Karen Swallow Prior
@karenswallowprior.bsky.social
Reader, writer, dog lover, Ph.D. Most recent book: You Have a Calling: Finding Your Vocation in the True, Good, and Beautiful. Find me on Substack at The Priory.
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
On the latest episode of #SavedByTheCity, we are joined by @karenswallowprior.bsky.social as we discuss all the different ways callings can present themselves in our lives. (That’s right – callings, plural!).
Hear the full conversation: linktr.ee/savedbythecity
Hear the full conversation: linktr.ee/savedbythecity
November 21, 2025 at 6:05 PM
On the latest episode of #SavedByTheCity, we are joined by @karenswallowprior.bsky.social as we discuss all the different ways callings can present themselves in our lives. (That’s right – callings, plural!).
Hear the full conversation: linktr.ee/savedbythecity
Hear the full conversation: linktr.ee/savedbythecity
…almost any writer will tell you that you cannot produce (create) thoughts and ideas while in the judging (criticizing) mode. You must get the words and ideas out—write, write, write—and then step back and judge, critique, edit, and revise.
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Alexander Pope's An Essay on Criticism
"A little learning is a dangerous thing ... "
open.substack.com
November 18, 2025 at 11:59 PM
…almost any writer will tell you that you cannot produce (create) thoughts and ideas while in the judging (criticizing) mode. You must get the words and ideas out—write, write, write—and then step back and judge, critique, edit, and revise.
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Folks, Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism is chock full of advice not only about literary criticism but also about WRITING.
Writers, you might want to give this one a look:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Writers, you might want to give this one a look:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Alexander Pope's An Essay on Criticism
"A little learning is a dangerous thing ... "
open.substack.com
November 18, 2025 at 5:45 PM
Folks, Alexander Pope’s An Essay on Criticism is chock full of advice not only about literary criticism but also about WRITING.
Writers, you might want to give this one a look:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Writers, you might want to give this one a look:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
“Bannon offered Epstein something irresistible: to build a right-wing MAGA coalition that would “stave off” the global movement against sexual harassment for more than a decade.”
bylinetimes.com/2025/11/14/s...
bylinetimes.com/2025/11/14/s...
Steve Bannon Offered Trump’s MAGA as Shield for Jeffrey Epstein
Jeffrey Epstein helped shape Trump’s MAGA movement through a secret alliance with its chief architect, Steve Bannon, who told him it could help him “stave off Time’s Up for a decade” in return for str...
bylinetimes.com
November 17, 2025 at 2:04 AM
“Bannon offered Epstein something irresistible: to build a right-wing MAGA coalition that would “stave off” the global movement against sexual harassment for more than a decade.”
bylinetimes.com/2025/11/14/s...
bylinetimes.com/2025/11/14/s...
‘Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But, of the two, less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
—from Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism, our reading next week at The Priory. Subscribe now! substack.com/@karenswallo...
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But, of the two, less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
—from Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism, our reading next week at The Priory. Subscribe now! substack.com/@karenswallo...
Karen Swallow Prior | Substack
A reader and writer attending more closely to what is good, true, and beautiful. 2025-26 Karlson Scholar at Bethel Seminary. The Priory is devoted to the holy cultivation of a rich inner life. “Attent...
substack.com
November 15, 2025 at 8:52 PM
‘Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But, of the two, less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
—from Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism, our reading next week at The Priory. Subscribe now! substack.com/@karenswallo...
Appear in writing or in judging ill;
But, of the two, less dang'rous is th' offence
To tire our patience, than mislead our sense.
—from Alexander Pope’s Essay on Criticism, our reading next week at The Priory. Subscribe now! substack.com/@karenswallo...
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
A beautiful reflection on All Saints' Day by @karenswallowprior.bsky.social.
OPINION: I hadn’t planned or scheduled the grief followed by hope that the All Saints’ Day service brought me. Rather, the church calendar had scheduled it for me long, long ago, when I didn’t know I needed it.
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
How All Saints’ Day brought me grief, then hope this year
(RNS) — Just as the Christian faith is a story rooted in time, so, too, are our lives’ stories rooted in time.
religionnews.com
November 15, 2025 at 3:32 PM
A beautiful reflection on All Saints' Day by @karenswallowprior.bsky.social.
Propane man left our annual calendar. And some treats for the dogs. They love him.
November 12, 2025 at 3:09 PM
Propane man left our annual calendar. And some treats for the dogs. They love him.
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
How All Saints’ Day brought me grief, then hope this year religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h... @karenswallowprior.bsky.social
How All Saints’ Day brought me grief, then hope this year
(RNS) — Just as the Christian faith is a story rooted in time, so, too, are our lives’ stories rooted in time.
religionnews.com
November 12, 2025 at 2:24 PM
How All Saints’ Day brought me grief, then hope this year religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h... @karenswallowprior.bsky.social
Grief runs by its own clock. Time speeds up and slows down at whim, but runs right on schedule in the land of the living.
Tomorrow marks one year since we lost my sweet mother:
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
Tomorrow marks one year since we lost my sweet mother:
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
How All Saints’ Day brought me grief, then hope this year
(RNS) — Just as the Christian faith is a story rooted in time, so, too, are our lives’ stories rooted in time.
religionnews.com
November 11, 2025 at 11:11 PM
Grief runs by its own clock. Time speeds up and slows down at whim, but runs right on schedule in the land of the living.
Tomorrow marks one year since we lost my sweet mother:
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
Tomorrow marks one year since we lost my sweet mother:
religionnews.com/2025/11/11/h...
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
One more day until these books will be together forever! (And not just in my head.) I can't wait to share Face to Face: A Novel of the Reformation with you all.
Erasmus, Luther, Melanchthon: I love you all, and I loved telling your stories!
Erasmus, Luther, Melanchthon: I love you all, and I loved telling your stories!
November 10, 2025 at 2:32 PM
One more day until these books will be together forever! (And not just in my head.) I can't wait to share Face to Face: A Novel of the Reformation with you all.
Erasmus, Luther, Melanchthon: I love you all, and I loved telling your stories!
Erasmus, Luther, Melanchthon: I love you all, and I loved telling your stories!
“A new start after 60: I found my feet in midlife, became a park ranger at 85 – and retired happily at 100”
Amazing and inspiring!
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
Amazing and inspiring!
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
A new start after 60: I found my feet in midlife, became a park ranger at 85 – and retired happily at 100
At 104, Betty Reid Soskin has had the most extraordinary life, from protest singing to civil rights activism to meeting the Obamas. She reflects on what it takes to stay strong and keep going
www.theguardian.com
November 10, 2025 at 2:20 PM
“A new start after 60: I found my feet in midlife, became a park ranger at 85 – and retired happily at 100”
Amazing and inspiring!
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
Amazing and inspiring!
www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle...
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. -A. Camus
November 7, 2025 at 1:45 PM
Autumn is a second spring when every leaf is a flower. -A. Camus
“It will flame out, like shining from shook foil.” — GMH
November 7, 2025 at 1:15 AM
“It will flame out, like shining from shook foil.” — GMH
New podcast conversation on callings—at all stages of life:
faith-and-imagination.castos.com/episodes/ep-....
faith-and-imagination.castos.com/episodes/ep-....
Ep. 111: Finding our Callings in Every Season of Life, with Karen Swallow Prior, writer and public intellectual
Karen Swallow Prior is the author of several books, among them The Evangelical Imagination, On Reading Well: Finding the Good Life through Great Books, and Fierce Convictions: The Extraordinary Life o...
faith-and-imagination.castos.com
November 4, 2025 at 2:07 PM
New podcast conversation on callings—at all stages of life:
faith-and-imagination.castos.com/episodes/ep-....
faith-and-imagination.castos.com/episodes/ep-....
Belinda is mortified at the loss of her beautiful curls and spirals into despair. Pope paints a literal picture of this existential space and its inhabitants. Belinda’s handmaids, who accompany her into this dark cave, are Ill-nature and Affectation:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock: Week 3
Melancholy, Spleen, Hysteria, and perhaps a little Misogyny into the Mix
open.substack.com
November 4, 2025 at 1:05 PM
Belinda is mortified at the loss of her beautiful curls and spirals into despair. Pope paints a literal picture of this existential space and its inhabitants. Belinda’s handmaids, who accompany her into this dark cave, are Ill-nature and Affectation:
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
I will be teaching a "Seminary for Everyone" course based around my book, The Evangelical Imagination, at Bethel Seminary (online) next June! More details to come. Interested registrants can receive $45 off with the code: SEM45
November 4, 2025 at 1:04 AM
I will be teaching a "Seminary for Everyone" course based around my book, The Evangelical Imagination, at Bethel Seminary (online) next June! More details to come. Interested registrants can receive $45 off with the code: SEM45
Today’s run
November 3, 2025 at 6:55 PM
Today’s run
“A sense of self-importance so high that it surpasses all limits is a mental illness called ‘mania grandiosa’.” — Leo Tolstoy
October 31, 2025 at 3:54 PM
“A sense of self-importance so high that it surpasses all limits is a mental illness called ‘mania grandiosa’.” — Leo Tolstoy
October 30, 2025 at 3:54 PM
“All human life begins the same way. Yet there are so very many ways to destroy it.”
Since nuclear weapons are back in the news (again), I’m sharing this 2015 essay of mine in Sojourners:
sojo.net/magazine/aug...
Since nuclear weapons are back in the news (again), I’m sharing this 2015 essay of mine in Sojourners:
sojo.net/magazine/aug...
Nukes and the Pro-Life Christian
A conservative takes a second look at the morality of nuclear weapons and discovers that there's more than one way to choose life.
sojo.net
October 30, 2025 at 3:16 AM
“All human life begins the same way. Yet there are so very many ways to destroy it.”
Since nuclear weapons are back in the news (again), I’m sharing this 2015 essay of mine in Sojourners:
sojo.net/magazine/aug...
Since nuclear weapons are back in the news (again), I’m sharing this 2015 essay of mine in Sojourners:
sojo.net/magazine/aug...
This is purity culture, eighteenth-century style. (Some things never go out of style.)
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Alexander Pope's The Rape of the Lock: Week 2
“By force to ravish, or by fraud betray”
open.substack.com
October 28, 2025 at 12:28 PM
This is purity culture, eighteenth-century style. (Some things never go out of style.)
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
open.substack.com/pub/karenswa...
Reposted by Karen Swallow Prior
At Dear, Strange Things, I interviewed @karenswallowprior.bsky.social about her excellent new book, "You Have a Calling." dearstrangethings.substack.com/p/author-q-a...
Author Q&A: Karen Swallow Prior, Author of You Have a Calling
My very talented friend Karen Swallow Prior is the author of several books, including The Evangelical Imagination, which I reviewed here last year. This August, she released her latest, You Have a Cal...
dearstrangethings.substack.com
October 27, 2025 at 4:05 AM
At Dear, Strange Things, I interviewed @karenswallowprior.bsky.social about her excellent new book, "You Have a Calling." dearstrangethings.substack.com/p/author-q-a...