We feel it at the grocery store. We feel it when we pay our utility bills. We feel it every time we check our bank accounts and browse house listings. I especially feel it when just two bags of groceries cost me more than a hundred dollars.

America’s affordability crisis is real. Inflation is hurting families. Housing costs are through the roof. The American dream feels increasingly out of reach for many young people.

Our story isn’t unique. For most of history, families have built stability and wealth together rather than waiting until they had already achieved it.

But what if part of the problem isn’t just economic? What if it’s cultural?

What if it’s that more and more of us are postponing — or outright rejecting — the very milestones that once allowed our country to thrive?

For generations, marriage and family were some of the biggest building blocks of financial stability and success. Today, marriage rates are declining, family formation is delayed, and birth rates have fallen so low that we can’t even replace ourselves. At the same time, Americans are marrying later than ever, and first-time homebuyers are now 40 years old on average.

These aren’t isolated trends. They are interconnected signs of a culture that has turned family from a foundation for building a good life into a finish line that many feel they must reach only after they have “made it.”

Foundation, not finish line

I didn’t grow up in affluence by any means. Things were often tight at the Thorman household with nine children (yes, all from the same parents), though none of us went “without.” My parents and their friends welcomed kids into the world with open arms even though they had no idea how they were going to afford us.

When my older siblings were born, things were so tight that they mostly lived on beans and rice and a whole lot of prayer. My dad worked extremely hard, and with smart financial decisions coupled with his integrity and strong work ethic, his salary increased over the years — just as the data has long predicted.

But one thing my parents didn’t have was Pinterest-perfect homes, luxury vacations, or every financial box checked before starting a family. They just did it. They just got married young, committed to one another, welcomed children, and built a life together.

I’m not advocating for irresponsibility, but we need to regain knowledge that was once intuitive: Marriage and family don’t stand in the way of financial success; they help create it.

Having it all

Our culture has it all backward. The expectation that we have to travel the world, have perfect-looking homes, and “find ourselves” before settling down has not made us happier or more financially savvy. Rather, it has only made us more miserable, lonely, and empty.

The very lies society feeds us about delaying marriage and family in order to “have it all” often undermine the very things people are seeking: financial stability, purpose, belonging, and long-term happiness. These are not obstacles to marriage and family; they are the fruit of them. We have convinced an entire generation that family should come after success, when for much of human history, family was the primary way people built success.

The data bears this out. Marriage and stable two-parent households consistently produce better economic outcomes: higher household income, greater wealth accumulation, lower poverty rates, and greater financial stability for children. Imagine that. The family structure God designed not only benefits individuals spiritually and emotionally, but also creates some of the strongest economic outcomes for families and society alike.

Having a family will alter your priorities, and rightly so. For my husband and me, having two kids (with more to come, God willing) has changed how we spend our money, where we spend our time, and what we value the most. We hardly get to take vacations, let alone the kind “influencers” brag about on social media, and that’s OK. I’ll take my kids over luxury experiences every day. So yes, kids change your lifestyle — and that’s a good thing.

For me, I get to do life with my best friend and make carbon copies of us, and it’s exceptionally awesome. I want everyone to experience it, because my family isn’t the obstacle to a meaningful life; it’s the source of one.

My story isn’t unique. Social science has been documenting the economic benefits of marriage and family for decades.

RELATED: How to bring Charlie Kirk’s vision to life — starting in your own family

Joe Raedle/Getty Images

Marriage: The great anti-poverty program

Washington politicians love to debate tax credits, subsidies, and government programs, yet one of the strongest predictors of economic stability isn’t a government policy at all — it’s marriage. Certainly, government policies matter. Washington can lower taxes, reduce burdensome regulations, and make housing more affordable. But no government program can replace what strong marriages and families provide: stability, sacrifice, belonging, and a purpose larger than ourselves.

Research from the Institute for Family Studies found that among Millennials who graduated high school, worked full-time, and married before having children, 97% avoided poverty altogether by their mid-30s. Far from being obstacles to financial stability, marriage and family are often among the strongest predictors of it.

My husband and I are a testament to that reality. We got married in our 20s with very little to our names. No trust funds or other “head starts”; nor did we have every financial box checked. We simply started building our life together anyway.

Since then, our careers have grown and our incomes have increased. After living in a small apartment and saving as much as possible, we purchased our first home — including a nice yard to play in — after welcoming our first child. Our story isn’t unique. For most of history, families have built stability and wealth together rather than waiting until they had already achieved it.

Worthy inheritance

The financial advantage enjoyed by married households extends to the whole family. Children raised in stable two-parent homes are far less likely to experience poverty and far more likely to move up the economic ladder. In 2021, just 9.5% of children living with two parents were in poverty, compared to 31.7% of children living with a single parent.

Strong families provide stability, support, and opportunity in ways that no government program can ever replicate. If we truly want to reduce poverty, expand opportunity, and strengthen our nation’s long-term prosperity, we must acknowledge the indispensable role marriage and family play in human flourishing.

Whatever efforts Washington makes to ease Americans’ financial burdens — whether through tax cuts or education reform — lasting change must start with us. Too many young people who tell themselves they’re putting off marriage and children for financial reasons are in fact mistaking risk for impossibility. Building a life has always required a leap of faith.

It’s a leap more of us have to make if we want to keep the American dream alive. Can we afford to have children? The better question is can we afford not to. If we want more prosperity, opportunity, and stability, we should start by strengthening the institution that has helped make those things possible for generations: the family.

​Marriage and family, Faith, Affordability, Lifestyle, Motherhood, Children, Christian living 

A UFC Freedom 250 event on the South Lawn of the White House — with a 5,000-seat temporary stadium and 85,000 tickets for viewing on massive screens on the Ellipse — has sparked controversy. The event is unprecedented, and it falls on President Trump’s birthday.

Put aside what you think of Sunday’s extravaganza. There is still a good reason to embrace June 14: Flag Day.

Those allergic to all things Trump should remember that Flag Day existed decades before he was born and, God willing, will endure for generations after.

Flag Day has a long tradition. Yet if not for its coincidence with Trump’s birthday, it would likely pass with little notice. That is a mistake. This is not a call to worship a colorful banner. It is a call to remember that Americans — left, center, and right — are united by founding principles from the Declaration of Independence, represented by Old Glory.

On June 14, 1777, the Second Continental Congress approved a resolution establishing a uniform national flag. The 13-star flag, commonly associated with Betsy Ross, became a rallying banner and a source of pride. It was not yet revered as it would be later, but it symbolized the freest nation in world history.

Then came the Civil War and the lowering of the flag over Fort Sumter. That image triggered an outpouring of love for Old Glory.

Jonathan Flynt Morris, a banker and strong Republican Unionist, urged Charles Dudley Warner, editor of the Hartford Evening Press, to write about the need not merely to respect the flag, but to revere it. On June 10, 1861, Warner followed that advice and proposed a new holiday: Flag Day.

“This flag is our dearest symbol of nationality,” Warner wrote. “It stands for civil liberty on this continent. To keep it full high advanced is our highest pride; to strike at it is to arouse all the passion of the nation to defend it, and to punish the perpetrators of the outrage.”

Flag Day celebrations began in Warner’s home state of Connecticut. They slowly spread to schools in Wisconsin in 1885, New York schools in 1889, and then to Philadelphia and public buildings in New York state in 1894. An American Flag Day organization was created to further the movement.

President Woodrow Wilson, a Democrat, issued the first federal recognition of the holiday on May 30, 1916. Wilson’s proclamation called for patriotic exercises that would “give significant expression to our thoughtful love of America” and our understanding of “the great mission of liberty and justice to which we have devoted ourselves as a people.”

RELATED: Damning poll reveals what Democrats ACTUALLY think of America ahead of its 250th birthday

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He also called Americans to rededicate themselves to the principles of “independence, liberty, and right,” which no person “can corrupt” and no influence could draw away from their ideals. Finally, on Aug. 3, 1949, President Harry S. Truman, also a Democrat, signed an act of Congress designating June 14 of each year as National Flag Day.

Flag Day exemplifies our shared American creed. It was the brainchild of Republicans, spread outside party politics, and was instituted nationally by Democrats. Its purpose is to recommit us to the founding principles declared in the Declaration of Independence and embedded in the Constitution: equality, limited government, the rule of law, unalienable rights, the social compact, and the right to alter or abolish oppressive government.

America did not fully live by those principles in 1776, and we do not perfectly live by them today. But belief in those principles has inspired generations of patriots to move us closer to their fulfillment. Abolitionism, women’s suffrage, and the civil rights movement all called upon America’s first principles to push the country toward its promise. At its best, our flag stands for liberty and equality.

Those allergic to all things Trump should remember that Flag Day existed decades before he was born and, God willing, will endure for generations after. It is not about one man. It is a call for all Americans to unite around the principles that made the country possible.

We should answer that call.

​Charles dudley warner, Civil war, Jonathan flynt morris, Opinion & analysis, White house, Woodrow wilson, Harry s truman, Flag day, American founding, Donald trump 

Augustine of Hippo is one of the most influential philosophers and Christian theologians in history, and he had a stark warning for the Western world: “A man has as many masters as he has vices.”

And Seth Gruber, CEO of White Rose Resistance, is relaying this warning, explaining that it means “by promoting vice, the regime promotes slavery, which can then be fashioned into a form of political control.”

“That sentence I just said Allie Beth is the beating heart of libido dominandi: the lust to dominate,” he tells BlazeTV host Allie Beth Stuckey on “Relatable.”

“Dominion becomes domination when man listens to and accepts the serpent’s counterfeit kingdom. And the things that we were called to steward … become the very things we are now enslaved to,” he says.

“Domination is a reflection of your own slavery projected onto others. But dominion is a reflection of your own stewardship exercised on behalf of others. So one is the city of man, and one is the city of God,” he continues. “But in each case, it reveals who or what we really worship.”

“Vice,” Gruber explains, “is contagious.”

And like anything contagious, it’s easily spread.

“Tyrants work very hard to spread the infection,” he explains, “because they know that a virtuous populace cannot be controlled. So they have to corrupt, seduce, blackmail. They have to weaponize lust.”

Gruber likens this to Jeffrey Epstein, because if “you cannot defeat militarily, you can always corrupt through sexual enticement.”

“Maybe that’s why the Epstein list will never get released,” he adds.

Stuckey agrees, adding, “What a fascinating, very disturbing connection … Epstein, you can just see it.”

Want more from Allie Beth Stuckey?

To enjoy more of Allie’s upbeat and in-depth coverage of culture, news, and theology from a Christian, conservative perspective, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Allie beth stuckey, Augustine, Christian theologians, Jeffrey epstein, Libido dominandi, Seth gruber, Relatable with allie beth stuckey 

For years, AI elites like Sam Altman, Jensen Huang, and even Elon Musk touted a future in which AI stole all the jobs and humanity simply accepted a life of meaningless unemployment while receiving a meager allowance of universal basic income until our dying days. Something changed recently, though, and several of those same elites are suddenly backpedaling on their promises of the past. What changed? There are a few possibilities.

Seemingly all at once, the CEOs of the world’s leading AI platforms, particularly OpenAI and Anthropic, both reneged on their opinions on artificial intelligence in the workplace. Where AI was once prophetically decreed to replace everyone’s jobs, now these bots are being positioned as tools to enhance human productivity instead.

But why? For what reason would the AI CEOs, who once plotted workplace domination, suddenly turn back on their greedy aspirations? Did they suddenly remember that humanity must somehow live on after all the jobs dry up? That their companies will lose money if consumers don’t exist to buy products and services? That it’s actually evil to force people into unemployment amid a hostile takeover of the entire economy?

Public sentiment around AI is at an all-time low, and it continues to bottom out.

Maybe. Or perhaps something is forcing their hands.

Four reasons the AI job apocalypse is finished

It’s IPO time

Both OpenAI and Anthropic are at pivotal points in their meteoric rise to ubiquity. Neither company is turning a profit, and as time drags on, venture capitalists, who will never get a return on investment with generative AI, are more likely to reduce or even pull their funding. That means AI companies looking to survive the impending bubble have to find funding elsewhere. The answer is to go public.

The two AI giants plan to launch IPOs this year, and they need strong public support to drive value. If the companies are perceived as harmful or even complicit in obliterating the workforce and killing the economy, their IPOs will tank. As a result, they have pulled back on the dystopian warnings of mass unemployment as they tidy up their reputations to portray benevolent corporations bent on helping humanity instead of hindering it.

Reality check

While the AI CEOs promised a workplace revolution on the backs of their LLMs, the real-world applications for these platforms have fallen short of expectations. In May, Starbucks retired its AI-powered inventory system, despite supposed “improved product availability in stores” ushered in by the service. Employees responded by praising the change, saying, in effect, thanks for discontinuing automatic counting! The thought behind it was great, but the execution was proving difficult.

Also in May, a Gartner study revealed that 80% of companies that replaced employees with AI did not see better returns. Meanwhile, companies that added AI to their workforce to enhance the productivity of existing employees without eliminations saw the strongest gains, highlighting the need for skilled employees to coexist alongside AI platforms.

RELATED: Google’s new daily helper knows all about you. Just how creepy is it?

Google’s new daily helper knows all about you. Just how creepy is it? Marina113/Getty Images

Lastly, some companies, like Meta, are learning the hard way that AI isn’t a replacement for human intellect. As we reported in early June, hackers tricked Meta’s AI customer support bot into changing the passwords on high-profile Instagram accounts with little security to stand in the way. This was a massive blunder for Meta — which recently laid off 8,000 employees in favor of AI — in what became the company’s largest account breach ever.

Public protests

Public sentiment around AI is at an all-time low, and it continues to bottom out as time goes on. Just last month, numerous videos surfaced of college graduates booing commencement speakers for merely bringing up AI. Young people looking to enter the workforce, where entry-level positions are among the first to dissolve in the AI race, seemingly appear to hate LLMs. Since this demographic is the future customer base for AI giants, OpenAI and Anthropic would be stupid to continue to ruin young people’s lives with more promises of job replacements.

Another point of contention among the people focuses around data centers. Not only do these massive buildings devour local energy, there are also growing reports that they generate loud noises that have caused some unsettling health effects, including headaches, dizziness, nausea, sleep disturbances, and more.

Hefty price tags

Finally, companies are learning that AI is expensive to run at scale. Microsoft, one of the leaders in the AI space, canceled its Claude Code licenses for employees just months after starting the program. Although no official reason was given, the high cost and volume of Claude tokens required for sophisticated projects is believed to be the culprit. At the same time, Uber’s chief operating officer cited concerns over the high cost of AI that made it difficult to justify. Even AI GPU maker NVIDIA admitted that human employees cost less than AI bots.

During a recent event, Sam Altman was asked about the sizeable AI costs for businesses. He feigned ignorance, stating that “the issue never came up” in the past when setting the prices for companies. “People were totally happy with the amount they were spending.” That appears to no longer be the case.

​Tech 

When Jase Robertson found himself in a movie theater featuring “Project Hail Mary,” he thought he was about to watch a football movie or a film on the Virgin Mary.

What he actually saw stunned him so intensely that it now ranks among his “top five” most shocking experiences ever.

“The reason I was shocked is there was so many spiritual vibes to this movie,” he said on a recent episode of “Unashamed.”

Between the main characters being named Grace and Rock, several nods to the idea of a “savior of the world,” and themes of self-sacrifice and redemption, Jase was astonished that Hollywood produced such a film, especially in this age.

But then the real stunner came.

“There is a Phil Robertson quote in the movie,” Jase exclaims.

After the movie ended, Jase set out with a mission to discover the “story” behind how a big-budget Hollywood blockbuster managed to slip a Phil quote into the script.

Artificial intelligence gave him a strange answer: The line in “Project Hail Mary” was not a Phil Robertson quote, even though it is “a universal accepted fact” that he coined the phrase.

But Jase doesn’t need AI to confirm what he knows is true. “There is a Phil Robertson quote in there, and I didn’t think that was an accident based on everything else I had seen.”

Jase, calling the movie “top-notch,” praises the directors for allowing the film to “play both sides” of the spiritual argument.

He recalls a scene in which Ryland Grace (played by Ryan Gosling) has a spiritual conversation with Eva Stratt, the no-nonsense administrator who gets tapped by world governments to lead Project Hail Mary.

Grace inquires whether or not she believes in God, to which she replies, “It’s better than the alternative.”

“It was just like, well, I know which side of the production that line came from,” says Jase, calling the film “a wonderful experience.”

To hear more, watch the episode above.

Want more from the Robertsons?

To enjoy more on God, guns, ducks, and inspiring stories of faith and family, subscribe to BlazeTV — the largest multi-platform network of voices who love America, defend the Constitution, and live the American dream.

​Unashamed with the robertsons, Jase robertson, Project hail mary, Unashamed 

One of the most common objections to Christianity is simple: The word “Trinity” does not appear in the Bible. If that is true, why do Christians believe it?

Christians believe the Trinity because it is the inevitable conclusion of what Scripture teaches about God, Jesus Christ, and the Holy Spirit.

The doctrine of the Trinity is therefore not an arbitrary invention. Nor is it a concession to polytheism. It is precisely the opposite: a refutation of polytheism.

The story begins in Genesis.

The Jewish Scriptures, what Christians call the Old Testament, taught something unique among the religions of the ancient world. Pagan nations treated their gods as physical beings within the universe. Israel taught that God created the heavens and the earth. God was not part of the system. He brought the system into existence.

God is therefore not made of matter, not located at one point in space, and not one deity among many. He alone existed from eternity. Everything else had a beginning.

Israel was repeatedly tempted to compromise with the polytheistic religions around it. Time after time, the prophets called the nation back to the worship of the one true God. Through Isaiah, God declared, “I am the LORD, and there is no other; apart from me there is no God” (Isaiah 45:5).

The God of Israel was understood to be eternal, immaterial, omnipresent, omniscient, omnipotent, and perfectly good. These are not properties material deities could possess.

That raises an obvious question. If Christians inherited this uncompromising belief in one God, how did they arrive at the doctrine of the Trinity?

John opens his Gospel with these words: “In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God” (John 1:1).

John then tells us that all things were made through the Word. The Word is distinguished from God, yet the Word is also called God. John 1:3 says all created things came into existence through Him. If all created things were made through the Word, then the Word Himself cannot belong to the class of created things.

Then John tells us, “The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us” (John 1:14). The eternal Son of God became incarnate as Jesus Christ.

RELATED: Don’t let ‘Disclosure Day’ doom you to spiritual death by discourse

The New Testament repeatedly presents the same pattern. At Jesus’ baptism, the Son stands in the water, the Spirit descends as a dove, and the Father speaks from heaven. The three are clearly distinguished from one another, yet elsewhere in Scripture the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are each identified as God.

Jesus commanded His disciples to baptize “in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit” (Matthew 28:19). Baptism is done in the name of God. Paul gives a Trinitarian benediction in 2 Corinthians 13:14. Jesus, the Lamb of God, sits on the throne of God.

Jesus also claimed an existence that preceded Abraham: “Before Abraham was, I am” (John 8:58). His words echo the divine name revealed to Moses. The Jews understood the implication and tried to stone Him for blasphemy. Elsewhere, they accused Him of making Himself equal with God.

Scripture also attributes personal qualities to the Holy Spirit. The Spirit teaches, speaks, guides, gives life, and can be grieved. He is not merely an impersonal force.

The early Christians therefore found themselves committed to three truths taught by Scripture:

There is only one God.The Father is God, the Son is God, and the Holy Spirit is God.The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are distinct from one another.

Deny any one of those truths, and you contradict the Bible.

Over the first several centuries, as pagan polytheists converted to Christianity or challenged it, the church debated how best to explain the doctrine of God from Scripture.

The Gnostics denied that Jesus was truly incarnate. They taught that He was a spirit who only appeared human. In doing so, they denied the incarnation.

Another early controversy involved Sabellius, who taught what later became known as modalism. According to this view, the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are merely different manifestations of the same divine person.

The church rejected this because Scripture repeatedly distinguishes the Father, Son, and Spirit from one another.

Then came Arius, who taught that the Father alone is eternal and that the Son is the first and greatest creature.

As Christians reflected on the biblical evidence, the church clarified its teaching: The Father is eternally unbegotten. The Son is eternally begotten of the Father. The Holy Spirit eternally proceeds from the Father and, in Western theology, from the Father and the Son.

The doctrine can be summarized simply: God is one “what” — one divine essence — and three “whos” — three distinct persons.

The church eventually summarized the biblical teaching as one God in three persons. Not one God and three gods. Not one person appearing in three forms. One God, three persons.

RELATED: Contentious theological debate erupts about Mormons over War Department faith list

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The doctrine of the Trinity is therefore not an arbitrary invention. Nor is it a concession to polytheism. It is precisely the opposite: a refutation of polytheism. The doctrine preserves the full teaching of Scripture and answers the questions Scripture itself forces us to ask about God.

What is striking is how often modern religious movements that spin off from Christianity repeat ancient errors. Some deny the full deity of Christ, as Arius did. Others collapse the distinctions among the persons, as Sabellius did. Still others deny Christ’s full humanity or full deity. Some even teach polytheistic material gods.

What has united Christians across denominations and centuries is their shared commitment to the biblical doctrine of God. By contrast, new religious movements often claim allegiance to Scripture while introducing another authority that corrects, supplements, or supersedes it.

When Jesus called people to believe in Him, He did not require them to master centuries of theological debate. But neither did He leave them free to invent their own Jesus. They were to believe true things about Him and reject false things about Him.

A person may sincerely use the name “Jesus” while holding beliefs about Him that contradict the Jesus revealed in Scripture. The issue is not sincerity but identity. Not, “What do I feel?” but, “What does the Bible say?”

The question is whether the Jesus a person believes in is the Jesus revealed in the Bible or a Jesus drawn from some other source.

The church’s long debates about the Trinity were not abstract philosophical exercises. They were answers to the most important question any person can ask: Who is Jesus Christ in the Bible?

​Bible, Christianity, Doctrine, Genesis, God, Jesus christ, Old testament, Opinion & analysis, Trinity, New testament, Faith 

Growing up in our house, prayer was non-negotiable. Before meals, before bed, and before tests. My mother prayed before she turned the ignition. Every single time. Backing out of the driveway to grab milk? A petition went up. Driving less than a mile to church? Another one. I rolled my eyes the way Hamlet brooded, often and at length.

I figured Mom was a soft touch for superstition. A nice lady with a nervous habit dressed up as theology. Turns out the habit was sound — and the theology even sounder.

You are not emptying the mind. If anything, you are spilling the contents before a higher power who already knew what was in there.

A recent study published in Religion, Brain & Behavior by researchers in Ireland looked at 628 middle-aged adults from the Midlife in the United States project, a long-running national study that has tracked the health of thousands of Americans since 1995.

They put participants through a standardized stress test and measured what their hearts and blood pressure did under pressure. They found that people who scored higher on private religious practices showed lower systolic blood pressure reactivity to the stressor.

Essentially, when life throws a curveball, the praying person’s heart absorbs the hit.

Religious but not spiritual

The researchers separated two things most people lump together: private religious practices (prayer, Scripture reading, devotion at home) and what they called daily spiritual experiences (a general sense of the sacred, feelings of connectedness, vague “spiritual” vibes). Only the first category, the one with actual prayer in it, produced the cardiovascular benefit.

This matters because the modern wellness industry has spent two decades trying to sell Americans on a defanged, deracinated version of spiritual practice. Meditation retreats. Mindfulness courses. Breath-work seminars at $400 a weekend. All of it positioned as the secular, sophisticated alternative to what your grandmother was doing for free with a worn King James Bible.

But prayer and meditation are not the same animal. The wellness industry would like you to believe they are interchangeable, two flavors of the same practice, both leading to lower cortisol and better sleep. That is a lie.

RELATED: Secular bias, fake faith — beware the new chatbot ‘Christianity’

Empty promise

Meditation, in its popular Western form, is largely about emptying the mind. You sit, you breathe, you observe your thoughts like passing strangers you owe nothing to, you achieve a kind of inner stillness.

The goal is detachment. You are training yourself to step back from your own mental chatter and watch it from a distance. The self is the subject, the object, and the audience all at once. If it works, you feel calmer. If it doesn’t, you feel like you spent 20 minutes wondering if you turned off the stove

Prayer is the opposite. Prayer is a conversation. There is a Person on the other end of the line, and that Person is listening. You are addressing someone, asking, thanking, confessing, repenting, interceding for your sister’s job interview. You are not emptying the mind. If anything, you are spilling the contents before a higher power who already knew what was in there.

Meditation looks inward. Prayer looks up. Meditation is a monologue performed for an audience of one, who is also the performer. Prayer is a dialogue with the Creator of the universe. Meditation assumes the cosmos is indifferent and that the best you can do is make peace with that.

One assumes you are a bundle of neurons talking to itself. The other assumes you are a soul talking to its Maker.

That difference is the whole game.

Praying together, staying together

And the benefits extend well beyond the cardiac. A 2016 systematic review examined a dozen randomized trials and found prayer reduced anxiety in mothers of children with cancer, helped chemotherapy patients cope, and improved spiritual well-being across the board.

Then there is collective prayer, which deserves its own paragraph. Something happens when believers gather and pray together that doesn’t happen alone in your kitchen.

A hospital-based study published in ScienceDirect documented measurable benefits among patients and staff at an outpatient clinic that began every workday with group prayer. The faithful have known this for 2,000 years. Fears that felt enormous at three in the morning shrink to a manageable size when spoken aloud in the presence of people who love you and a God who loves you more.

Burdens get distributed. A timid believer hears a confident prayer spoken aloud and realizes that confidence is available, not reserved. A confident believer hears someone else struggle to find words and remembers that brokenness is not a disqualification. The result is a kind of mutual restocking.

Kneeling and dealing

Which brings me to the deeper point. America is in a mental health crisis. Antidepressant prescriptions keep climbing. In 2023, loneliness was declared a public health emergency by the surgeon general himself. Suicide rates among the youth are at generational highs.

Pundits offer theories that include smartphones, social media, economic precarity, and polarization. All are real, but all are partial. The fuller explanation is the one your pastor has been preaching for years. You cannot evict God from a culture and expect the building to stand. A nation that traded the sanctuary for the self-help aisle was always going to drown in despair. There is a God-shaped hole in the modern Western psyche; stuffing it with meditation apps and microdoses is like trying to plug a dam with Kleenex.

Prayer is older than the problem. Prayer is bigger than the diagnosis. The studies show it, and Christians know it.

​Christianity, Health, Lifestyle, Meditation, Mental health, Mindfulness, Prayer, Science, Wellness, Faith 

Last month, another family requested I play “It Is Well with My Soul” for their loved one’s funeral.

After nearly 50 years of playing the piano for funeral services, I’ve lost count of how many times I’ve played that hymn.

The sorrows like sea billows are a given. They arrive for all of us eventually. The question is not whether suffering comes. The question is what we have been taught to do when it arrives.

Those years at the piano have provided an unusual vantage point. Most people attending a funeral spend the service looking toward the front of the sanctuary or chapel. They see the pastor, the flowers, the family, and the casket. Sitting at the piano, however, I’ve spent much of my life looking in the opposite direction.

I see the faces. I’ve watched businessmen, ranchers, physicians, pastors, politicians, mechanics, celebrities, schoolteachers, and grieving children. I’ve seen estranged family members share a pew for an hour. I’ve seen old wounds temporarily set aside. I’ve watched tears fall from people who spent a lifetime convincing the world they didn’t cry.

It’s hard to lie during a funeral service. The face and eyes give it away.

For a brief moment, the distractions of life are suspended in the face of death. Everyone in the room is confronted with the same reality: Life is fragile, time is limited, and something had the final word over a life that may have loomed very large only days before.

When I offer to help select the music, I often ask the family’s favorite hymn. “It Is Well with My Soul” almost invariably stands out.

This year marks 150 years since Philip Bliss set Horatio Spafford’s words to music. Ever since, grieving families have continued reaching for that hymn.

After hearing it and performing it for a lifetime, I’ve become convinced that something happens in the fifth measure where the word “sorrows” lands on the first minor chord of the hymn.

I leave room for that chord.

When I play the hymn, I take my time. I’ve had music ministers try to conduct me faster through it. I politely ignore them. Grief does not benefit from haste.

Not because I am trying to showcase the music, but because I have watched what happens in the room when people hear it. Heads lower. Shoulders sag. Eyes fill with tears. In that moment, the hymn permits grieving people to tell the truth.

The sea billows are rolling.

RELATED: What we lose when we rush past pain

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Sometimes, when I invite the congregation to sing, I watch people exhale. Some simply mouth the words. Others sing through tears. Some stand motionless and stare straight ahead. I’ve watched grieving fathers, mothers, and spouses raise their hands heavenward as tears run down their faces.

Occasionally, I stop playing altogether on the last chorus and let the congregation carry the hymn themselves. There is something profound about hearing a room full of grieving people give collective grief a collective voice.

The hymn was written from within great sorrow. It never hurries people through it. It doesn’t offer clichés or pretend pain isn’t pain.

It acknowledges sorrow while refusing to grant it the final word.

Then comes the line that has occupied my thoughts more than any other: “Whatever my lot, Thou hast taught me to say …”

Taught me.

The sorrows like sea billows are a given. They arrive for all of us eventually. The question is not whether suffering comes. The question is what we have been taught to do when it arrives.

What do we reach for when things around us feel so unsteady?

I’ve played this hymn for people who sang it with confidence and for people who could barely get the words out. I’ve watched some sing it as testimony and others sing it as prayer. Some seemed to embody it. Others seemed to aspire to it.

Yet, the requests keep arriving.

After nearly 50 years at the piano bench, I’ve never lost my sense of wonder at what happens when a room full of grieving people stand together and sing: It is well with my soul.

​Opinion & analysis, Funeral, Music, Philip bliss, Horatio spafford, Hymn, Christianity, Faith, Grief, Mourning, Soul 

In the beginning, there was a pool. It was green, and broken, and hemorrhaging millions of gallons a year into the soft earth beneath the National Mall. For decades, nobody fixed it.

America turns 250 this July. For a country that can’t agree on anything — especially about Donald Trump — what is reflected back isn’t always easy to look at.

‘It looks real good. And you know what, ‘scuse my French, but I f**king hate that.’

In preparation for the 250th celebration, the pool was drained, painted, and fenced off. It brought on lawsuits, court hearings, and more cable news segments than anyone expected from a paint job.

And then the water came back in. On June 4, the Lincoln Memorial Reflecting Pool refilled under a blazing June sun. Tourists, joggers, and D.C. regulars lined the steps of the Lincoln Memorial to watch the water rise.

The reflecting pool is the centerpiece of a broader $95 million push by the Trump administration to restore Washington ahead of the 250th. Under Executive Order 14252, “Making the District of Columbia Safe and Beautiful,” the National Park Service launched a sweeping effort to restore fountains, rehabilitate historic landscapes, and address aging infrastructure across the city.

The funds come not from the NPS’ congressional budget but from national park entrance fees — money the agency is legally permitted to redirect at its discretion.

More than 20 fountains that had sat dry for years — some for decades — are flowing again. The Columbus Circle fountain in front of Union Station was turned back on in late May for the first time since 2007. Meridian Hill Park’s cascading fountain — the longest in North America — is running again.

The reflecting pool is the latest in a series of restoration projects that have drawn surprisingly positive reactions across the city — even from residents who didn’t vote for Trump.

RELATED: The fountains in DC are back on. It turns out that decline was ‘a choice.’

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The pool was designed by architect Henry Bacon and completed in 1923 — a long, narrow mirror stretching almost 2,030 feet between the Lincoln Memorial and the Washington Monument. Trump compared the pool’s length to “skyscrapers.”

The nation’s reflecting pool has also been leaking for most of its existence. The original structure was built without pilings on the soft, dredged riverbed and started losing water almost immediately.

The Obama administration spent $34 million and closed the pool for nearly two years, rebuilding the structure with foundation support and installing a brand-new filtration system. The algae came back within a month. The leaks never stopped.

By the time Trump took office, Department of the Interior Secretary Doug Burgum said it was losing 45,000 gallons a day.

The Biden-era NPS received estimates “above $100 million” for another fix and didn’t move forward.

Trump ordered a different approach. Workers drained the pool, hauled away what he says were 12 truckloads of garbage, sealed the cracks, and replaced the filtration system with a state-of-the-art ozone nanobubbler — the first of its kind at the pool. Then, they coated the basin in what the president calls “American Flag Blue.”

When Trump first visited the drained pool on May 7, he said previous estimates to fix it had run as high as $355 million and 3.5 years. He initially said it would cost $1.8 million and take one week.

The contract was signed for almost $6.9 million — awarded to Atlantic Industrial Coatings, a Virginia firm, through an expedited no-bid process. The DOI later revised the timeline to a month and added $6.2 million, citing the urgency of the July 4 deadline.

It took six weeks. Federal contracting records show the final cost came to just under $14.2 million — more than eight times Trump’s 1.8 million estimate, yet roughly 4% of the $355 million he said it could have cost otherwise. Trump says the work will last 50 to 100 years.

“Our country is about beauty, cleanliness, safety, great people,” he told reporters who questioned why he was focused on the pool during a period of international tension. “Not a filthy capital.”

Trump drove his motorcade across the drained floor to inspect it personally. He also posted an AI image of himself and other Cabinet members swimming in it.

“It won’t leak; it will shine and be the pride of Washington, D.C., for decades to come,” said Trump.

RELATED: America 250 UFC event at risk: Anti-Trump group sues to shut down event on behalf of Democratic activists

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But the landscape architects and historic preservationists weren’t concerned about the preventable water loss. They were concerned about “American Flag Blue.”

“It wasn’t intended as a place that looks jolly like your local golf course,” said Judy Scott Feldman of the National Mall Coalition, a nonprofit that helps protect the area’s historic legacy. The Cultural Landscape Foundation filed suit, calling the project a “permanent blemish” that would turn a national landmark into a “theme park.”

The pool’s original bottom was dark asphalt and tile — not Obama’s 14-year-old tinted gray concrete that critics defended as “historic.” The NPS agreed that a darker bottom, like Trump’s dark navy, improves reflectivity.

An EarthCam time-lapse from the top of the Washington Monument shows what actually changed. The pool isn’t green any more. Trump’s new nanobubbler targets the algae, and the sealant addresses the leaking joints that the Obama renovation didn’t.

One problem reportedly remains: two miles of cracked underground pipes that, if they fail, could shut down the filtration system and bring the algae back. The Trump administration says pipe replacement will begin in the fall.

Blaze News went out to the National Mall and asked five people what they thought.

A resident who has run the Mall route for six years barely broke stride. “I didn’t like the construction, so I started running the Jefferson Memorial way. Honestly, I don’t even care who did it. It was Trump, right? I’m not really political — I work in tech. It looks fine.”

A 13-year-old on his school trip said his class had studied the “I Have a Dream” speech just weeks before. “I didn’t know the pool was broken. I just thought it was always like this.”

A retired couple from Western Pennsylvania had been here before — once for the Bicentennial in 1976 and twice since 2023. He pointed to their matching MAGA hats. “We promised to come back only to Trump’s Washington,” he said, “and seeing it completed makes me feel more patriotic than I already was.”

Not everyone Blaze News spoke with voted for Trump. In 2024, Washington, D.C., voted more than 92% for Kamala Harris.

A college junior interning on Capitol Hill had watched the construction drag on through her first weeks in the city. “I tried walking by here to romanticize, you know, my D.C. hot-girl summer,” she said. “The construction was low-key annoying. Our office has been talking about it, and besides the fact that it seems, yet again, like just another one of Trump’s pet projects, I wouldn’t go as far as to say it looks bad.”

A lifelong resident who works in education stopped at the edge of the pool, looked out at the water, and said: “I’m not going to give that man credit. I’m just not. But it does look good. It looks real good. And you know what, ‘scuse my French, but I f**king hate that.”

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​Blaze news, Capitol hill, Donald trump, Education, Kamala harris, Lincoln memorial, Reflecting pool, Union station, Politics 

While the transgender movement has lost significant ground culturally and politically in recent years, it’s still probing for vulnerabilities — especially during Pride Month.

In a recent interview with women’s sports advocate and founder of XX-XY Athletics Jennifer Sey, Steve Deace highlighted a recent example: In California high school track and field, biological male athlete AB Hernandez (who identifies as transgender) has dominated the girls’ high jump and triple jump at state championships, leading to a California Interscholastic Federation policy where displaced biological girls are forced to share the top podium spot and co-champion status with him.

“You’re on the front lines of this battle. What do you think?” Deace asked Sey.

Sey believes that the transgender agenda has been “pushed back,” but it’s far from being defeated.

She explains that while 27 states currently have laws keeping women’s sports for biological females only, a pending Supreme Court decision this June will determine if those protections are constitutional. She expects the court to uphold them, but emphasizes that this victory would only apply to those 27 states. The remaining 23 states, which prioritize gender identity over biological sex, would still allow biological males to compete in girls’ sports.

In other words, even a favorable ruling from SCOTUS doesn’t end the fight nationwide.

“So we still have a ton of work to do,” she says.

That work, she argues, needs to focus on “[changing] the culture.”

“Seventy to 80% of Americans agree … that women’s sports should be for women … but I don’t think we’ve made meaningful progress in getting that 80% to stand up and say what they believe,” says Sey.

“All right, so how do we do that?” Deace asks.

As for her, Sey plans to “keep producing content, keep encouraging people to stand up and say what they think, to stand up and say the most commonsense thing that there is, which is that men and women are different.”

With every person who speaks this truth, the stronger the “permission structure” becomes in the broader culture, she argues.

“Yes, we need legislation. We need state legislation; we need national legislation to reify Title IX. But I think when we win the cultural battle is when we actually win,” she tells Deace.

He agrees and reiterates the need for people to have enough courage to endure public shaming if necessary — especially “dads at school board meetings” and “young women [willing] to say, ‘I refuse to take part in this charade.’”

Sey agrees that men specifically need to join the movement. “We need way more men in this fight. … We need moms to do it too, but dads have been particularly absent in this fight.”

While she agrees that young female athletes should take a stand for their own rights, she is unwilling to ask them to forgo competing in order to make a statement.

“How do I tell a 14-year-old girl that she needs to do it when a professional athlete with all the money in the world won’t do it because she’s afraid of losing endorsements?” she asks.

“These [professional athletes] are women with enough power and enough influence, and they pull enough dollars in for these brands that I’d be willing to bet that the brands won’t fire them,” Sey continues.

“I want to put the pressure on them more than these 14-year-old girls. They’re the leaders.”

To hear more, watch the episode above.

Want more from Steve Deace?

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​Steve deace show, Steve deace, California, Men in women’s sports, Jennifer sey