National Geographic has released a special issue titled “Gender Revolution,” and it includes one article offering advice for parents of transgender children. Here is the bottom line: Your most important role as a parent is to offer understanding, respect, and support to your child. A nonjudgmental approach will gain your child’s trust and put you in a better position to help your child through difficult times. When your child discloses an identity to you, respond in an affirming, supportive way… In short, parents must affirm whatever identity a child embraces or risk “harming” their child. But there are some obvious questions that never get asked and answered in this article.…

Last year, Karen Swallow Prior had a fascinating piece at TGC about the author of “In the Bleak Mid-Winter.” Her name is Christina Rossetti (1830–1894), and Prior writes that she was a woman of “deep Christian conviction.” Prior concludes: The paradox of Rossetti’s life is that her “spirit of self-postponement” produced some of the finest Christian poetry written—the gift of herself, given to her Savior and received by the world. I commend to you the rest of Prior’s essay, which you can read here. I also recommend two versions of the song that are staples around my house during this time of year. My favorite version is Shawn Colvin’s, and…

Alan Levinovitz is a professor at James Madison University, and he argues in The Atlantic that “trigger warnings” in university syllabi have the effect of shutting out Christian viewpoints. He explains: According to anonymous in-class surveys, about one-third of my students believe in the exclusive salvific truth of Christianity. But rarely do these students defend their beliefs in class. In private, they have told me that they believe doing so could be construed as hateful, hostile, intolerant, and disrespectful; after all, they’re saying that if others don’t believe what they do, they’ll go to hell… The unpleasant truth is that historically marginalized groups, including racial minorities and members of the…

I have written in this space before about the idea that pedophilia is a sexual orientation, that it’s just another element of human sexual diversity not to be condemned but understood and sympathized with. We are now at the next stage of normalization. Indeed, the DSM-V already recognizes pedophilia as a sexual orientation (p. 698). But now we have a full-length academic book arguing the same: Pedophilia and Adult-Child Sex: A Philosophical Analysis, by Stephen Kershnar. In this book, Kershnar questions whether pedophilia should be considered a mental disorder and/or morally wrong. His argument is that it can only be considered a mental disorder if and only if two conditions…

It is hard to imagine that July 4, 1776 was anything but bittersweet for the men who signed the Declaration. They knew the principles they were standing for, and they knew what it would cost them to stand: “With a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes and our sacred Honor.” It would cost them all of that and more. On July 4, 2016, two-hundred and forty years hence, we find ourselves at another bittersweet moment. Our nation desperately needs leaders and statesmen to stand for principle and to be willing to do so at great personal cost. Where…