Addressing my fellow citizens of the United States: Let’s consider how our founding fathers understood happiness and the purpose and role of the federal government. And as we do, also consider how well the societies of the top 11 happiest nations correlate with the happiness understood by those founding fathers.
I walked out of our church in ritual silence with the procession at twilight and was met—stunned—by the radiant face of the nearly full moon. I started to weep. Especially tired this particular Maundy Thursday, I was hit by the welling up of unprocessed emotion from a particularly hard year.
(The following is the speech delivered in Paris at the launching of the French Translation of Jesus for the Non-Religious.)
How can those of us living in …