I was 8 years old when I was asked to leave the fancy private school where my aunt had been a teacher. It was a bit of irony; the daughter and granddaughter of writers couldn’t…

Across Kansas, lawmakers have advanced a series of policies that directly threaten students’ First Amendment rights — policies that should alarm anyone who cares about democracy, civic participation, and the development of informed citizens.  Most…

The basic storyline of Alysa Liu’s recent Olympic triumph was plenty inspiring: Young Chinese American figure-skating phenom quits the sport at age 16, citing burnout, returns at 18, and with carefree charm at 20 secures…

During the immigration enforcement surge in Minnesota, bystander video showed America an out-of-control federal immigration agent essentially executing a protester in cold blood for no good reason. And Kansas Senate President Ty Masterson wants to…

I met Bill Foege only once in my life. My ten-minute conversation with the epidemiologist, who died in January at age 89, is one I’ll never forget. I had just preached at the Chautauqua Institute…

On a summer day after the Civil War began in 1861, civilians including elites, politicians and socialites packed picnic baskets with sandwiches and cakes and drove their carriages to Centreville, Virginia, to watch, some through…

We live in an era of compounding climate disasters. Hurricanes lead to power failures that make heat waves more miserable. Heat waves harden the ground and make flooding worse. The Colorado River might be about…

War is ugly. So is hubris. The next time President Donald Trump tells you how well the war is going, remember that U.S. missile strikes have killed more than 1,400 people in Iran, including 168…

It’s not easy to put bad news on our front pages, especially when it’s local. We want to project Allen County as a safe and friendly place to live and do business. So it was…

The U.S. war on Iran has exposed the mounting costs to President Donald Trump’s solo foreign policymaking, driven by whim and unchecked by strategic planning or competent advisers. Apparently, the president never foresaw Iran’s willingness…