Sightings Articles
Thoughts and Prayers
As inhabitants of the only country in the world where school shootings are routine, the American faithful must not pray for serenity, but for courage.
June 8, 2022
Are Calls for Policy Change the New #ThoughtsAndPrayers?
“Lockdown.” To a parent, perhaps no word induces more panic. Last Wednesday (May 22), I received a text alert that my son’s elementary school was going on lockdown. A second alert from the University of Chicago Office of Safety and Security advised a...
May 30, 2019
Defiant Hope
Ed. Note: Today's column is the third in a three-part series by Divinity School faculty reflecting on the Christchurch mosque shootings in New Zealand during Friday Prayer on March 15, 2019. Last Monday, Richard Rosengarten wrote about the challenges...
March 25, 2019
OMG
“… a longtime Facebook staffer told me that to detect instances of suicide or murder on Facebook Live the company created a system that looks for sudden spikes in attention—‘by number of people viewing, by the rate at which those impressions are go...
March 18, 2019
Tree of Life
A man may not go out with a sword [on Shabbat], nor with a bow, nor with a shield, nor with a round shield, nor with a spear. If he has gone out [with any of these] he is liable for a sin offering. Rabbi Eliezer says: They are ornaments for him. Bu...
November 1, 2018
Protesting Children
“How Young Is Too Young for Protest?”—an article by Stephanie Saul and Anemona Hartocollis in the New York Times published the day before the March 14 protest marches against gun violence in a great number of American high schools—posed questions whi...
March 19, 2018
Souls and the Guns of America
“Guns and the Soul of America” is the title of an important recent column by David Brooks (The New York Times, October 6th). Sightings writers do not claim to be experts on guns, but something or other about “souls” shows up in most of our semiweekly...
October 9, 2017
Epidemic as Metaphor: Meaning and Morality in Our Narratives of Gun Violence
Much could be written, has been written, and still needs to be written about gun violence, the Second Amendment, responsible gun ownership, the gun lobby, and politicians. But here—for a moment—I want to pause and consider two metaphors that are beco...