Dear Friends,
I am going to write something encouraging for you by the end of this newsletter, I promise.
Last Sunday David Bahnsen wrote a lengthy postmortem—a measured, honest, and fair assessment—of the Trump Presidency, and then suggested a path forward for conservative-minded people. I highly recommend you set aside some time to read and digest it. As final assessments go, I don’t think it can be improved.
My own final assessment is shorter. Almost five years ago, when I watched in bewilderment as smart conservative Christians latched on to Donald Trump as their “Cyrus the Great,” God’s bare-knuckled man of the hour, come to protect us from the progressive forces of the left, I said to anyone who would listen:
“This will not end well.”
Not only has Donald Trump now managed to hand the reins of legislative and executive power to the forces of the progressive left with his pre and post-election antics, he also managed to utterly enrage them on his way out the door. And the only targets left standing for the inevitable political and cultural reprisals, retribution, recrimination, and backlash, is anyone and everyone who latched on to him—and those of us guilty by mere political association. Even I didn’t think the “Cyrus the Great, Our Protector” gambit could end that badly.
A Christian gentleman from France made a rather chilling comment during a Zoom meeting I attended. In France, when the State coercively cracks down on “religion,” they typically have in mind radical Muslim groups. Now into their popular imagination has been injected the image of people storming the U.S. Capitol building waving “Jesus” flags. That should make you squirm. Badly done, everyone.
Batten down the hatches. There is a storm arriving shortly—which I remain confident we will weather. It only took two days for the U.S. Government to start funding abortions around the globe, mandate that boys can compete against girls in sports and share their locker rooms, and cancel a pipeline project that’s been in the works for well over a decade and employed thousands of people because that will somehow save the planet from existential crisis. Well, what did you expect? Progressives are going to “progress.” And I’ll continue to be here, standing athwart, yelling “Stop!”
There are people on the right who think the way forward is recriminations of our own, to now purge leaders who were insufficiently loyal to President Trump—you know, get rid of Liz Cheney and Mitt Romney and Ben Sasse. With all due respect, that’s what I call doubling down on insanity. I’ll go with the folks who saw the situation clearest and acted with integrity, thank you.
Weight of the World
I’ve received the question more than once, “Brian, what can we do?”
Stop carrying the weight of the world on your shoulders.
At least two poisonous ideas have infected our society: First, that everything is and should be a political power struggle and that we all individually must be perpetually engaged in it—us versus them, who’s in power and who’s out, who’s the oppressor and who’s the oppressed. For way too many people, to be patriotic means one must spend every waking moment “owning the libs” on Twitter, or expressing outrage at the double standards and bias of mainstream media. I can think of nothing more fruitless and exhausting. If it’s bias and double standards you’re after, the supply is never ending. Your energy is not. On the other side, too, it is your full-time obligation to be “woke” and promoting “social justice,” and—I’m not kidding—your “silence” on any outrage of the day is taken as “violence.” I’m exhausted just thinking about living like that.
Do you know one of the greatest benefits of having a representative government? Why we send Congressmen and Congresswomen and Senators to Washington, D.C.? So that we don’t have to exhaust ourselves in politics. We send them to do that. The whole point of our system is to free us up to engage in the “pursuit of happiness”—enterprise, commerce, education, art, family, church, community, and leisure.
If you don’t believe me, here is John Adams explaining it to his French hosts.
I am not suggesting for a moment that politics is unimportant or irrelevant. I am suggesting that your role in all of that is so small and so limited that your attention to it is likely wildly out of proportion. Let’s be honest: you vote. That’s about the extent of your involvement. Some people have platforms and roles that enable them to speak on political topics to wide and/or influential audiences, but that is a very small number of people. Owning libs or dunking on media personalities on Twitter may feel like you’re actually doing something. You’re not moving any needle at all.
It is okay to turn it off. I’m actually begging you to turn it off. No more Tucker or Sean or Rachel or Don or Jake or Andrew on the cable networks—they make their money, piles of it, keeping you anxiety-ridden and addicted to outrage. Attend to your business. Literally your business, if you’re a business owner. Taken figuratively, I mean attend to your family, your church, and your neighborhood and community. Our national politics is a symptom, not a cure, of our cultural and social problems on the ground-floor level. And do you know where you have the biggest role to play—where you do a lot more than just vote? On the ground-floor level. Right here in the place God has put you. With maybe the exception of a few readers, that is not likely Washington D.C. Plant a garden, read books, raise godly and well-rounded and thoughtful kids. I’m not saying ignore politics: I am encouraging you to keep it in its proper limits. We live in a land of freedom yet fail to exercise that for which we have freedom—we’re too busy scrolling in the mind-stultifying cesspool of political social media. This is no way to live. Switch to Instagram and post a picture of a meal you made or the book you’re reading.
The fate of the Republic does not rest on your shoulders.
The second poisonous idea: this political power struggle is always on the knife’s edge of catastrophe. This “catastrophizing” of politics on the right has been around my whole life; for me, it really got started with Bill Clinton, ramped up again for Barack Obama, Hillary, and so on. Michael Anton’s famous 2016 “Flight 93 Election” essay injected straight-up epinephrine into this paranoia—that the country will crash if Hillary is elected, so we must “storm the cabin” and vote for Donald Trump. In retrospect, it was sort of a Flight 93 Election: we stormed the cabin and now we’ve crashed an entire political party.
There are cultural pressures; there are bad agendas; there are things to resist and oppose. I mean, President Biden’s first two days looks like he’s going to go for the whole Progressive wish list. There are times when one side or the other seems to be “winning,” but we really should take a broader view of what that means. There is no such thing as winning the political war, just as there is no such thing as losing the political war. We live in a Republic, a vast and diverse nation that isn’t going to see eye to eye on everything. Ever, this side of glory. Politics can move the football a bit, win a public policy battle or two; as I’ve said before, it is a game played between the 40 yard lines—okay, maybe these days it’s even the 35 or 30. There might even be some long passes that connect for the Biden Administration, but we tend to hyperventilate overmuch about those. I was told that the Affordable Care Act (the last Democrat Party long bomb that really connected) was going to usher in single-payer socialism.
One of the things I’ve been doing off and on during the Trump years is reading Ronald Reagan’s White House diaries. Did you know that he kept a handwritten account of nearly every day he spent in office, for eight years? I’ve learned a lot about the man, and have grown in my admiration for him. But the thing that has struck me most is how perennial America’s political issues are. Same issues, year after year, decade after decade, the exact same “trouble spots” around the globe, the same worries about terrorism, socialism, race relations, police violence (yes, really), the economy, you name it. One of the most bizarre things is to discover that events of forty years ago involved the same people of today! Joe Biden shows up quite a bit, for example. (Boy, our political class is sclerotic.) Understanding the substantial continuity of our political system and our political issues over time helps to immunize one from the impulse toward catastrophe.
Are there bad periods of time when bad policies are pursued? Sure. But we are not living in unprecedented times, at least politically speaking. Even the rise of radicalism on the left is hardly new. 1960s, anyone? Anyway: Executive Orders that skirt the legislative process are terrible. Until the next guy writes new ones. “Living Constitutionalist” judges are bad, in my view of things, but there aren’t exactly a ton of openings for new judges thanks to a newly re-stocked judiciary of lifetime appointees. The Democrat majority in the legislative houses are razor-thin with little margin for error. Add to that the likelihood that Biden and Company will greatly overreach, get way out ahead of their skis, prompting a backlash the next time voters have a say. I’m not promising smooth sailing, by any means. But I will ask you to think back to every promise of political catastrophe you’ve heard in your life and honestly answer how it panned out. I will tell you the honest answer in advance: not anywhere near as bad as the people seeking my urgent donation promised it would.
To reiterate: The fate of the Republic does not rest on your shoulders.
Attend to what does rest on your shoulders. Not the whole world. Just your square footage and those within and around it. That is where your efforts, however insignificant they seem, will bear longterm fruit for God’s glory and the good of your neighbors and nation.
Miscellany
If you want to read more about some of the themes of this particular newsletter, I highly recommend getting a copy of Senator Ben Sasse’s book, Them: Why We Hate Each Other & How To Heal. This is not your typical book by a politician—meaning, a ghost-written litany of public policy proposals. It is a book by a learned and wise man, who really, really understands our society and cultural moment. Much of my own thinking is indebted to him, and I think he can open your eyes to a great number of things, too.
This is pretty cool. Western civilization hasn’t been all bad.
Speaking of England, I watched Master & Commander: Far Side of the World recently, and here’s a scene that dovetails nicely with what I’m getting at. You want to make a huge difference in the culture war? Understand that your home is your field of action. As Jack Aubrey stirringly puts it: “This ship is England.”
Still arguing with “Stolen Election” friends, or are one yourself? Henry Olsen explains things for you here, if you take the time to listen. Also, Alan Jacobs has compiled a list of resources on the topic.
An amazing thing happened to me this week. I’ve been prepping a class on the Doctrine of Christ, and I’ve been a bit overwhelmed by it. The other night I was having a dream, and in my dream I remembered that I had once taught a full semester adult Sunday School class on Christology. When I awoke in the morning, I wondered if I was imagining it all because I don’t remember teaching such a class. I opened up my Dropbox (which I rarely use) and, Lo and Behold! A folder entitled, “Doctrine of Christ.” Full of my own lecture notes. My current self is grateful to God and my former self for their remarkable foresight; and to my subconscious self for its remarkable hindsight.
This week a viral phenomenon broke out on TikTok (whatever that is) of people singing 19th century “sea shanties.” I wholeheartedly approve.
Thank you so much for this analysis. Praise God for your words and your faithfulness!
Yes! Good post. And Tic-toc!!