English Issue 20/2024

What must it have been like for the disciples, sitting together after Christ left them, shocked and confused over all that had happened and in undescribable pain at their loss? What did they say to each other? What would we have said? And what was there amongst them that heard their suffering and responded with the gift of language? Could we find such a center?

This week’s issue, which comes out between the Christian celebrations of Ascension and Pentecost, is dedicated to the heart, as an organ and a gesture of listening and responding. Our authors offer different perspectives—Branko Furst discusses the physiology of the heart, John Bloom asks us to see it in the economic sphere, Gilda Bartel alludes to it in the search for social identity, and it plays a part in Julia Demming’s considerations for educating sensitive children.