Insights by R.R. Reno in First Things (March, 2015).

Old-fashioned Marxists read deeply in philosophy and history. an earlier generation of progressives cared about literature. Irving Howe was wrong about political economy, but he knew things. That’s not true of today’s progressives. They’re intelligent and in many respects well trained. But they’re de-cultured. And cultural illiterates, however powerful they become, cannot lead. They can only bribe, seduce, intimidate, and coerce.

Great Books and classical education are largely Christian projects in America today. Christian colleges are the institutions most likely to encourage a sustained engagement with Western history, literature, and philosophy. To have an influential and lasting say in the living future, one must have a deep knowledge and love of what one has inherited. That’s something that can’t be transmitted through TED talks. The authority that comes with cultural literacy won’t be superseded by brain science. Which is why we’re far more likely to shape the future of the West than are de-cultured secular progressives.

. . .

As radical Islam so clearly shows, the global future we face involves conflicts with convictions, not race, class or gender. This is not a future that secular progressives are well equipped to face. . . . As a result, we cannot count on the de-cultured elites of the West to defend Western culture. (European populists are coming to recognize this.) At the same time, non-Westerners see Western progressivism less as a rival for men’s souls than as an attack on all cultures of conviction, including their own. It is paradoxical that today’s Western imperialism denies its loyalty to the West, posing instead as a globalized benevolence and universal dispenser of justice.

 We need a global culture of truth, in which conviction and loyalty have scope for their full expression. But this same culture needs to encourage peace. Here we have a great advantage. We have a humility born of our knowledge that original sin limits our grasp of truth and taints our motives for public engagement. The commandment to love our neighbors nurtures civility.

“So what is the relationship of grace to hard, moral effort? Well, hard, moral effort is grace. It is not every grace, but it is a true grace. It is a gift of God, lest any should boast” (Douglas Wilson, Against the Church, 85).

“God has not left us to our own resources in the study of his Word. There is the never-failing promise and the ever-present ministry of the Holy Spirit. He is the author of the Word and it is his peculiar prerogative to illumine the Scriptures and to seal its truth upon our hearts” (John Murray, Collected Works, Vol. 1, 8).

“One does not need an advanced degree–even a high-school degree–to be a good husband and father.”   R.R. Reno in First Things (March, 2015).

“I have said earlier in these discussions that the works of the flesh are manifest (Gal. 5:19). We know that the works of righteousness are also manifest (John 3:21). All this is simply to say that midnight and high noon are not that difficult to tell apart” (Douglas Wilson, Against the Church, 72).

“We do well to peruse our great catechisms and creeds and textbooks and not be carried away by the pedagogical mush to which we are in these days subjected. But if we rely upon such a reservoir of knowledge we are in a dangerous and slippery position. Thought and life are too complex to be adequately met by any such reservoir. The means God has provided for every exigency that may arise the Word of God itself” (John Murray, Collected Writings, Vol. 1, 7).

“When the eternal Word of God became a man, He thereby honored the material world and did so in a very permanent way” (Douglas Wilson, Against the Church, 64).

“Systematic theology is nothing less than remembering what you read in other passages while you are reading this passage” (Douglas Wilson, Against the Church, 53).

“Worldview thinking radiated from him [G.K. Chesterton] like heat from a stove. That is what systematic thinking should look like, but it hardly ever does” (Douglas Wilson, Against the Church, 53).

Hope thou in God (Psalm 42:11).