On History Not Ending
It’s a cute and annoying title because of course it’s a reference to Fukuyama, but I didn’t even realize that until I typed it. What I was referring to is what has been haunting me (and probably you) for the...
Scott Alexander, the Hitpiece, and the Limits of Inquiry
In certain moods I think that one of the greatest current social fights is the fight against the Grey Tribe ascendency, against the let’s-regard-humans-and-society-as-an-amoral-optimization-experiment approach to life. There are certain versions of this that are at the center of the...
The Time is Near
I’ve never written about this before, but today is the first Sunday of Advent, and it’s also both C.S. Lewis’ and Madeleine L’Engle’s birthday, and so I am going to try to describe something – at least to start. I...
American Solidarity Party: Don’t Throw Away Your Shot
Why not vote for a candidate you can actually support? Brian Carroll and Amar Patel, the American Solidarity Party ticket, are on the ballot in eight states; you can write them in in all other states. They’re a party that...
Attention: a Breaking Ground Newsletter
This is the text of this week’s Breaking Ground newsletter. To view the website, and to sign up for the newsletter, go here. If, in January, we thought that we had transcended the limits of our physicality, we know better...
TONIGHT: 7:30 EDT: Hauerwas, Danticat, Christman, and a New Cocktail!
Good afternoon! Tonight, join Stanley Hauerwas, Edwidge Danticat, and Phil Christman for the launch of Plough Quarterly’s special “Regeneration” issue, focusing on COVID and what lies ahead. Hosted by KGB Red Room on Manhattan’s Lower East Side, this event is...
The King of Social Distancing, c. 1665
In what will be surely the first of too many posts consisting of excerpts from Daniel Defoe’s Journal of the Plague Year, I would like to introduce you to an unnamed man who is an example to all of us...
Ashes
Christ walks the world again, His lute upon His back, His red robe rent to tatters, His riches gone to rack, The wind that wakes the morning blows His hair about His face, His hands and feet are ragged with...
Auschwitz
The only Auschwitz survivor I knew well was my friend Claire Fiala. She died about 18 months ago; she was my neighbor, and I spent a couple of winters shoveling her walk, until, in the last two years of her...
The Political Theology of Brunch: a Post in Honor of the Season
Among the many reasons for my affection for the 16th c. German political philosopher and jurist Johannes Althusius is this: He gets specific, to a degree that may be fanciful but is endlessly fascinating, about the commonality between different levels of political...