In 1984, I returned to Newnham College at Cambridge University to teach after completing my Ph.D. there a couple of years earlier. Almost all of my colleagues in the university's classics department were men, and my office at the all-women's college was in the dorm.

One of the downsides of working in antiquity is that you don't have many female voices, but you certainly have a lot of male terror about the potential of women's power. It shows you very clearly that the most oppressive cultures tend to be afraid of those whom they oppress.

For whatever reason, some sorts of women's silence were broken by MeToo. This is the optimistic bit. And that will lead to a much more careful attention to women's voices.

Gender is a key marker of power and powerlessness. Most of the structures of how our world works are biased in terms of men.

9/11 allowed us to witness the ordinary face of goodness in the love that those about to die brought with them to work that day. It is fitting that we refer to a large segment of the church year as Ordinary Time because it describes the look of the true faith that, as we read of the Kingdom, is spread about us.

We should not permit prayer to be taken out of the schools; that's the only way most of us got through.

Just as a son, to be a son of man, must be of the same nature and spirit of his father; so with the sons of God, and so it will be with all who are born of the spirit of God.

Large swathes of people losing faith in democracy is a dangerous thing. Conflict, desperation, totalitarianism are the products of that loss of faith.