I think you’re reading my 1,000th WORLD column on this back page, so it’s time to reveal one trade secret in column-writing: Give readers a sense of security by being in the same place each issue, but give them a bit of insecurity by not necessarily signaling at the beginning how the column will end.

I mentioned last year how pathetic a hitter I was in Little League. I could mention that I was also poor in dodgeball, rope-climbing, or anything else that required agility or strength. But this column is not a search for sympathy.

Amid coronavirus fears, consider Christ’s words: “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? And not one of them will fall to the ground apart from your Father.”

And consider the hummingbird. Learning from my wife, Susan, last September I filled two hummingbird feeders with two cups of tepid water, stirred in half a cup of sugar, and hung them outside. We live in a tall house on the side of a hill, which bragging Texans call Edwards Mountain, so our two-feeder restaurant is just above the treetops.

Ross Douthat, 40, has for 11 years been a rarity: a conservative and pro-life New York Times columnist. On Feb. 14, before the coronavirus became a major preoccupation, I asked him about ideas in his new book, The Decadent Society. Here are some edited and tightened excerpts.

Parental advisory: This article includes vivid descriptions of aborted babies

Edward Larson mentions Donald Trump once in his clear and thoughtful new book, Franklin & Washington: The Founding Partnership (William Morrow, 2020): “Objecting to the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee in Charlottesville, Virginia, President Donald Trump sharply asked, ‘I wonder, is it George Washington next week?’” Larson seems on Trump’s side in pushing back against revisionist history: “Despite their flaws, Franklin and Washington have held up better under examination than most leaders of any age.”

The Houston-based Terry Foundation is the largest private scholarship provider in the state of Texas. Here’s a history talk with current applications I gave at the 1997 celebration of Terry scholars at the University of Texas at Austin. See last month’s “stump speech” about how concerns over corrupt Anglicanism helped spur American colonists to revolt.

I’ve been reading “progressive” looks at our national divisions so as to understand the intellectual winds that will blow more intensively if we have a Biden presidency.