Abraham Lincoln practiced law for nearly twenty-five years, five times longer than he served as president. Nonetheless, this aspect of his life was known only in the broadest outlines until the Lincoln Legal Papers project set to work gathering the surviving documentation of more than 5,600 of his cases. One of the first scholars to work in this vast collection, Mark E. Steiner goes beyond the hasty sketches of previous biographers to paint a detailed portrait of Lincoln the lawyer. This portrait not only depicts Lincoln's work for the railroads and the infamous case in which he defended the claims of a slaveholder; it also illustrates his more typical cases involving debt and neighborly disputes. Steiner describes Lincoln's legal education, the economics of the law office, and the changes in legal practice that Lincoln himself experienced as the nation became an industrial, capitalist society. Most important, Steiner highlights Lincoln's guiding principles as a lawyer. In contrast to the popular caricature of the lawyer as a scoundrel, Lincoln followed his personal resolve to be "honest at all events," thus earning the nickname "Honest Abe." For him, honesty meant representing clients to the best of his ability, regardless of his own beliefs about the justice of their cause. Lincoln also embraced a professional ideal that cast the lawyer as a guardian of order. He was as willing to mediate a dispute outside the courtroom in the interest of maintaining peace as he was eager to win cases before a jury. Over the course of his legal career, however, Lincoln's dedication to the community and his clients' personal interests became outmoded. As a result of the rise of powerful, faceless corporate clients and the national debate over slavery, Lincoln the lawyer found himself in an increasingly impersonal, morally ambiguous world.

Mark has been in and out of hospital his whole life - and he's fed up. So when his cancer returns, he decides he's had enough. Running away with his dog Beau, he sets out to climb a mountain - and it's only when he's left everything behind that Mark realises he has everything to live for.

Doubt is a still small voice, best heard in desperate hours when we are alone. You and I know these hours: the ones when you come to your place of prayer in troubled times and are helpless to speak. The need or pain that drives you to pray becomes more than you can speak, but you reach toward God, doing your best to find the words for your sorrow. You stay, struggling until your emotions are spent. There is no miracle and God does not answer; but your pain is less and you have a good cry. You tell yourself it is time to wait on God and you watch to see what God will do, as you turn back to your life among men. Days become weeks and a solution forms. You do not see the place of your prayer in the outcome. The things you asked for do not fit the result, so you trust that God knows best and ignore the voice of doubt that is trying to save you.

Doug Bixby knows that many of us have had enough of the liberal vs. conservative battles in the church. In The Honest to God Church, Bixby demonstrates how these extremes have distracted us from our true calling as conduits for God's grace--both individually and as congregations. Many churches see themselves as "okay," while everyone outside the church is "not okay." These churches embrace an ethic of perfection rather than love. Often they are very judgmental and rigid; little room exists for grace after a person is converted. Legalism, rather than love, becomes the primary defining characteristic; people pretend to be perfect even though they are not. In reaction to this approach, many churches have replaced judgmentalism with an ethic of tolerance. But tolerating someone is not the same thing as loving them. Tolerance demands only that we give people space. Love is deeper and more significant and demands that we enter into their space. Besides, if on our own we are okay, then why do we need God and one another? Bixby recommends we embrace the teaching of Martin Luther that we all are saints and sinners simultaneously. Churches that do this raise disciples who readily admit their sin and brokenness and see God's grace as the only means for straightening out their lives. Bixby encourages all congregations to live this way--authentically and transparently--so that we do not have to pretend that we are okay when we are not. Bixby challenges us to respond to Jesus's call to come as we are, not as we think we ought to be.

Bullshit isn’t what it used to be. Now, two science professors give us the tools to dismantle misinformation and think clearly in a world of fake news and bad data. “A modern classic . . . a straight-talking survival guide to the mean streets of a dying democracy and a global pandemic.”—Wired Misinformation, disinformation, and fake news abound and it’s increasingly difficult to know what’s true. Our media environment has become hyperpartisan. Science is conducted by press release. Startup culture elevates bullshit to high art. We are fairly well equipped to spot the sort of old-school bullshit that is based in fancy rhetoric and weasel words, but most of us don’t feel qualified to challenge the avalanche of new-school bullshit presented in the language of math, science, or statistics. In Calling Bullshit, Professors Carl Bergstrom and Jevin West give us a set of powerful tools to cut through the most intimidating data. You don’t need a lot of technical expertise to call out problems with data. Are the numbers or results too good or too dramatic to be true? Is the claim comparing like with like? Is it confirming your personal bias? Drawing on a deep well of expertise in statistics and computational biology, Bergstrom and West exuberantly unpack examples of selection bias and muddled data visualization, distinguish between correlation and causation, and examine the susceptibility of science to modern bullshit. We have always needed people who call bullshit when necessary, whether within a circle of friends, a community of scholars, or the citizenry of a nation. Now that bullshit has evolved, we need to relearn the art of skepticism.