A church I was a member of 30 years ago published a daily Bible-reading schedule showing several chapters, along with a list of many more labeled “For the Hearty Ones.” I believe those of you who regularly read our Saturday Series are also hearty ones, so this is the place to extend an invitation to the World Journalism Institute’s annual mid-career course. The next course, No. 12, will meet Jan. 7–13, 2021.

The Jewish New Year begins the evening of Sept. 18, and Elliott Rabin’s The Biblical Hero: Portraits in Nobility & Fallibility (Jewish Publication Society, 2020) shows differences between Judaism and Christianity but also points of contact. 

The first Sunday after Labor Day is National Grandparents Day, which has its own official flower: the forget-me-not. If your grandparents are still alive, have you thanked them? If they’re deceased, do you honor them?

This month we commemorated the 75th anniversary of the end of World War II, which followed the dropping of atomic bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki. American military planners at the time considered the death weapons to be lifesavers: Japanese leaders had showed no inclination to surrender, and an invasion of their islands would cost at least 400,000 American lives and 10 times that many Japanese fatalities. 

A great pro-life friend of mine, former Care Net president Guy Condon, once told me his mom almost aborted him. His greatest fear was nonexistence. In November 2000 he died at age 46 when a van broadsided him as he drove home from speaking at a pregnancy resource center fundraiser. I believe he still exists. I hope to hug him some day. 

Over the past few months, we’ve posted in the Saturday Series a few of my never-published speeches on topics that are still relevant.

Sally Pipes is president of the Pacific Research Institute and the author of False Premise, False Promise: The Disastrous Reality of Medicare for All (Encounter). I interviewed her on Feb. 6, just after that book came out, and just before COVID-19 hit the headlines. Her analysis makes me realize that we have not only a political problem but a cultural problem affecting both supply of doctors and demand for their time.