Safe Haven

Deneen begins functionally his first chapter with the goal of defining liberalism as he is using it in this book, and then with the goal of affirming that which is good in liberalism--with the attendant recognition that liberalism in the political-philosophical sense is very popular. In his view, as stated earlier, liberalism stands unchallenged among competing ideologies in terms of not only its popularity, but its success in achieving its aims. He says that no other ideology had proved as successful in upholding the liberty which is fundamental to human desire and dignity. Liberalism proved especially attractive, he says, to those who were accustomed to arbitrary rule, to extreme poverty, or to social isolation. Deneen will argue that liberalism has proved most insidious because it redefines terms like "liberty" but with different, less sound philosophical bases. Deneen says that liberalism is distinctive in its rejection of older mores and traditions, which its advocat...

There's a slur going around: "globalist". I guess it means that some secret cabal of radically liberal bankers or power brokers is controlling the world, and encouraging mass immigration, along with other disasters real and imagined. It absolutely blows me away that the American administration eventually embraced the term "nationalist". I know we're 75 years on from the end of World War II, but you would think we could at least learn the basic lesson of the war: that nationalism, as a reckless patriotism that uses the love of country against people in other lands--in domination, violence, and murder--should be avoided. I don't even have a strong opinion about unchecked immigration. Frankly, we still have a lot of open space over here. We're not full, as it were. As soon as you say anything to the effect that crossing the southern border of the United States isn't in itself a grave crime, someone replies, "Don't you believe in borders?...

One of the things that I started to notice in the back-and-forth of partisan politics was that since the goal is to persuade people that you are right and the other side is wrong, and we've lacked virtue in that effort for a long time, there became an incentive to score cheap outrage points against one's enemies. I remember when Michelle Obama was talking about the election of her husband to the presidency. She said concerning it, "For the first time in my adult life, I was proud of America," or something to that effect. The outrage was swift and predictable; how could any self-respecting American say that they never been proud of our country before that? Well, a black American, that's who. I knew what she meant, and for as much as a frank statement like that might hurt me as a patriot, Michelle Obama is going to get some wide latitude, and so is her husband. I owe every American of color that, and especially black Americans--descendants of transatlantic slaves-...

I had a special insight into this verse a couple of months ago in prayer. The fairly readily apparent meaning is that sin causes spiritual death, and can lead to Hell, which among other things, is the complete absence of love. Yet it seems to me, and presumably to the Holy Spirit, that there is another meaning. As the writer of the book of Ecclesiastes points out in several memorable turns of phrase, the good and the bad alike all die here. What's the point, if we're going to live, and then we're going to die? But we know that most people are neither all good, or all bad. Most people can find someone somewhere to say something good about them and how they lived when they die. But if death is not changed or transcended in some way, life is rather pointless, or so it seems. At the best, a life of sin is a pointless life. At worst, it is much worse, because the supernatural judgment where the sentence is a complete lack of love or consolation is almost unimaginably bad. ...

Lord, you have stripped away all pretense of strength. All hope of acquired virtue has been dashed upon the rocks of the fact of my finitude. If I did not hope in you, I would have surrendered everything out of sheer discouragement. Yet you are here. Your blood flows as freely as it did the day you made the bloody sacrifice on the hill of Calvary. It flows for me. I know it as fact, not consolation. I do not feel your tenderness, nor would I deserve it if I did. Hear me as one who seeks your friendship, not as one who speaks fearful pleas for mercy, hoping you will answer. Speak to me as a friend to a friend, as if I had never broken faith with you. Restore me for your own name's sake, because I do not love you as you love me. My desire for you is my only gift, meager as it is. If you were pleased by a lowly widow who put in all she had, perhaps you will show mercy to me, because I bring even less. You see all things. You see in the moments I would like to forget. In those ...