"In other words, our form of government has no sense unless it is founded in a deeply felt religious faith, and I don't care what it is"
-Dwight D. Eisenhower (Address at the Freedoms Foundation, Waldorf-Astoria, New York City, New York, 12/22/1952)

"All of us in the West are a goldfish, and the water that we swim in is Christianity, by which I don’t necessarily mean the confessional form of the faith, but, rather, considered as an entire civilisation.”
    -INTERVIEW: Tom Holland interview: ‘We swim in Christian waters’: The faith of the Church transformed the West — and the entire world (Andrew Brown, 9/27/19, Church Times)

Bellah strongly disagreed that America’s lack of an established church and its freedom of religion made it a secular society. America was and remained a country with a sacred center on which the legitimacy of its ideals and institutions depended. Bellah called this America’s “civil religion.” He defined the term sociologically. It described the rituals, symbols, and language of civic life, not the private beliefs of individuals. He interpreted American history through the lens of the French sociologist Émile Durkheim, who argued that all societies—even those that seemed most secular—express their identities in religious symbols. For Durkheim, the nonobservant son of a rabbi, the truth of a religion is not found where both believers and unbelievers often assume it to be—in its official dogmas—but in the practices that promote group solidarity and commemorate social bonds. Bellah maintained that, when viewed from this perspective, America clearly possessed a national cult. It had its own civic rituals, liturgical calendar, and holy documents, as well as its own saints, prophets, martyrs, hymns, and pilgrimage sites. Bellah insisted that this national cult’s celebration was not purely ceremonial. Nor did it worship what sociologist Will Herberg had dismissively termed the “American way of life.” “The American civil religion is not the worship of the American nation,” Bellah wrote, “but an understanding of the American experience in the light of ultimate and universal reality.”
    -The Civil Theology of Robert Bellah (Matthew Rose, July 29, 2023, Commonweal)

The first is a pragmatic rationale: liberalism is a way of regulating violence and allowing diverse populations to live peacefully with one another. The second is moral: liberalism protects basic human dignity, and in particular human autonomy—the ability of each individual to make choices. The final justification is economic: liberalism promotes economic growth and all the good things that come from growth, by protecting property rights and the freedom to transact.
   The Triple Justification for Liberalism: It advances peace, prosperity, and human dignity (Francis Fukuyama, Jul 25, 2022, The UnPopulist)

Though its main thesis is obviously, even fatally, flawed, Mr. Lefebvre's project here is too valuable for us to be overly harsh with this book. At a time when the Right and Left are embracing Identitarianism and rejecting liberalism--precisely because the latter seeks to treat everyone fairly, rather than privileging certain "Identities"--we need all the good folks we can get to argue with their "own side" and summon them back to the ideals of republican liberty. The spirit of this book and its author is so generous and inviting that a polemical response would be unworthy.

Mr. Lefebvre asks a key question in his Introduction:

This book is written primarily, though not exclusively, for those of us without religious affiliation. If that is you—and let’s be frank, as this is a book on ethics and political philosophy published by a university press, the odds are high—I ask you to ponder a question. Put the book down for a moment, dear reader, and ask yourself, “Where do I get my values from?” I am not just talking about your highest-order principles about right and wrong but also your sense of what is good, normal, and worthwhile in life, and if I can put it this way, your general vibe too. What could you point to as the source for that?

His answer is that liberalism is "the water we swim in"--indeed, the cover of the book features beach-goers in the ocean. Over the rest of the book he argues that these liberal values, though we may no longer even be conscious of their source, provide us with the basis for a rich and rewarding life. Further, by defending and cultivating these values we can make that life even better.

Full credit here for recognizing that those "without religious affiliation" may be unaware of where they derive their own values, or even be resistant to accepting the source. However, the "water we swim in" metaphor itself resists the fundamental truth cited in the quotations above: liberalism is but a bay in the ocean of Abrahamism. At its core, liberalism is merely structural. It is a system designed to vindicate and protect the human dignity of Created man. There is no rational basis for said dignity. It is this that leads even the most outspoken New Atheist, Richard Dawkins, to concede that while not a believer he is a "cultural Christian." The uncomfortable reality for those who wish to enjoy liberal values and a liberal way of life is then that they soaking in faith.

Mind you, I am not saying that it is necessary to be a believer to be a good liberal and a good American. However, though notion that one can derive values from the form of liberalism instead of the content is morally unserious. We should welcome this form of free-riding if it makes the people Mr. Lefebvre is addressing his argument to become more dedicated defenders of our liberalism, but we need not ignore the short-comings of such an arrangement.

These problems are nowhere more evident than in two of the three philosophers he chooses to defend his passion for mere structuralism. The first, Pierre Hadot, looked back to the Stoics as the models of liberal life and regretted the way the rise of Christianity forced them into the background. It is certainly true than the Founders appreciated the Stoics, but the liberalism they believed in and the liberal structure they erected was explicitly Christian, and not Stoical:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

The Stoics then were background, not central.

Second, he celebrates John Rawls and his Theory of Justice, but makes a concession that gives the game away:

Crucially, he does not cl;aim it is his own invention. Neither does he derive it from first philosophical principles. He believes instead that citizens of liberal democratic societies by and large already see and structure their societies as fair systems of cooperation. That is why this idea is accessible for a wide readership: not merely because his reader "knows" or "understands" what he is talking about, but much more powerfully, because they already affirm it as expressing something essential about themselves and their society.

Indeed, if you are already a creature of the sea of liberalism it is easy enough to understand the ideas being expressed in one minor inlet. Though you needn't accept them to enjoy the water and Anglospheric liberalism has always been skeptical of, if not hostile to, Rawls's sort of Rational social contract twaddle, as too abstract and theoretical to be taken seriously.

Rawls himself finally had to agree so he moved on to the text more cited here, Political Liberalism. But therein he looks to explain how to live within the pre-existing liberal system and culture, provided that, once again, you accept it as the water you swim in.

“How is it possible,” Rawls asked, “for there to exist over time a just and stable society of free and equal citizens, who remain profoundly divided by reasonable religious, philosophical, and moral doctrines?”

Okay, that hasn't gotten us very far. the fish are just asking why living in the water works.

On the other hand, the third great thinker he celebrates is not one, but a comic character, who models liberal virtues without ever bothering to try and offer an alternative grounding for them: Leslie Knope from Parks and Rec. Leslie may not be explicitly or orthodoxly religious, but at the the very heart of the show resides the insight, which is Christian, that human dignity is universal. In one of the most famous scenes in the show, she gets herself tied up in knots asking Tom where he's from, until it dawns on her that he is American, just like her. And the cast of the show is diverse not just in race but in personalities and convictions and Leslie learns to treat each of them as a friend and ally in seeking to make life in Pawnee better. This is not just liberalism as a practical way of life but an expression of the neighbor love upon which liberalism depends.

So maybe it is time now to be clear about how this belief is the pre-requisite for liberalism. We are all familiar with, but may think little about, the text of the Declaration of Independence:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.--That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed

We begin, not from philosophizing or trying to discover ancient contracts, but from received truth: having been Created by God in His image we each have inherent dignity and rights. In the liberal schema that the Declaration enunciates and the Constitution would subsequently institutionalize, restrictions on said rights, in order to be legitimate, had to apply universally and be adopted via democratic processes. This idea of republican liberty is an adaptation of the Roman Republican system, but expanded to all men and grounded in the Christianity that Imperial Rome bequeathed the West. It had begun being incorporated into British culture at least as early as Magna Carta and had expanded over time, as it would expand to include blacks, women, etc.. And it was just one leg of a stool. the other two are the small "p" protestantism that allows citizens to choose how to worrship in their own way, without being bound to an Established church, and capitalism, it being no coincidence that Adam Smith's Wealth of Nations was, likewise, published in 1776. From the truth that every individual has dignity flows the system that allows for choice in religion, economics and politics. Ultimately, the body of water surrounding us is a function of our faith in Creation.

I do not mean to suggest that one has to accept religion in order to be a member in good standing of liberal society. And here lies the importance of Mr. Lefebvre's book, like Rawls's before him: having implicitly accepted the faith, the target audience can and should enjoy the water and should help to preserve it. Indeed, they are likely to be better liberals than the Identitarians, Integralists, Christian Nationalists and so forth of the Right who are more hostile to the truth because they deny the equality of all men. Just as Mr. Lefebvre seeks to encourage the left to vindicate liberalism, so must conservatives clean our own house and beckon MAGA and company back into the water. These are tall tasks and Mr. Lefebvre is too good an ally to allow a few inapt metaphors to stand in the way of our cooperation. Buy the book. Read the book. Live the liberal way.

(Reviewed:29-Sep-24)

Grade: (B) Orrin C. Judd

Tweet

Alexander Lefebvre Links:

    -AUTHOR SITE: alexlefebvre.com
    -TWITTER: @alex_usyd
    -FACULTY PAGE: Professor Alexandre Lefebvre (University of Sydney)
    -BOOK SITE: Liberalism as a Way of Life by Alexandre Lefebvre (Princeton University Press)
    -INDEX: Alexandre Lefebvre (Academia.edu)
    -CHAPTER: Closed and Open Societies (Alexandre Lefebvre & Nils F. Schott, 2022, The Bergsonian Mind)
    -EXCERPT: Liberalism as a Way of Life by Alexandre Lefebvre (Academia.edu) [PDF]
    -ESSAY: Liberalism and the Good Life (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2022, Journal of Social and Political Philosophy)

Not even the most persnickety historian would deny that Montesquieu and Locke are hugely in?uential for the liberal tradition. On paper, they furnish most of its main ideas: separation of powers, rule of law, consent of the governed, and individual rights. Furthermore, and this is Shklar’ sargument, they set a mood of misanthropy for those fully ?edged liberals who follow in their footsteps. Yet something essential is missing: the development of these ideas and mood in relation to the single great political problem that would animate the nineteenth century. It was up to thinkers who took the name liberal to do that.

What was that problem? Ironically, the very thing that brought the world of cruel kings and bold princes crashing down: democracy. Nineteenth century liberals of all stripes were exercised by the fact that not just political, but also social, economic, moral, and cultural power would increasingly be held by the common man.

    -ESSAY: Liberalism may be the source of your soul (Alexandre Lefebvre, June 14, 2024, Princeton University Press)
    -ESSAY: The Spiritual Exercises of John Rawls (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2021, Political Theory)
    -ESSAY: Human Rights as Spiritual Exercises (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2020, The Subject of Human Rights)
    -ESSAY: Liberalism and the Good Life (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2022, Journal of Social and Political Philosophy)
    -ESSAY: Human Rights and the Leap of Love (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2016, Journal of French and Francophone Philosophy)
    -ESSAY: The Rights of Man and the Care of the Self (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2016, Political Theory)
    -ESSAY: Wollstonecraft, Human Rights, and the Care of the Self (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2016, Humanity: an International Journal of Human Rights, Humanitarianism, and Development)
    -ESSAY: Rawls the redeemer: For John Rawls, liberalism was more than a political project: it is the best way to fashion a life that is worthy of happiness (Alexandre Lefebvre, Aeon)
    -ESSAY: Liberal Soulcraft: Liberalism is in trouble. It will take a concerted act of will to save it. (Alex Lefebvre, Aug 12, 2024, Persuasion)
    -ESSAY: Ode to Joy:The mood at the Democratic National Convention can tell us a lot about what makes life meaningful *Alexander Lefebvre, 29 Aug 2024, ABC: Religion & Ethics)
    -REVIEW: of Helena Rosenblatt, The Lost History of Liberalism (Alexandre Lefebvre, 2018, Times Higher Education)

a cool-headed observer might step back from the scene to observe that, polemics aside, liberalism does indeed have a settled meaning. It is a doctrine whose core principle consists of the protection of the individual and, speci?cally, his or her rights and choices.

    -VIDEO INTERVIEW: "Liberalism as a Way of Life": Alexandre Lefebvre in conversation with Helena Rosenblatt (The Philosopher, Jun 20, 2024)
    -PODCAST: Liberalism is not Neutral: In a secular age, where do liberals get their values from? (SHADI HAMID AND CHRISTINE EMBA, MAY 31, 2024, Wisdom of Crowds)
    -INTERVIEW: Liberalism As a Way of Life: An interview with political theorist Alexandre Lefebvre, whose important new book offers a comprehensive, spiritual defense of liberalism against its enemies and opponents (DAMON LINKER, MAY 22, 2024, Notes from the Middleground)

Well, liberalism has a characteristic set of values. We can argue around the edges but the core, I’d say, is personal freedom, fairness, tolerance, reciprocity, self-reflection, and irony. In the way that Christianity, for example, has a recognizable package of moral commitments and excellences (such as love, fellowship, charity, and devotion), so does liberalism.

    -PODCAST: Are we all liberals at heart?: Liberalism isn't just a political philosophy but the basis of a truly meaningful life. That's the bold statement of philosopher Alexandre Lefebvre, author of the forthcoming book Liberalism As A Way of Life. Should individuals be free to pursue their own passions and interests in life? Does liberalism mean more than freedom of speech and small government? You might not identify as a liberal, but are we in fact all liberals at heart? (ABC: Big Ideas, 3/27/24)
    -PODCAST: Bonus - The Liberal Way w/ Alexandre Lefebvre (AMERICAN PRESTIGE, JUN 02, 2024)
    -PODCAST: Alexandre Lefebvre (Keen On)
    -PODCAST: The Liberal Way w/ Alexandre Lefebvre (American Prestige, June 2, 2024)
    -PODCAST: Alexandre Lefebvre, "Liberalism as a Way of Life" (New Books in Political Science, July 1, 2024)
    -PODCAST: Episode 2105: Alexandre Lefebvre explains why Liberalism is a Way of Life (Keen On, June 23, 2024)
    -PODCAST: Alexandre Lefebvre on Liberalism as a Way of Life: Yascha Mounk and Alexandre Lefebvre discuss taking liberalism seriously as the main moral paradigm of our world. (Yascha Mounk, Sep 14, 2024, The Good Fight)
    -PODCAST: Liberalism as a Way of Life: Alexandre Lefebvre (Helena Rosenblatt, Jun 24, 2024, Boston Review)
    -PODCAST: #354 - Liberalism As A Way Of Life: A Dialogue with Alexandre Lefebvre (Xavier Bonilla, 6/30/24, Converging Dialogues)
    -PODCAST: Alexandre Lefebvre (The Gist, 9/26/24)
    -REVIEW ESSAY: Marinating in liberalism: Can this philosophical tradition offer a blueprint for a just society? (Peter Mares, 6 JULY 2024, Inside Story)
    -REVIEW ESSAY: Liberalism and the West’s ‘Crisis of Meaning’: Many liberals are strangely eager to concede that liberal societies are morally and spiritually bankrupt without religion to give life meaning. (Matt Johnson, 4 Jul 2024, Quillette)
    -VIDEO ARCHIVE: Alexandre Lefebvre (YouTube)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Adam Gopnik, The New Yorker)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Daniel Bell, Times Literary Supplement)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Walter G. Moss, LA Progressive)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Becca Rothfield, Washington Post)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Galen Watts, The Point)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Stephen Holmes, The Ideas Letter)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Sam Mace, Liberal Currents)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (G. John Ikenberry, Foreign Affairs)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Matt McManus, Jacobin)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Peter Berkowitz, July 28, 2024, Real Clear Politics)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Galen Watts, The Point)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Sam Mace, Liberal Currents)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Georgina Downer, Australian Policy and History)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Mathis Bitton, Critical Inquiry)
    -REVIEW: of Liberalism as a Way of Life (Tod Lindberg, Commentary)
    -REVIEW: of L:iberalism as a Way of Life (Tim Sommers, 3Quarks)
    -

Book-related and General Links:


PIERRE HADOT:

    -WIKIPEDIA: Pierre Hadot
    -ENTRY: Pierre Hadot (1922-2010) (Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
    -ESSAY: The Foundation of the Founders (Dylan Pahman, 7/04/24, Fusion)
    -ESSAY: The book that changed me: how Pierre Hadot’s Philosophy as a Way of Life taught me to ‘love a few old truths’ (Matthew Sharpe, October 25, 2022, The Conversation)
    -ESSAY: Pierre Hadot’s Stoicism (Matthew Sharpe, December 1 2018, Modern Stoicism)
    -ESSAY: Pierre Hadot (in-between Two Worlds, 20th December 2010)

LESLIE KNOPE

    -ESSAY: Knope and Change: The Politics of Parks and Recreation (James Poniewozik, January 22, 2015, TIME)
    -ESSAY: Parks and Recreation Watch: We Didn’t Start the Fire (James Poniewozik, January 21, 2015, TIME)
    -ESSAY: Parks and Recreation's Pawnee: The Happiest Place on Television: The final season of the NBC comedy has underscored its optimistic and open-hearted ethos. (Sophie Gilbert, February 18, 2015, The Atlantiic)
    -ESSAY: Garry Gergich the Stoic (Matthew Downhour, 6/28/21, Erraticus)
    -ESSAY: The brilliant, confident liberalism of ‘Parks and Recreation’ (Alyssa Rosenberg, February 24, 2015, Washington Post)
    -ESSAY: Socialism on the Small Screen: On "Parks and Recreation": A History of Progressivism in Pawnee (Matthew Gannon, April 23, 2013, LA Review of Books)
    -ESSAY: Wanted: Leslie Knope Democrats: We need politicians of the left (and the right) who defend their places by standing up to Woke Capitalism (Rod Dreher, Jun 11, 2019, American Conservative)
    -ESSAY: Cool Takes: Can Leslie Knope Save Our Politics? (S.D. Kelly, Christ and Pop Culture)
    -ESSAY: Five Ways Leslie Knope Challenged Me to Be a Better Person (Gowdy Cannon, 7/29/16, Rambling Ever On)
    -ESSAY: A Defense of Government: On Parks and Recreation and the Importance a Personal Conception of Government ( Cody Knapp, 11/22/12, Georgia Political Review)
    -ESSAY: Hate Thy Neighbor: The politics of Parks and Recreation. (Juliet Lapidos, April 25, 2011, Slate)
    -ESSAY: WHY YOU SHOULD BE WATCHING ‘PARKS AND RECREATION’ DURING THE PANDEMIC (Victoria McCollum, Apr 24, 2020, CST Online)
    -ESSAY: 9 times 'Parks and Recreation' taught us how to get real about ethics (Matt Windsor, April 25, 2019, UAB Reporter)
    -ESSAY: In praise of Leslie Knope: feminism and small-town politics (Iona Sharma, ·24 December 2013, The F Word)
    -ESSAY: Leslie Knope, a true Strong Citizen (Rachel Quednau, May 13, 2016, Strong Towns)
    -ESSAY: An Ode To Leslie Knope: The Working Woman’s Working Woman (Lindsey Stanberry, September 14, 2014, Refinery 29)
    -ESSAY: 4 Ways Leslie Knope Is More Like Jesus Than I Am (Jake Roberson, February 25, 2015, Plugged In)
    -ESSAY: Already Great: On the dead-end optimism of Parks and Recreation. (Timothy Shenk, Spring 2019, Dissent)
    -ESSAY: The Leslie Knope of It All (The Psychological Hook)
    -ESSAY: The Idealistic Legacy of ‘Parks and Recreation’ (Chris Kopcow, 2/23/15, Vulture)

CULTURAL CHRISTIANITY/NEW THEISM:

    -
    -ESSAY: Slog and Sacrifice: You don’t have to be religious to appreciate what millennia of religion have given us. (Jonah Goldberg, October 4, 2024, The Dispatch)

Human rights, universal equality, the sovereignty of the individual, higher education, and scientific inquiry—even the idea of secularism itself—are products or byproducts of Jewish and Christian thought.

For instance, Western science flows straight out of the Abrahamic revolution. “Postulating a single creator for the entire universe,” writes Walter Russell Mead, “leads to the belief that the universe is predictable and rule driven.” Therefore, the universe outside of our heads is discoverable and knowable through investigation. The scientific method has many catalysts —from alchemy to dye-making to the necessities of war—but even these things had religious aspects, and the systemization of science itself was the product of religious scholastic orders and institutions (like Harvard used to be). Modern astronomy is largely a Christian invention. (Yes, the Chinese had astronomers, too. But when they discovered that the Christians were better, they imported Jesuits to jobs the Chinese couldn’t do.)

Or take the ideal of “universal brotherhood”—i.e. Equality. It’s a Christian idea flowing straight out of Paul’s exhortation to believers in Christ: “You are all sons of God.” And Paul, a heretical Jew, owed much of his thinking to his religious upbringing. You could argue that the idea of the right to follow your conscience started with Socrates—though given how things ended for him, that’s debatable. But the idea of conscience—conscientious objection to war, civil disobedience, etc.—became a thing thanks to folks like Aquinas and Martin Luther.

I suppose it’s possible that there could have been an alternative timeline where we got driverless cars and microwave ovens, democracy and the Bill of Rights, without Abraham and his theological progeny. But the indisputable fact is that we didn’t. And remember, God gave us plenty of time to figure this stuff out without Him.

    -ESSAY: The Civil Theology of Robert Bellah: A socialist who insisted that democracy needs religion (Matthew Rose, July 29, 2023, Commonweal)

Bellah strongly disagreed that America’s lack of an established church and its freedom of religion made it a secular society. America was and remained a country with a sacred center on which the legitimacy of its ideals and institutions depended. Bellah called this America’s “civil religion.” He defined the term sociologically. It described the rituals, symbols, and language of civic life, not the private beliefs of individuals. He interpreted American history through the lens of the French sociologist Émile Durkheim, who argued that all societies—even those that seemed most secular—express their identities in religious symbols. For Durkheim, the nonobservant son of a rabbi, the truth of a religion is not found where both believers and unbelievers often assume it to be—in its official dogmas—but in the practices that promote group solidarity and commemorate social bonds. Bellah maintained that, when viewed from this perspective, America clearly possessed a national cult. It had its own civic rituals, liturgical calendar, and holy documents, as well as its own saints, prophets, martyrs, hymns, and pilgrimage sites. Bellah insisted that this national cult’s celebration was not purely ceremonial. Nor did it worship what sociologist Will Herberg had dismissively termed the “American way of life.” “The American civil religion is not the worship of the American nation,” Bellah wrote, “but an understanding of the American experience in the light of ultimate and universal reality.”

    -ESSAY: The New Theists (Ed West, 16 December 2023, Spectator)
    -INTERVIEW: Tom Holland interview: ‘We swim in Christian waters’: The faith of the Church transformed the West — and the entire world (Andrew Brown, 9/27/19, Church Times)

All of us in the West are a goldfish, and the water that we swim in is Christianity, by which I don’t necessarily mean the confessional form of the faith, but, rather, considered as an entire civilisation.”

    -ESSAY: Humanism is a heresy (Tom Holland, Dec. 24th, 2022, UnHerd)
    -ESSAY: Why I am now a Christian (Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Nov. 10th, 2023, UnHerd)
    -ESSAY: The Atheism Delusion (KONSTANTIN KISIN, JUL 04, 2023)
    -REVIEW: of Peter Harrison’s Some New World: Myths of Supernatural Belief in a Secular Age (Daniel K. Williams, Christianity Today)

“Modern naturalism,” Harrison declares, is therefore “Protestantism on steroids.” But it is Protestantism severed from its theological foundations, and as a result, it is based on a set of assumptions that no longer make sense without God.

    -ESSAY: Pagans, Gnostics, and Christians—Oh My? (JACK BUTLER, JUNE 25, 2024, Religion & Liberty)
    -ESSAY: THE BURIED LIFE : On the development of identity. (Charles Taylor, 6/28/24, The Lamp)

For many, the “bourgeois” life lacks something, some higher purpose.

    -ESSAY: Cultural Christianity and the vulgar wisdom of memes: Dawkins is caught between the pure idea of rationalism, and the messy meme of cultural Christianity (Sebastian Milbank, 5 April, 2024, Spectator)

LIBERALISM

    -ESSAY: The End of History? (Francis Fukuyama, Summer 1989, The National Interest)
    -ENTRY: Liberalism (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy)
    -KEYWORD: liberalism (Imaginative Conservative)
    -ESSAY: What Comes After Liberalism? (John Horvat, June 19th, 2024, Imaginative Conservatism)
    -ESSAY: The Revival of Liberalism: And the revival of its problems. (Crispin Sartwell, 6/24/24, Splice Today)
    -REVIEW: Scientizing Liberty: Gary Gindler’s Heroic Failure: a review of Left Imperialism: From Cardinal Richelieu to Klaus Schwab by Gary Gindler (Paul Krause, Voegelin View)
    -ESSAY: The Authoritarians Have the Momentum (David Brooks, May. 16th, 2024, NY Times)
    -REVIEW: of Keeping the Republic: A Defense of American Constitutionalism, by Dennis Hale and Marc Landy (Daniel DiSalvo, City Journal)
    -ESSAY: For True Freedom, We Need Power-Sharing Liberalism: The answer is simple: policies that reflect homespun values and stick up for people getting the short end of the stick. (Danielle Allen, June 20, 2024, New Republic)
    -
    -
    -ESSAY: Liberalism: A Primer (Julio Teehankee, 2005, THE NATIONAL INSTITUTE FOR POLICY STUDIES)

The fundamental liberal principle grants primacy to liberty as a political value

    -ESSAY: Can Liberalism Stop Being So Darn ... Liberal?: Needed: a liberalism that ceases to fear itself. (Sam Adler-Bell, June 20, 2024, New Republic)
    -ESSAY: America's Epicurean Liberalism (Joshua D. Hawley, Fall 2010, National Affairs)
    -ESSAY: The many deaths of liberalism : More than a century of death notices have not diminished the achievements and the necessity of liberalism (Daniel H Coleis & Aurelian Craiutu, 6/28/18, Aeon)
    -ESSAY: The theorist of belonging: Judith Shklar fled Nazis and Stalinism before discovering in African-American history the dilemma of modern liberalism (Samantha Ashenden & Andreas Hess, 3/16/20, Aeon)
    -ESSAY: Order and the American Culture of Liberty (JOHN C. PINHEIRO • JUNE 27, 2024, Religion & Liberty)
    -REVIEW ESSAY: Modern Secularism Makes No Sense Without Christianity: A new book argues that early Protestant thinking helped fuel an anti-supernatural worldview. But that worldview retains more Protestantism than it cares to admit. (DANIEL K. WILLIAMS, JULY 5, 2024, Christianity Today)
    -INTERVIEW: Liberalism Isn't a Western Concept: Its moral core started taking shape in India long before the Enlightenment (ZACK BEAUCHAMP, JUL 16, 2024, UnPopulist)
    -ESSAY: Why You Should Feel Good About Liberalism: We need to get better at standing up for the greatest social technology ever devised. (Jonathan Rauch, Aug 06, 2024, Persuasion)
    -ESSAY: The Unfreedom of Liberty (Arianna Marchetti, August 2024, Philosophy Now)
    -ESSAY: The Politics of Freedom (Rick Lewis, August 2024, Philosophy Now)
    -REVIEW ESSAY: Liberalism and Equality (Gregory Conti, August 2024, American Affairs)
    -ESSAY: Two Forms of American Liberalism: Although the American tradition is broadly liberal, it is best understood as divided between two schools: classical and managerial liberalism. (Matt Wolfson, 9/18/24, Law & Liberty)
    -ESSAY: In Search of Liberty (Timothy D Padgett, 07/26/19, Breakpoint)
    -ESSAY: The Dangerous Reinterpretation of Freedom (Barry Brownstein, September 18, 2024, AIER)
    -REVIEW: Defining Liberty: Review of 'Liberty & Equality' by Raymond Aron, translated by Samuel Garrett Zeitlin (Flagg Taylor, Septem,ber 2024, Commentary)
    -ESSAY: Religious Liberty and the Golden Rule: Freedom of religion will survive because it rests on a universal and immutable law. (Andrew M. McGinnis, 9/18/24, Law & Liberty)
    -ESSAY: To American revolutionaries, patriotism meant fair dealing with one another (Barbara Clark Smith, September 18, 2024, The Conversation)
    -ENTRY: Constitutionalism: By imposing limits on government, it makes justice possible. (Keith E. Whittington, September 17, 2024, Conservative Encyclopedia)
    -ESSAY: The Enduring Wisdom of America's Founding Documents: A liberal reading of the Declaration of Independence. (William Galston, Sep 11, 2024, Persuasion)
    -ESSAY: Religion, Conservatism, and Liberationism: Christians understand man’s destiny: not only to suffer and die but to know and love. (Peter Augustine Lawler, winter 2002, Modern Age)
    -ESSAY: The Spirit of American Constitutionalism (Gregory S. Ahern, September 16th, 2024, Imaginative Conservative)
    -ESSAY: A Popular Defense of Our Undemocratic Constitution (Pavlos Papadopoulos, September 16th, 2024, Imaginative Conservative)
    -ESSAY: How Cold War Liberals Changed Liberalism for the Worse (Samuel Moyn, 9/13/24, Yale University Press)
    -REVIEW ESSAY: Liberalism's Persistent Troubles: James E. Cronin's "Fragile Victory": The work of preserving liberalism is perpetual. (Guillaume A. W. Attia, Sep 24, 2024, liberal Currents)
    -Individualism: Balancing freedom and social order is a fundamentally American challenge. (Wilfred M. McClay, Conservative Encyclopedia)
    -ESSAY: Jesus Christ and the Democratic Ethos (Tim Milosch, September 11, 2024, Providence)
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