Thanks to all my newsletter friends for your support over the last year of faith-beat adventures. Here are the best stories I wrote and read in 2017.

My best work

5. Briefs filed in Supreme Court case describe harm experienced by LGBTQ community

4. What a meditating Mormon has to do with the future of faith

3. Serving God by suing others: Inside the Christian conservative legal movement

2. The long road to a religious freedom victory for Sikhs in the U.S. Army

1. Finding God in the national parks

My favorite discoveries

5. How an American ex-jihadi struggled to rebuilt his life in the country he’d once vowed to destroy, New Republic

4. Jewish rituals are the hot new thing in wellness, BuzzFeed News

3. The perfect holiday for a rootless 20-something, The Washington Post

2. As the State Fair changes, the last church food stand clings to tradition, Des Moines Register

1. Half-full of grace, Los Angeles Review of Books