Angels surround us all the time — figuratively if not literally — especially during the holidays. They appear in paintings, etchings, figurines, T-shirts, posters and just about everything else.

Across many old stories, angels seem so close to humans yet always just out of reach. They appear in visions, stand beside ...

“The louder he talked of his honor, the faster we counted our spoons.” That’s how Ralph Waldo Emerson described his distrust of a certain type of “private adventurer.” I think of that whenever I hear ...