“It is quite possible—certain, in fact—that some parents sitting across the aisle might know more about what’s going on with you and your kid than you do. You might not know that your kid is a pill, and the person sitting across from you at church might not know your kid’s middle name—but he can still see that the kid is a pill. We need people looking at the back of our head”
A Two-Bucket Woman
Introduction: One time in the 19th century, an aristocratic woman sniffed at the idea of an invitation to receive Christ at the end of a church service. “I don’t need to go down to the front ...
Maybe the Whole Narrative is Wrong
“How many times can the masses be shocked out of their conformist stupor before we begin to wonder whether they were ever in a conformist stupor to start with?”
Nation of Rebels, p. 95
Sounds Like Fun
“The goal is to have civilization and the kingdom of God become more and more synonymous and harder and harder to tell apart.”
A National Review Contretemps
Introduction: Brian Mattson has done me the honor of engaging with my recent interactions with the French/Ahmari debate. And what I would like to do, weather permitting, is engage right back. He did this over at National Review at the Corner, and you can read all about it here. My two most recent posts on …
Audio Reading of Post
Somebody Send Him My Dad’s Bitterness Booklet
Which Would be Inaccurate
“One way of articulating the central idea of the counterculture is simply to say that it collapsed the distinction between deviance and dissent (or, more accurately, that it began treating all deviance as dissent).”
Nation of Rebels, p. 80
The Foundation of Christian Civilization
‘Paideia was one of those huge words in the ancient world, and it referred to the enculturation of a child so that he could take his place as a citizen in the polis. In other words, paideia referred to an all-encompassing, civilization-making reality. Paul is using the word to refer to something very similar [in Eph. 6:4]”
Because the Feminists Tore Down Chesterton’s Fence
“For example, during the 60’s, many of the social norms that governed relationships between the sexes came under sustained criticism. Traditional male ‘gallantry’ involved showing a somewhat exaggerated concern for the health and well-being of women: opening doors for them, offering them one’s coat during inclement weather, paying for their meals, and so forth. Feminism argued that these norms, far from helping women, served only to reinforce the conviction that they were helpless and unable to care for themselves . . . Men took the criticism of the older male obligations as a license to do whatever they wanted. This gave rise to the widely noted epidemic of boorishness (or, as the English like to say, ‘yobbishness’) in the male population. Rather than finding alternative ways of expressing concern and respect for women, a lot of men have simply stopped paying any attention to the needs of women at all. For these men, equality means ‘I look after myself, she looks after herself’”
Nation of Rebels, p. 80
An Exercise in Missing the Point
“Imagine a four-lane highway, with two lanes going opposite ways, two to Heaven, two to Hell. A Ford and a Chevy are on the two lanes going to Heaven, and on the two lanes going to Hell are a Ford and a Chevy. We live in perverse time, such that when the Fords pass, the drivers beep and wave at each other. Same thing with the Chevys. The cars going in different directions might feel a real sense of solidarity, since they have the same kind of vehicle, but they are going in completely different directions”