The Human Condition
-
The Crisis of the Liberal Order, Part II
And that is not all: even if man really were nothing but a piano-key, even if this were proved to him by natural science and mathematics, even then he would not become reasonable, but would purposely do something perverse out of simple ingratitude, simply to gain his point. And if he does not find means
-
The Crisis of the Liberal Order, Part I
I've pleaded here for years that the political sphere should not be the place to arbitrate cultural issues. In a pluralistic society, the political should focus on practical policy concerns, things like healthcare, energy and transportation infrastructure, and wealth distribution. In the cultural sphere, the rule should be simply to live and let live–as much
-
Naive Idealism
During the Enlightenment, it became commonplace among the smart set to think of confessional religion as a force for evil. They had good reason to think it. The 17th Century saw some of the worst violence and the worst kind of crimes committed in the belief that its perpetrators were fighting God's fight. But whatever
-
Heroes of the Fourth Turning
I have just read Will Arbery's intriguing play. I haven't seen it on stage. I read an interview with Arbery in Vox, which motivated me to purchase the play.which I read the other day. I come out of the Catholic world, and this blog represents what I hope is an intellectually coherent presentation of a
-
America’s Religious Future
No wonder the newly ascendant American ideologies, having to fill the vacuum where religion once was, are so divisive. They are meant to be divisive. On the left, the “woke” take religious notions such as original sin, atonement, ritual, and excommunication and repurpose them for secular ends. Adherents of wokeism see themselves as challenging the