray with fewer, better titles.

“Pray without ceasing.” “The fervent prayers of a righteous man avails much.” In the church where I grew up, I heard these verses a lot. For those who bandied them about they were convenient summaries of their prayer life, or what they wanted it to be. For me they were like slogans for products not for sale in my city. (more)

As I sit down gingerly to write this, it’s Sunday, just before noon. Yesterday I ran the half-marathon here in Nashville. What was I thinking?

I’m now hobbling like an old man. Every part of my lower body hurts. My knees, hamstrings, and other parts and pieces connected by various ligaments and sinews are all threatening a sit-in — mainly because they can’t manage a walkout any longer. The arch of my right foot has filed for divorce, charging physical abuse. I dreaded church this morning. We kneel at three places in the liturgy. Would I be able to get back up? (more)

I make books. I don’t make shoes. But if it would help me make better books, then maybe I should learn what goes into making a pair of shoes. The division of labor allows specialists to focus on their strengths in the marketplace. The idea is as good and useful today as it was when Adam Smith first talked about it in The Wealth of Nations. But the division of labor can also create other divisions—divisions of assumptions, incentives, communication, and creativity. Sometimes I think that these divisions can do as much damage to a business as the division of labor does it good. (more)

Getting published seems a universal aspiration. Read this from Justin Martyr’s Second Apology: “And we therefore pray you to publish this little book, appending what you think right, that our opinions may be known to others, and that these persons may have a fair chance of being freed from erroneous notions and ignorance of good. . . .” (more)