Centering our national politics on the culture wars is unhelpful because in the end it simply is not cut out for this. The optimal jurisdictional sphere for resolving many of our cultural battles will be localities, not states. Localities must be empowered boldly to operate and experiment within the immense gray areas that the [...]
In “The City of God,” Augustine systematically lays bare the empty ideology of the city of man and the Roman empire in a breathtaking counter-narrative that remains remarkably modern and relevant for today. In contrast to the city of man, the City of Love, Augustine argues, is the godly city to which Christians belong [...]
The battle for civilization requires knowledge of what is at its roots. Our digital culture is good for providing access, though of a precarious kind, to such knowledge. The battle also requires, however, habits of reading, listening, watching, thinking, and reflecting that are cultivated best in a non-digital environment. We are in a cold [...]
Easter’s supposed pre-Christian spring ritual roots are an opportunity to make the feast simply about bunnies, spring flowers, and eggs—all signs of spring without any of that obnoxious cross or empty tomb nonsense. Yet, the idea that Christians added Christ to a pre-existing Easter is standing on incredibly shaky ground. It is a well-known [...]
In his latest book, Yuval Levin presents irrefutable evidence of America’s weakening attachment to its core institutions of family, community, voluntary associations, religions, and political parties. His goal, however, is to move beyond today’s ideological culture war and show how commitment to institutions puts us on an edifying path to belonging, social status, personal [...]
Understanding who we are is an essential question to culture because the answer we give to that question affects how we understand our history, identity, and the symbolism—sacred and secular—that goes with it. Yet, there are many conservatives who have not the slightest inkling of this phenomenon. What is culture? “Culture War” has reentered [...]
They held a meeting and they said They could no longer tolerate His portrait peering down while they were fed With college food and facts that led to hate; Quite frankly, there’d be no debate – And as to motive, there would be no mystery; They wouldn’t burn it, but they’d put it in [...]
The divisions among Virginians are not only over history, heroes and guns, they are also moral and religious. A new secession is underway. Virginians are separating from each other over issues as deep and divisive — such as who can take innocent life and when — as those that divided us in 1861. Since 1969, [...]
Signs within the developing culture from the 1950s indicated, even then, a new confusion about sexual identity. From the dawn of time a man was defined as a father, or potential father. A woman was a mother, or potential mother. The whole delicate dance of courtship and sexual relationships circled around the undeniable link [...]
Chick-fil-A’s decision to stop donating to the Salvation Army and the Fellowship of Christian Athletes last month was met with a lot of anger on the part of conservatives and Christians because it was seen as a betrayal of a large portion of its customer base, many of whom were fans of the place [...]
Drag Queen story hour is actually not the worst part about public libraries these days. The worst part is that these days you can’t actually take your kids to the library and simply let them check out books on their own. So what to do? The intra-conservative battle over liberal institutions and their relation [...]
If America is polarized and directionless today, it is partly due to the cultural revolution that emanated from Woodstock. The solution is not to recreate Woodstock fifty years later, but to reject it as the cultural and moral disaster that it was. Woodstock represented what America would eventually become—a broken and dysfunctional society. It shows [...]
The impetuous call to sack Roger Scruton shows those who clamored for the blade of the guillotine to fall on his head for what they are. His sacking also exposed the concerted effort to demonize and silence anyone outside the public orthodoxy of thought... Sir Roger Scruton is one of the preeminent conservative intellectuals in [...]
Many liberals maintain that they themselves are victims. Where does this belief come from? And why would anyone want to be a victim? To understand the origins of victimhood, we must understand the work and thought of Jean-Jacques Rousseau, the godfather and patron saint of liberalism… Candace Owens, an African American woman, is a [...]