To give hope in uncertain times, this issue of Plough profiles people who have lived courageously.

In unsettling times such as these, being told to “take courage” can sound like a grim joke. Yet courage is precisely what we’re in need of today: courage to stand by the truth, and courage to stand by the gospel’s claim that everyone belongs to God, because Jesus has overcome the world. To inspire such courage – and to guard against a failure of nerve or of imagination – this issue of Plough highlights people who have lived courageously.

In this issue:
• Chinese dissident Yu Jie looks at the challenges facing the church in China.
• Cuban pastor Raúl Suárez reveals how encounters with Christians thawed Fidel Castro’s atheism.
• Plough pays tribute to NYPD Det. Steven McDonald, who forgave the young shooter who paralyzed him.
• Maureen Swinger tells how a young man with severe disabilities became an exceptional teacher.
• Evangelical activist D. L. Mayfield finds an unsettling role model in Dorothy Day.
• Comic artist Julian Peters illustrates T. S. Eliot’s poem “Little Gidding.”

Plus:
• Insights on courage from Teresa of Avila, George Bernard Shaw, Meister Eckhart, and Mother Teresa
• Original poetry by Christopher Zimmerman
• Reviews of Martin Scorsese’s Silence, Mark Sundeen’s The Unsettlers, and Craig Greenfield’s Subversive Jesus
• Profiles of Thomas Müntzer, Traudl Wallbrecher, and the Sisters of Life
• Art and photography by Nikolay Ge, Boris Ivanovich Kopylov, Taisia Afonina, Wayne Forte, Dave Beckerman, Luca Sartoni, Wu Guanzhong, and Sadao Watanabe

Plough Quarterly features stories, ideas, and culture for people eager to put their faith into action. Each issue brings you in-depth articles, interviews, poetry, book reviews, and art to help you put Jesus’ message into practice and find common cause with others.

Managing editor: Peter Mommsen