Thirty years ago, with the demise of the Soviet Union, there was euphoria in the west. It seemed that constitutional democracy was destined to prevail throughout the world. But democracy has been declining for years now and the worldwide response to the COVID pandemic has brought it to profound crisis. Collectivism is roaring back into the picture. The warning signs came thick and fast after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Within three years genocidal conflicts had broken out in…..
Pope Francis’s social and political message has clear affinities with Joe Biden’s democratic Catholic vision, according to Massimo Faggioli in his book, Joe Biden and Catholicism in the United States,[1] released on the day of Biden’s presidential inauguration. This convergence is not coincidental. Francis’s encyclical on human fraternity, Fratelli Tutti, was published last year “so as to appear ahead of the American election.”[2] Francis was attempting to influence the American election in favour of Biden, the Catholic candidate with agreeable policies. Biden’s election was…..
America stands at the crossroads according to a recent call for national renewal: “Liberty and Justice for All.”[1] One of the initial signatories is George Weigel, who suggests that it is “worth reading carefully” and that it “should be especially appealing to Catholics serious about the social doctrine of the Church.”[2] Weigel’s prescriptions deserve our close attention as they are similar to those he has expressed previously,[3] and which pose threats to America’s free society.[4] Weigel states that “Liberty and Justice for All”…..
In recent months the world has experienced heightened anxiety and crisis over climate change and COVID-19. At times of extremity, extreme ideas that have long been excluded from the public square, can make a comeback and this is what is happening in relation to the American constitution. While these extreme ideas are getting some media attention, COVID-19 is taking precedence. Still, the ideas have the potential to impact the civil and religious liberties of Americans, after COVID-19, in ways…..
The Western tradition of freedom of speech is increasingly under threat in academia, media and politics. This is the claim of Andrew Michta in a recent piece in The American Interest.[1] Michta is concerned that the West is “at an inflection point on free speech, and it’s not clear which way things will go on this issue in the next 20 or 30 years.” Michta’s concluding sentences reveal what he considers to be at stake in the declining commitment to freedom…..
Throughout 2018 democracy has been a constant theme in the political commentary of the west.[1] Illiberalism is rising and it presents a serious challenge to American and world democracy. In a section of Chapter One of It’s Sunday in America entitled “Mobilizing Christian Heritage,” I included a brief assessment of the dangers of illiberal democracy to the religious liberties of minorities.[2] This was in the broader context of mobilizing Christian heritage to preserve western civilisation. I gave two examples of mobilizing Christian…..
An intriguing piece byPeter Leithart entitled “Sabbath Deification” recently appeared in First Things, an American ecumenical journal of religion and public life.[1]For Leithart the Sabbath command in Exodus 20:8-11 is a case of Father-son talk, based upon God’s directive to Pharaoh in Exodus 4:23 to let His son (Israel) go. Leithart states, Sabbath-keeping is more an elevation than an obligation. It speaks of Israel’s filial participation in paternal privileges. Sabbath is a sign of Israel’s deification. Joseph Ratzinger’s…..
I was on study leave in late 1989 when the Soviet satellite states in eastern Europe fell like dominoes, so I had the opportunity to follow events closely. I was amazed at the speed of the great unravelling. Within two years the USSR disintegrated. The liberal democracies had triumphed in the Cold War. The euphoria in the West was immense. To many observers liberal democracy was destined to become the dominant form of government in the world, albeit with…..
This year, as Americans celebrate Independence Day on the Fourth of July, there is evidence that the spirit of independence is eroding particularly among American millennials (those born after 1981). Yascha Mounk reveals that data drawn largely from the World Values Survey shows that less than one-third of millennials say it’s essential for them to live in a democracy, compared with more than two-thirds of people born in the 1930s and 1940s.[1]Twenty years ago six percent of young affluent Americans…..
The conservative commentator, David French, recently drew attention to the big “God gap” between Republicans and Democrats, reported in a Pew Research Center survey.[1]While 70 percent of Republicans believe in the God of the Bible, the Democrats are much lower at 45 percent. Yet there is an even larger God gap within the Democratic party — 32 percent of white Democrats compared with 61 percent of nonwhite Democrats. French discusses the fragmenting effects of the people, black and white,…..