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    Plough Quarterly No. 41: Freedom

    Autumn 2024

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    Featured Articles

    All Articles

    Editorial

    In Defiance of All Powers What’s the point of freedom? Which kinds of freedom might be worth dying for?

    Reflections

    Form and Freedom A visual artist, an architect, and a poet celebrate the freedom of coloring within the lines. Disciplines for Freedom A doctor learning how to die of cancer finds guides in Simone Weil, Iris Murdoch, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, and Pedro Arrupe.

    Dispatch

    Encounters at the Southern Border Who are the migrants seeking asylum in the United States? The Open Road I went on a roadtrip down Route 66 looking for freedom.

    Essays

    The Workers and the Church What happened to the Christian tradition of supporting workers’ rights? The Body She Had If only her parents had been spared the terrible freedom of having to choose whether to have a child with a disability. Become Slaves to One Another Paul’s letters probe the paradox of freedom through love. Paraguayans Don’t Read In a dictatorship, literature nurtures freedom. In a democracy, does it matter? Taking Lifelong Vows Poverty, chastity, and obedience bring a different kind of freedom. Bad Faith or Perfect Freedom Sartre and Augustine reflect on what it takes to be free. American Freedom and Christian Freedom Freedom is central to American ideals and to the Christian faith, but there is danger in confusing the two.

    Personal History

    Recovering from Heroin and Fiction I sought freedom in drugs and novels. They couldn’t save me. The Autonomy Trap Is commitment just for suckers? A conversion story.

    Reading

    Yearning for Freedom Four thinkers across the centuries reckon with Christian freedom. Arvo Pärt’s Journey In this excerpt from Between Two Sounds, we see the moment when the Estonian composer begins to run afoul of the Soviet regime.

    Poetry

    Poem: “And Is It Not Enough?” The poet relishes the beauty of autumn, but sees the stripping away that comes with it.

    Editors’ Picks

    An American Mother Forgives In American Mother, Diane Foley recounts her journey to forgive her son’s killers. I Cheerfully Refuse Despair In Lief Enger’s novel I Cheerfully Refuse, one man fights against despair (and wrongdoers) in a post-apocalyptic world. The Glory of God Is a Human Being Fully Alive In Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times, Elizabeth Oldfield uses the seven deadly sins to point towards the seven heavenly virtues.

    Family and Friends

    The Forgiveness Project In London, an unconventional project shares stories of forgiveness. Humanizing Medicine In Baltimore, the Paul McHugh Program for Human Flourishing gets med students talking.

    Bible Reflection

    The Bible’s Story of Freedom Scripture tells an unfinished history of liberation.

    Community Snapshot

    The Busted Bean Follow an old school bus’s transformation into a space for coffee and camaraderie.

    Forum

    Readers Respond Readers respond to Plough’s Summer 2024 issue, The Good of Tech.

    Interview

    An Exodus From China A persecuted house church chooses to flee together as a community.

    Report

    A Lion in Phnom Penh An insider reckons with complicity and compromise in Cambodia’s aid industry.

    Forerunners

    Jakob Hutter, Radical Reformer In just three short years, the sixteenth-century martyr founded a church that has endured to this day.

    Covering the Cover

    Covering the Cover: Freedom Birds, boats, broken chains . . . freedom brings to mind many visual metaphors.

    Featured Authors

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    About This Issue

    In an election season, all political parties claim to champion freedom, which highlights the very different ways people think about what it means to be free. This issue of Plough Quarterly explores many dimensions of freedom: not only what people need to be freed from, but what we are set free to do. Contributors look at freedom in light of addiction, disability, asylum, religious liberty, modern slavery, dictatorship, conversion, workers’ rights, theology, the fine arts, and more.