{‘O} ur hearts are so tender. All of our emotions right at the surface. Laughter. Tears. Closer than ever.”

Those come from the new season of The Chosen. If you haven’t heard of it yet — it’s about Jesus and His apostles — do consider going to see it. Angel Studios has it in theaters now instead of streaming it as it had done during Covid.

Whatever your faith, it hits to the core of life.

“Should we avoid dark places out of fear? Or should we be light to them?” Jesus, portrayed by the actor Jonathan Roumie, asks. Once the question is posed, if we don’t start doomscrolling on our phones, we know the answer.

I confess I cried in the best of ways while watching the first three episodes the night before its release.

Roumie and the actress who plays Mary Magdalene stopped by before the preview I attended in Manhattan. Whoopi Goldberg did as well. I found that absurdly profound. If you ever watch ABC’s The View and read my column, you might have the sense that the talk show’s hosts and I are not on the same page on several issues. And yet there is something uniting about Scripture. And humanity. Which is part of why The Chosen is a beautiful contribution to our cultural lives. (Roumie was on The View earlier in the day and Goldberg — and others on the panel — shared their fondness for the series.)

The Chosen resonates because of the humanity of its characters. It’s not preaching. It’s witnessing to living life with all its challenges — even including infertility.

Watching the start of the new season, I couldn’t help but think of the recent March for Life in Washington, D.C. I’ve been going for decades and was not sure how many people might come two years after the end of Roe v. Wade. It was overwhelming to see how many young people — still — were at Masses and the March and associated events. For the second year in a row, I spoke at a conference of Ivy League students who met the day after the March. My panel, again, was about life after the Dobbs decision. And yet again my encounter with students was a balm to my soul.

At first, they wanted to know about politics and what grand strategies we propose to somehow make things better (my fellow panelists were a former Democratic congressman and Republican White House official). We all know politics and media after the end of Roe has been a mess. It’s not a winning political issue, we are told (and see it play out in state elections) — even if it is the human-rights issue of our lifetimes.

As the students asked about strategy, the bipartisan panel pivoted to real life. Live virtue. Get married — and do it when you are young if you can. Have babies. That’s what’s going to change our culture. One young man pushed back a bit. He agreed — he wanted those things — but ran through a litany of obstacles in the air we breathe. Our panel was at the Museum of the Bible in D.C., and I couldn’t help but think that was no coincidence.

In one of the first episodes of the new season of The Chosen, there is an exchange — and moving encounter — about forgiveness. Jesus tells Matthew that forgiveness is a gift. You don’t apologize to get forgiveness. You apologize to repent. The forgiveness part is not a given. Everyone has freedom in their responses. Regardless, repenting is the right thing to do.

I apologized to the Ivy League students of the David Network on behalf of the Catholic Church. We have teachings about what is good and beautiful that have been downplayed in recent decades. And that hurts people — because we all could otherwise benefit from them.

There is much for us to repent for. The sexual revolution is a big one. Not because sex isn’t a good, but because family life is just about the most important thing we have. And all our personal and community relationships and civil society and public policies must be about supporting families. And it is no breaking news that that is not the case. And it’s unconscionable that even churches have fallen short.

One of the blessings of The Chosen is the reminder that the Bible is not just some book but a historic reality that speaks to every minute of our life.

The next time you read a headline about abortion, think about that and about how you and I can be better neighbors, friends, and relatives. It’s so much more important than who the next president will be. And we should never forget the pain of abortion and how tender our hearts are whatever we are living and suffering. Our politics don’t often acknowledge or reflect that. But we need meet one another in that reality.

This column is based on one available through Andrews McMeel Universal’s Newspaper Enterprise Association.