choices on Benefit of the Doubt

We should aim for rational confidence in these sorts of pursuits because certainty is a mere will-o’-the-wisp. Finite minds simply can’t pull it off. Though the distinction between aiming at certainty...

Doubt is really the felt tension that exists between a belief you have and a contrary claim you do not yet believe…Simply put, doubt is that experience of one of our beliefs seeming like it might be f...

In The Sickness unto Death , Kierkegaard describes a “moment” familiar to all of us. It is the “little tiny transition from having understood to doing.” Here’s what he says about it: …if a person d...

O God, who guides the decisions of the meek, and whose light shines in darkness for the godly: Give us, in all our doubts and uncertainties, the grace to ask what you would have us do, that the Spirit...

Sobriety is the counterweight that must balance out success. Especially if things keep getting better and better.

* This story is debated among Galileo scholars, though most would agree that the story conveys Galileo’s unique approach to learning. Galileo Galilei was a man who dared to look beyond what othe...

Gracious God, sometimes I think that I can figure out all the consequences of my decisions. I can become overly impressed with what I perceive to be my strategic vision and analysis. Forgive me for my...

Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before.

It is always easier for us to want to purify other people, and attempt a moral reformation among our neighbors. (Yet) how much have I helped to make her what she is?

May your choices reflect your hopes, not your fears.

Sometimes the circumstances at hand force us to be braver than we actually are, and so we knock on doors and ask for assistance. Sometimes not having any idea where we’re going works out better than w...

Richard Mouw, the former president of Fuller Seminary and a professor of philosophy, shares an amusing anecdote from a lecture by the esteemed Catholic ethicist Charles Curran. During his talk, Curran...

The biggest deception of our digital age may be the lie that says we can be omni-competent, omni-informed, and omni-present. . . . We must choose our absence, our inability, and our ignorance—and choo...

Both processes begin even before death. The good man's past begins to change so that his forgiven sins and remembered sorrows take on the quality of Heaven: the bad man's past already conforms...

As popularized in Richard Thaler and Cass Sunstein’s fascinating book by the same name, nudges are small changes in the environment around us that make it easier for us to make the choices we want to ...

Carl Jung, one of the early pioneers of modern psychology, wrote this from his years of experience as a therapist: The acceptance of oneself is the essence of the moral problem and the epitome of ...

There is a television show that has one of those beginnings that stick with you long after you’ve seen it. And it starts like this…A man, dressed like a cowboy enters an ultra sleek Miami club, lookin...

Guilt is a moral emotion, perhaps the quintessential moral emotion, and is therefore about values.

The way we are living, timorous or bold, will have been our life.

How many shortcuts have been justified with the best of intentions? At the sentencing for her role in the 2019 college admissions bribery scandal, actress Lori Loughlin addressed the court:  “I mad...

At crucial moments of choice, most of the business of choosing is already over.

Almighty and gracious God, Your love is everlasting and filled with patience. In our sinfulness, we run away, yet You seek after us. We make foolish choices in spite of the fact that You teach us a be...

The pioneering work of Israeli psychologists Daniel Kahneman and Amos Tversky has been popularized in recent years by the gamut of notable thinkers, including Malcolm Gladwell (Blink) and, in this cas...

Invitations are powerful. Like tides, they ebb and flow, shaping the contours of our existence. Some invitations we desperately want but never get—“Will you marry me?” or “Would you consider a promoti...

We might say that convictions are firmly held moral or religious beliefs that guide our beliefs, actions, or choices.

William James, in a famous letter to H. G. Wells in 1906, credited what he called American “moral flabbiness” to “the exclusive worship of the bitch-goddess Success. That—with the squalid cash interpr...

The only reason for doing the right thing is that it is the right thing to do; all other reasons are reasons for doing something else.

We have the freedom to make choices that can lead to blessing and favor or painful consequences. Battling busyness requires me to take a look inside my heart to make sure that my choices align with my...

When every option is available to us, we don’t actually have freedom; we tend to shut down. I experienced what sociologists call choice overload (or paralysis) and decision fatigue. If you’ve ever tri...

Holy Comforter, You are near when my dream dies. You are near the brokenhearted. Thanks be to you for a new dream and a future beyond my imagining. Maker of Miracle, You are near when I cannot see yo...