Tens of thousands of people come here every year to visit a cave where Abraham may have been born and a fishpond marking the site of the pyre where he was almost burned up by Nimrod, except that God transformed the fire into water and the coals into fish.

NEWYORKER: The Sanctuary

She has a kind of glowing-pebble night-light that changes colors very slowly, and she is lying in this sea of stuff: books and broken Nintendos and inflatable Bratz cushions and God knows what else except, from somewhere deep inside the heap, her breathing.

NEWYORKER: Natalie

The Catholic Church is never going to view marriage except from the perspective of a sacrament, an unbreakable bond between one man and one woman, open to the God-given gift of children.

BBC: Viewpoints: Successes and failures of Benedict XVI