Liberalism

Jealousy, love, and punishment are not bad ways of understanding the rise in both government-based religious discrimination and societal religious discrimination, as Jonathan Fox shows in his newest book, Thou Shalt Have No Other Gods Before Me: Why Governments Discriminate against Religious Minorities.

A theologian’s task in time of plague is to show the light and give people hope. In recent years, many of us trained as theologians have traded our office for that of the pundit and scold. That we have so little worthwhile to say now, in this unprecedented time of fear and uncertainty, is yet one more sign of judgment.

If we are going to get anywhere in this debate about liberalism, we should take on the strongest arguments from our opponents and not their weakest or most caricatured. While I do not think Christians should see liberal democracy as the enemy, I do think its critics often have a point.

Nationalism should form the bonds of social contract in any great power, and should not just be an idea that is despised by the far-left and usurped by the far-right.

The confounding of contentious liberal theories with actual concrete polities stems from the assumption that liberal democratic states are somehow the product of liberal theories.

In the fate of Egypt and its Christians, we should read one crucial fact: neither democratic nor authoritarian governance delivered anything resembling equal citizenship.

From a liberal Augustinian perspective, Christians should affirm several liberal institutions, such as the separation of church and state, religious tolerance, and a number of individual rights. Beyond that, it’s over to the considerations of wisdom. And democracy, best I can tell, remains the best of the worst.

Drag queen story hour (DQSH) occupied the debate between David French and Sohrab Ahmari. So how should Christians respond?

I am grateful that the post-liberal, nationalist right has grown more explicit about its antipathy to core tenets of classical…