There’s a reason there are so many who are talking about the Rittenhouse trial. Of course, various commentators have various reasons. The reason I want to talk about the Kyle Rittenhouse trial isn’t really because of the Kyle Rittenhouse trial. Because, I don’t think that the Rittenhouse trial is extremely instructive. It hasn’t taught us anything new. The corruption and abuse we saw in the Rittenhouse trial is not the disease – it’s a symptom of what’s wrong in this country. The trial has, because it is symptomatic and emblematic, caught our attention and it’s become the focus of many, especially on the political right in this country, because it seems to them to be a clear cut case of a political prosecution.
And it’s with VERY good reason that conservatives are concerned that this was a political prosecution. If you haven’t followed the trial, let’s do a brief review of the facts so that we can make sense of why it has created such a furor.
Kyle Rittenhouse was tried for murder because during the Kenosha riots (I mean the Kenosha peaceful protests) Kyle went to defend businesses and offer 1st aid to people who had been injured. During the night, he was attacked – this is not alleged, it’s on video, he was attacked, guns were fired, and according to both witness testimony and the video evidence, young Kyle only fired after he was attacked, by people who had physically assaulted him with a skateboard and a gun, again, AFTER at least one shot had been fired while he was being chased by a group of peaceful protesters.
Now, if you think that this is a textbook case of self-defense and that it’s ludicrous that this case was even being tried, then you would side with a huge number of legal scholars who had been saying for days that the Judge should’ve issued a directed verdict meaning that the judge doesn’t even let the case go to a jury but he enters the verdict of not guilty himself because no reasonable jury could find otherwise.
Again, if you hadn’t followed the trial, this may sound like I’m blowing things out of proportion, but the case went so badly for the prosecution that some legal commentators are actually suggesting that the prosecution deliberately threw the case, and were possibly acting unethically to try to get a mistrial so they could possibly retry later.
Amazingly AFTER the prosecution’s star witness – the prosecution’s star witness…prosecutions! – said that Rittenhouse only shot him AFTER he had pointed a handgun at Rittenhouse…AFTER that little bit of legal theatre, the prosecutor had Rittenhouse on the stand, and it was like watching a tragicomedy when someone who isn’t a lawyer is forced through some kind of body-switching magic to try a murder case when they’d had zero legal training. It really is that bad. Imagine a Freaky Friday type sitch, except instead of Jamie Lee Curtis and Lindsay Lohan, this is the version where Binger’s 9 year old son switched bodies with him in the night, and now the 9 year old is attempting to prosecute a murder trial. It really is that bad. He was asking Rittenhouse if he played the Call of Duty video game, which is of course deeply relevant to whether he was acting in self-defense. He asked Rittenhouse why he thought he needed to shoot Grosskreutz when he had a rifle and Grosskreutz only had a handgun.
Yes. He really asked that.
And to top it off, he asked Rittenhouse why he had been silent and hadn’t talked to the media until the trial, which he did to insinuate that Rittenhouse’s silence was evidence of his guilt. Now, I’m no legal scholar. I’ve never been to law school – I don’t even watch cop-dramas, so I’m no expert. But I have read the Constitution a few times, and last I checked in this country you have the right to remain silent, and that silence cannot be interpreted as an admission of guilt. Moreover, people who actually ARE legal experts, including the judge, have said that asking a defendant this question is a major no-no, like first year legal stuff that every lawyer knows – you simply cannot ask that question because you risk the judge dismissing with prejudice. Now, this is especially relevant because Judge Schroeder has apparently often spoken out about how he thinks the media craze for information is poisoning juries before trials and prosecutors are getting cases tried in the media before they make it to court. And I’m inclined to agree with the judge. I think it’s getting very hard in this country to get a fair trial. But the fact that this prosecutor would ASK that question, knowing that it’s 1) unethical 2) stupid 3) sticking a finger in the judge’s sore spot 4) possibly illegal, the fact that he would ask this question is mind boggling.
And so, people who followed this case are saying that this Kenosha District Attorney brought a case that never should have been broughten and that the prosecutor engaged in misconduct. And the thing is that there have been corrupt and crappy prosecutors and District Attorneys for a long time – that’s not new, and that’s not particularly disturbing, because that’s a correctable bug.
What’s worrying isn’t so much the crappy behavior of the lawyer in the trial. It’s the fact that this looks VERY much like a selective prosecution. It looks VERY much like Kyle Rittenhouse was only on trial because it is politically expedient for the DA to try him. All over the country, the major media were calling him a murderer and a racist and a white supremacist; the BLM and Antifa thugs and terrorists (I mean peaceful protesters) were threatening to burn Kenosha again if Kyle weren’t tried and found guilty – which by the way is like the literal definition of terrorism, you know the use of or terrorizing threat of violence to achieve political ends. So, we either have a criminal justice system too frightened of the race-baiting, communist terrorists to oppose them, or in league with them…and I’m not sure which is worse.
And this is all in line with what we’ve been seeing. From the government we see the FBI has become little more than a progressive political enforcement brigade…which is neat to see the FBI go back to its roots when it was little more than Hoover’s personal blackmail network, ya know #rememberwhereyoucamefrom.
Oh, also the FBI recently raided the offices of Project Veritas because they apparently were in possession of Ashley Biden’s diary – which she claims was stolen – so therefore it was possession of stolen goods. Notice how the New York times wasn’t raided when they received Donald Trump’s stolen tax returns. We see that the raid and the data extraction being done by the FBI was so egregious that a Federal judge halted their work.
Of course, the IRS under Obama was targeting political opponents and now we’re beginning to see history repeat with bureaucratic agency attacks on conservative groups and individuals, as the government wants to start monitoring all transactions over $600. And this is…disquieting. But it’s all the more upsetting, when we see that corrupt government bureaucrats and agents are not only abusing their power, but that the apparatchiks are in bed with big business to have a joint public-private progressive platform to ensure that the only people who get to have rights to free speech and privacy and conscience and trial by jury are people who fit the mold. Business and Bureaucracy are united in bringing in the secular millennium – and I say millennium and not Utopia because this vision is clearly a religious and theological vision and not merely sociopolitical – as if the theological could ever be removed from the political anyways!
The problem is NOT that our institutions are godless – the problem is that they worship the wrong gods! It isn’t a lack of theology, it’s a bad theology. And a bad theology is always opposed to good theology. Indeed, bad theology cannot tolerate good theology and when men whose theology is bad are in charge they will persecute those who have good theology.
Consider the account of Joash, the king of Judah.
Now, if you have a good bible memory, you’ll remember that Joash was a little boy who was likely to be put to death by the wicked queen Atahliah, who took over after her son was killed by Jehu. The godly priest Jehoiada took Joash and hid him until the king was not a baby anymore and Jehoiada had gathered enough strength and political power. Then he had Athaliah deposed and Joash was made king. And as long as Jehoiada was around, Joash listened to him and he did what was right – but then he decided to forget God and we’re given this story in 2 Chronicles 24:
17 After the death of Jehoiada, the officials of Judah came and paid homage to the king, and he listened to them. 18 They abandoned the temple of the Lord, the God of their ancestors, and worshiped Asherah poles and idols. Because of their guilt, God’s anger came on Judah and Jerusalem. 19 Although the Lord sent prophets to the people to bring them back to him, and though they testified against them, they would not listen.
20 Then the Spirit of God came on Zechariah son of Jehoiada the priest. He stood before the people and said, “This is what God says: ‘Why do you disobey the Lord’s commands? You will not prosper. Because you have forsaken the Lord, he has forsaken you.’”
21 But they plotted against him, and by order of the king they stoned him to death in the courtyard of the Lord’s temple. 22 King Joash did not remember the kindness Zechariah’s father Jehoiada had shown him but killed his son, who said as he lay dying, “May the Lord see this and call you to account.”
23 At the turn of the year,[a] the army of Aram marched against Joash; it invaded Judah and Jerusalem and killed all the leaders of the people. They sent all the plunder to their king in Damascus. 24 Although the Aramean army had come with only a few men, the Lord delivered into their hands a much larger army. Because Judah had forsaken the Lord, the God of their ancestors, judgment was executed on Joash. 25 When the Arameans withdrew, they left Joash severely wounded. His officials conspired against him for murdering the son of Jehoiada the priest, and they killed him in his bed. So he died and was buried in the City of David, but not in the tombs of the kings.
26 Those who conspired against him were Zabad,[b] son of Shimeath an Ammonite woman, and Jehozabad, son of Shimrith[c] a Moabite woman. 27 The account of his sons, the many prophecies about him, and the record of the restoration of the temple of God are written in the annotations on the book of the kings. And Amaziah his son succeeded him as king.
Later we read that Amaziah, the son of the prophet murdering king Joash was also confronted by a prophet – let’s look at that in 2 Chronicles 25:
14 When Amaziah returned from slaughtering the Edomites, he brought back the gods of the people of Seir. He set them up as his own gods, bowed down to them and burned sacrifices to them. 15 The anger of the Lord burned against Amaziah, and he sent a prophet to him, who said, “Why do you consult this people’s gods, which could not save their own people from your hand?”
16 While he was still speaking, the king said to him, “Have we appointed you an adviser to the king? Stop! Why be struck down?”
So the prophet stopped but said, “I know that God has determined to destroy you, because you have done this and have not listened to my counsel.”
And, since God isn’t a liar, King Amaziah was destroyed because he decided to challenge Jehoash, Jehu’s grandson and the powerful northern kingdom and he got himself killed.
Now these two stories may seem random – but they are NOT. Notice what happens in this story – the idol worshippers in power, when challenged, they overthrow law and justice, and they try to silence opposition through intimidation or murder. And while these are of course only two examples of MANY we could find of this kind of behavior in the Bible, it’s important to note that both of these events, the murder of Zechariah son of Jehoiada and the threat to murder the unnamed prophet who challenged Amaziah, both of them came about before these kings were destroyed.
Because bad theology doesn’t work. Bad theology is always its own undoing. Those who reject God’s wisdom and murder and threaten his prophets have to suffer for their wickedness and folly.
Friends, the way of the transgressor is hard because God is not mocked; every man reaps what he sows. When people sow lies and corruption and violence then they reap destruction. And a nation whose politicians and police and prosecutors and presidents are a pack of lying heretics is a nation that is doomed.
Now, if you’re listening to me right now saying that seeing kids railroaded and investigative journalists’ homes and raided and the FBI lying on FISA warrants, and the big tech oligarchs silencing free speech and the myriad other events that have happened in the past few years have eroded our public trust in institutions; you’re hearing me right. If you hear me say that and you expect me to say that the solution is a return to the constitution and rural values and some kind of Cato-like classical liberal virtues and society, then your expectations are sadly out of line with reality.
Because I have no intention of saying that all we need is to be more American, that we need more free speech and we need to get rid of corruption in the courts and need to reign in the power of the technocrats. I have no intention of saying it because 1) it isn’t true and 2) it wouldn’t work. It isn’t true because thinking that all we need to do is read the Federalist Papers and some Ayn Rand and start baking apple pie again misses the point. It ignores how we got here in the first place. The kind of Ra-Ra Let’s Go Brandon kind of Americans think they can restore their country by fixing the manifested corruption in our systems – but they have no idea WHY that corruption exists.
Progressives don’t become Utopians because they are progressive – Utopians become Progressives because they are Utopian! And Utopians are Utopian because they are godless and ignore the theological truths of God’s sovereignty, God’s laws, and human depravity. Indeed, they hate the truth and reject it and hate you for believing it.
Remember, Progressivism IS a religion. Now, I know what you’re thinking. You’re thinking – “but Luke, a lot of Progressives are atheists, so it can’t be a religion.” Well, that all depends on how we define religion doesn’t it? Do atheist Progressives believe in theistic God? Many if not most do not, and if they do, then that God is not consonant with the God of Biblical Christianity. Indeed, many of the early American Progressives in the late 19th and 20th Century were Social Gospel Christians. But the God of the Social Gospel Christians was not the God of Biblical Christianity.
But ignoring the Liberal Christians who are engaged in Progressivism, though they once made up a sizable portion of Progressivism and still have some influence today, but ignoring them, I want to substantiate the claim that Progressivism is a religion.
Now, again, you might be saying, “but Luke atheists cannot be involved in a religion.” But like I said, that all depends on what you mean by a religion. And if you want you can look up “religion” in the dictionary and depending on what dictionary you use you’ll get a different definition – or you can read anthropologists or sociologists of religion or experts in comparative religion – or, I know this sounds crazy, but you could ask a theologian! GASP! And they all are going to give you some slightly different answers on what a religion is.
But here’s how I’m defining the word and I think that this can be defended. When I say “religion” I mean a system of thought that gives and account for the way the world is and how it should be. Now, I know that that’s very, very simple. But It’s also very broad. But consider this definition: a religion is a system of thought that gives an account for the way the world is and how it should be. So, let’s look at my definition piece by piece to see if it makes sense.
First, I say that a religion is a system. Now, I’m pretty firm on this – for something to be a religion it cannot be a collection of disconnected superstitions – that would be a culture, but not a religion. So, for instance, if someone believes in aliens, sasquatch, and ghosts, but they believe each of things independently, it isn’t a religion, because it isn’t a system. A religion has to cohere – even if it’s incoherent – it has to attempt to hold things together.
Second, not only does it have to be a system, but it has to be a system of thought. Now, this doesn’t mean that all religion is is thinking and not behaviors or values – those come later. But a religion is a system of thought, not merely a system of behaviors. Otherwise being a major league pitcher or a welder or a heart surgeon could be a religion. Those things all are systemic and all of them are systems of behavior, but that’s not enough. It has to be a system of thought. Because thoughts and ideas are how we understand the world – which brings us to the next point.
Third, a religion has to be a system of thought that gives and account for the way the world is. This means that there must be an account – not necessarily an explanation – but an account for the way the world is. You have to give an account for why there is an earth. You have to give an account for why there are humans. You have to give an account for death, disease, and despair. You have to give an account for why there is a world and why the world is the way that it is! This means that for something to be a religion it has to have a Creation and a Fall if it’s going to tell us how we got here and why things are how they are. This means that the Big Bang Theory isn’t a religion. Yes, it attempts to give an account for why the universe is in its current form, but it doesn’t give an account for the way the world is – i.e. why there is pain and suffering and why people care about it. The theory of Evolution is not a Religion, because while it explains why there is death and disease, it doesn’t explain where anything came from – nor why we care. However, Progressivism accepts the Big Bang and Darwinian Evolution as part and parcel of its system – at least the atheistic versions of Progressivism do.
Fourth, a religion is a system of thought that gives an account for the way the world is and how it should be, and the emphasis is on how it should be. Notice that word SHOULD – that’s the most important word, because SHOULD implies volition and obligation and morality. This is the key component, but by itself it isn’t a religion. You can have people who have all kinds of opinions on how the world should be, but they don’t give an explanation of why the world is the way it is. If having opinions on how the world SHOULD be were a religion, then every 3-year-old on earth would be the founder of their own religion. No, a religion has to explain not only how the world SHOULD be, but why it is the way it is, now – and it has to do it systematically.
Now, again, I know that a lot of people are going to disagree with me because they think that a religion has to involve a supernatural being. I disagree. If something meets the criteria I’ve listed above, then that thing is a system of thought that explains the origins of the world, and gives an accounting for the human condition, and then makes moral statements about how people ought to behave – and all of this is based on faith.
Any account of origins is based on faith – it can’t be else. You weren’t there to see the creation, so you can only accept an explanation on faith. You don’t know WHY anyone does anything, often to include yourself! You have to have faith that the explanations you have for human behavior are accurate. You can’t prove moral values; you simply accept them on faith.
So, a religion, as I’ve defined it as: a system of thought that gives an account for the way the world is and how it should be. That means it’s a faith-based account of the creation, human nature, and moral values and obligations.
That sounds pretty religion-y to me.
Now, let’s consider Progressivism – and for our purposes, we’re going to restrict ourselves to atheistic Progressivism.
Now, is Progressivism a system? Yes. Is it a system of thought? Yes. Is Progressivism a system of thought that gives an account of the way the world is? Yes. Atheistic Progressivism holds to Materialist Darwinism – so they would accept something like the Big Bang, and would believe that all life came from non-life, at some point after everything came from nothing. So, Progressivism has a creation account, and the various versions of Progressivism also have a Fall – with Marx it was Capitalism that alienated workers from the wealth generated by their labor. For the Fascists it was racial enemies that weakened the Razza or the Volk. For Humanists it’s society. For the Woke it’s Whiteness. For Environmentalists it’s carbon emissions. For the Neo-Malthusians it’s population growth. Because all the Progressive visions of why humanity is the way it is have to give an accounting for why the world sucks – I mean Buddhists just did an end run and said that pain isn’t really real, so don’t worry about it, but that seems like a lazy answer to most people.
Lastly, is Progressivism a system of thought that gives an account for the way the world is and how it should be? Yes, because all of those above gave us an ought to follow up with the why. For the Communists it was worldwide proletarian revolution to overthrow the bourgeoisie. For the Fascists it was the Holocaust. For Humanists it’s getting rid of spanking or everyone being naked or whatever the latest claptrap is. For the Woke it’s modern injustice to overcome past injustice. For environmentalists it’s the Green New Deal. For the neo-Malthusians it’s China’s 1 child policy, or forced sterilization, or war.
But if you notice, that embedded in every one of those Progressive positions is the idea that the world can be improved through human knowledge and will and political power. There is, fundamentally, in all the atheistic Progressivisms a belief that the world is wrong but that it can be better. And more importantly, they believe that this progress is the inevitable conclusion of history (which is why Progressives are always talking about being on the right side of History). And even more importantly, they believe at the culmination of history, the world will be at peace and all the people who matter will be truly flourishing (emphasis on all the people who MATTER will flourish). And more importantly, this is a moral imperative to make the world the way they envision it. And most importantly, they should be the ones who make the world become the way they believe it ought to be.
It’s a Utopianism – all modern Atheist Progressivisms are all Utopian at their heart.
And yes, to be sure, the Bible has a vision of Utopia – it’s called the Millennium. And yes, Progressivism ABSOLUTELY mirrors the Biblical story. Progressivism is Christianity without Christ. It’s Creation, Fall, Redemption, and Utopia. But it’s a godless Utopia. And it’s one that has no external moral standards.
Throughout the Bible, the problem of evil is taken seriously. The Bible says that there are things God cannot do, because they will violate His nature. The Bible has people questioning God’s righteousness and asking whether the Judge of all the earth will do right. The Bible has a moral standard that is the standard of God’s transcendent moral character. But God is bound by that character – and it’s one that we can know and appeal to.
The Progressive has no transcendent moral standard. To men like Hitler, Stalin, and Mao, it didn’t matter how many people you had to murder if it meant Utopia for the survivors. For our contemporary Progressives it doesn’t matter if you break the law and violate the constitution as long as the Progress of history moves forwards. For the American atheist Progressives, it doesn’t matter who has to be disenfranchised, or robbed, or harmed, or murdered; it doesn’t matter whose rights are violated; it means nothing to lie and cheat – as long as Progress is achieved. And that’s because Progress is the only moral good and if not the only, then the highest. And when Progress is the only moral good, then anything that opposes Progress is, by definition, not only a moral evil, but a blasphemy.
That’s why we’re seeing the heightened emotions and violent outbursts in our political scene today. That’s why we’re seeing the anger and crudeness. That’s why we’re seeing the hatred. That’s why we see the cheating and the lying and the illegality and the unconstitutionality and all the evil going on. It’s because the Progressives view themselves as the good guys in a Holy War and their opponents as the blasphemous heathens and heretics who oppose what is good.
And all throughout human history there has only been one penalty for blasphemy.
Friends, I hope I’m being clear, but this is a very complex subject – you could do years of reading and study on this topic, it is deep and complex, but in the end it boils down to this: Progressives treat Progressivism as a religion. And as a religion, it has moral values and obligations. Progress is the highest and really the only good. Thus, whatever leads to progress is admissible and even laudable – whatever resists progress is evil and blasphemous.
This means that Progressivism is a religion in conflict with Christianity.
Yes, these are very similar religions – no doubt about that. And it’s there very similarity that makes the conflict all the more confusing and fierce, because we want many of the same kinds of things, and we often use the same words.
But make no mistake, Progressivism and Christianity are not the same. Indeed, they are incompatible. Despite the similar language they are different.
Christianity says that a Transcendent Holy God created the Universe because it please Him. Atheist Progressivism says a causeless, purposeless, meaningless explosion set everything in motion.
Christianity says that man is made in the image of God and that all people have inherent worth and dignity. Atheist Progressivism says that men are hairless apes who won the brain and thumb lottery and do not have inherent and inviolable value and dignity.
Christianity says that man was created to rule the planet as coregents in communion with God. Progressivism says we have no purpose.
Christianity says that because of disobedience to God, sin and death entered the world. Progressivism has many versions of the Fall, but they reject that we’ve offended a creator God.
Christianity says that we are all born evil and sinner in Adam. Progressivism says that we are all born good and are corrupted by society.
Christianity says that we cannot be improved without being born again and led by the Spirit. Progressivism says that progress comes from having the right leadership and enough willpower.
Christianity says that God became man and died to save us and to redeem us. Progressivism says that redemption comes form the right people getting enough power.
Christianity says that God will bring about the Kingdom of God for those who love God and wish to serve Him. Progressivism says that Utopia will be brought about when the right people get enough power and either win over or kill all their enemies.
I could go on and on, but I think you’re seeing the point. These are religions and they are religions in conflict. And as you watch the strife and conflict in our country – attempt to see it not through the lens of Left and Right or Libs vs. Cons but see the conflict as atheist Progressive Utopians and Christians, and see if that doesn’t offer a better explanation.
This is the division in our society because these two religions are not only competing but incompatible. They cannot both survive and they cannot tolerate eachother because both worldviews are totalizing.
Let me unpack that statement.
There are some beliefs that you can hold that have little or no impact on other things you believe. For instance – you can believe that there is a Loch Ness Monster and that may have literally no bearing whatever on anything else you believe. It cannot be used to predict any other belief you have. If you believe in the Loch Ness monster, I can’t use that to guess whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat; it doesn’t tell me your opinion on Abortion or Gay marriage; it doesn’t tell me whether or not you support the Green New Deal; it gives me no hint as to whether you think that the Versailles treaty was fair to the Germans! Your belief in Nessie has low diagnosticity. That means that as a diagnostic tool it’s useless. You can’t diagnose or predict other beliefs you have based upon your faith in the Scottish Lake Monster. So, some views, and opinions, and beliefs don’t interfere with other beliefs.
I can think that Sonic is orders of magnitude better than McDonalds and it doesn’t affect any other thought I have, unless it’s specifically related to whether or not I want a delicious juicy burger from Sonic…and I do…but that’s irrelevant. It just means I need to stop recording these when I’m hungry!
Belief in the Loch Ness monster or admitting the truth of the superiority of Sonic is a VIEW.
However, some views DO impact other beliefs. If you believe that all humans are endowed by their creator with inalienable rights, among which are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness and that these rights cannot be infringed without due process of Law, then YES, that will have a HUGE impact on other beliefs – even if you’re inconsistent, or a bit hypocritical at times, you’re faith in the Constitution’s description of basic human rights is going to affect A LOT of things. Beliefs that affect lots and lots of other beliefs are called worldviews. They are attempts to make sense of the specific problems or phenomena in the world through one or several guiding principles. These are called WORLDVIEWS.
Then there is a special category of worldviews. These worldviews not only attempt to make sense of the world through guiding principles, but they claim to answer all questions. These are metanarratives – these, as one writer has put it, subsume all paradigmata under its own paradigm. OK, but that’s a lot of $5 theology worlds.
Let’s break it down. This special category of worldviews doesn’t accept that there is anything that the worldview cannot explain, incorporate, or refute. All knowledge and truth is incorporated into the system. Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Buddhism, Atheism, Scientific Materialism, Communism, and of course Progressivism – these are all worldviews that attempt to explain everything. True believers would tell you that there is nothing that these systems cannot explain, incorporate, or refute. All knowledge, all data, all phenomena, all truth, every human behavior, every paradigm, every narrative – everything can be accounted for by the system and accounted for EXCLUSIVELY. These are TOTALIZING WORLDVIEWS.
And, as you can expect, totalizing worldviews are exclusivist, and by nature, very intolerant. Now, understand, when I say intolerant, I don’t mean that that’s a bad thing. Intolerant is not a pejorative. Indeed, sometimes intolerance can be a very good thing. If you swallow a bunch of poison – you ought to want your body to be intolerant of the poison and to vomit it out. If you get a virus or bacterial infection, you want your immune system to be intolerant of that disease.
Indeed, we have a name for diseases that prevent your immune system from fighting off diseases – a disease that effectively prevents your body from being intolerant – we call them immunodeficiency diseases…AIDS is an example. When your body’s immune system becomes tolerant of the WRONG things, that’s bad.
However, when your body’s immune system is intolerant of the WRONG things, then that, of course, is also bad. These are auto-immune disorders. Things like arthritis and lupus are autoimmune diseases, but so are forms of myocarditis and autoimmune disorders can cause fatal cytokine storms.
The problem isn’t tolerance or intolerance per se – the question is whether you’re tolerant and intolerant of the right things. A totalizing worldview is intolerant of contradictions. And if the worldview is correct it SHOULD be intolerant.
Now, I’ve spent all this time making this point, because I want us all to be on the same page – 2 weeks ago, I laid out the case that the division in this country is not primarily political, but theological – it’s a division not between Left and Right, but between Progressive Utopians and Christians.
Last week, I showed that Progressive Utopianism is a religion and a religion incompatible with Christianity.
And so far today, we’ve added some new vocabulary and maybe some new thought concepts to our theological toolbox. It isn’t simply that Christianity and Progressive Utopianism are in conflict. And it isn’t simply that they are incompatible religions. Those things are true enough.
But not only are Christianity and Progressivism conflicting, incompatible, religions – but they are both TOTALIZING worldviews, which means that they will both try to completely defeat and evict the other from the marketplace of ideas. Neither can tolerate the other. Christianity is allergic to Progressive Utopianism, and Utopian Progressivism is allergic to Christianity. They cannot both share the public square in a single polity forever. They are incompatible. A nation cannot be both Christian and Progressive Utopian. It does not work. They have conflicting aims, conflicting moral systems, conflicting views of man, conflicting conceptions of the good, they are in total conflict and if those are the only two options, then a society cannot be both – at least not forever.
Right now, our nation is a kind of Frankenstein’s monster, Christian in its founding and heritage and our institutions and systems are all Christian in orientation, but the overt and even the implied Christian ideals and morals and influence is, bit by bit, being replaced with Progressive alternatives.
Consider marriage. Marriage in this country came from the Christian ideas of marriage taken from Europe. But Progressivism has been undermining marriage for well over a century – first with Darwinism and Feminism and Modernism, then with 2nd and 3rd Wave Feminism, and the 60s counter-culture, and the sexual revolution, and no fault divorce and legalized abortion, and now homosexual marriage, and the dissolution of marriage so that vast numbers of people are not going to get married and now huge percentages of millennials and gen Zers have no interest in having children.
Marriage has been eroded through cultural and legal means so that it is a hollow shell of its former self, as far as social institutions go.
And that’s not an accident. It is not accidental that marriage has been eroded since the rise of Progressivism. Communist Russia talked about abolishing marriage; we see the antimarriage policies and cultural moves in the US. Marriage is only tolerated as a proxy for childrearing. In fascist states, marriage was promoted because it meant children and you need children if you’re going to conquer the world. But marriage would be jettisoned if possible. Why? Because marriage creates a bond that supersedes one’s loyalty to the state. Now, that’s not to say that Progressives, themselves, don’t like marriage – many of them have married well and are happy with their 1.7 children and large nest-egg. They, on a personal level, see the benefits of marriage. But marriage for Utopian Secular Humanist Totalitarians is not a beneficial social institution, if your primary goal is to have a subservient population.
Unfortunately, children born outside of stable marriages have a very high rate of criminality – so it’s a bit of a double-edged sword. You can’t get rid of marriage without having a population of uncontrollable hellions, but you can’t keep marriage and have everyone worship the state. Similarly, after the Communist Revolution in the Russian Empire, Lenin, Stalin, and all the Communist big-wigs had to legalize, tolerate, and actually PROMOTE capitalism, because it was the only way for the country to get wealthy enough to get rid of capitalism! The New Economic Policy meant that the only way to get rid of capitalism was with more capitalism!
And that points out the underlying folly of every aspect of the Progressive Utopian project – it is all contrary to reality. It has a faith-based and dogmatic and entirely incorrect view of human nature. And because its anthropology is inherently, unchangeably, and unavoidably wrong, its policies always fail in the long run. You can’t create policies that succeed with humans if your anthropology is totally wrong. Unless of couse your goal isn’t actually to gain Utopia but just to have dictatorial power. And of course, we see this clearly in 1984. O’Brien asks a naïve Winston why they really want power, and this exchange happens.
[Winston said] 'You are ruling over us for our own good,' he said feebly. 'You believe that human beings are not fit to govern themselves, and therefore – …
'That was stupid, Winston, stupid!' he said. 'You should know better than to say a thing like that.'
'Now I will tell you the answer to my question. It is this. The Party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power. Not wealth or luxury or long life or happiness: only power, pure power. What pure power means you will understand presently. We are different from all the oligarchies of the past, in that we know what we are doing. All the others, even those who resembled ourselves, were cowards and hypocrites. The German Nazis and the Russian Communists came very close to us in their methods, but they never had the courage to recognize their own motives. They pretended, perhaps they even believed, that they had seized power unwillingly and for a limited time, and that just round the corner there lay a paradise where human beings would be free and equal. We are not like that. We know that no one ever seizes power with the intention of relinquishing it. Power is not a means, it is an end. One does not establish a dictatorship in order to safeguard a revolution; one makes the revolution in order to establish the dictatorship. The object of persecution is persecution. The object of torture is torture. The object of power is power. Now do you begin to understand me?'
The point O’Brien makes is that it doesn’t matter to the totalitarian that his projects don’t work. It doesn’t matter that their economic system fails. It doesn’t matter that the Utopia never comes. Achieving Utopia is not the purpose of Utopianism – according to O’Brien, the purpose of Utopianism is power for those in charge of creating the Utopia.
Progressivist Utopianism fails everywhere it is tried. It cannot bring in the Utopia because it is fundamentally wrong about what human flourishing IS and therefore it is fundamentally wrong about how to achieve it. The totalizing worldview of progressive Utopianism is a complete and utter failure – if its purpose is to create a Utopia. But if its purpose is to justify, and secure power for the elites, then it is eminently and incontrovertibly successful. If, more specifically, its goal is to overthrow Christianity is the dominant cultural worldview, then it has been very successful heretofore and is likely to win the day, unless God intervenes.
Because here’s the thing. There are only 2 kinds of progressive utopians, the useful idiots who believe the rhetoric and the evil people who don’t. Indeed, there are a LOT of Utopians who have convinced themselves that Progressivism is the way to create paradise o earth. They sincerely believe this. It’s a stupid idea, and they are either self-deceived or willfully blind, or so arrogant that they can believe something demonstrable false. Human beings can sincerely believe a lie. Sinners can, indeed, convince themselves of something they KNOW to be a lie. The Bible calls this suppressing the truth in unrighteousness! So, there are the true believers, but apart from them are the cynics who, with eyes wide open, reject the living God and try to overthrow him.
That’s all there is to it. But at the root of it all is a rejection of God’s vision for the world, and His revealed truth about humanity, and His diagnosis and cure for the human condition. Progressive Utopianism is the big lie that people swallow to give them an excuse to reject Christ. At least it’s the one on offer today! Every culture in every generation has at least one great lie on offer. Every culture in every generation has some excuse to hate God and continue in humanity’s disordered loves.
And the most tragic and shocking thing is that so many do this knowingly. They know, even if not consciously, they KNOW that they are looking for an excuse to reject Christ. And then know, even if not consciously, they KNOW that their lie is a lie and it cannot work.
But they persist in their lies.
I’ve thought long and hard for a long time about why. Why do people persist in self-destructive behavior? Why do people reject God, knowing that it will mean misery? I’ve spent a long time thinking and pondering this, and in the end I don’t think anyone has said it better than Milton:
Is this the Region, this the Soil, the Clime,
Said then the lost Arch-Angel, this the seat
That we must change for Heav'n, this mournful gloom
For that celestial light? Be it so, since he [ 245 ]
Who now is Sovran can dispose and bid
What shall be right: fardest from him is best
Whom reason hath equald, force hath made supream
Above his equals. Farewel happy Fields
Where Joy for ever dwells: Hail horrours, hail [ 250 ]
Infernal world, and thou profoundest Hell
Receive thy new Possessor: One who brings
A mind not to be chang'd by Place or Time.
The mind is its own place, and in it self
Can make a Heav'n of Hell, a Hell of Heav'n. [ 255 ]
What matter where, if I be still the same,
And what I should be, all but less then he
Whom Thunder hath made greater? Here at least
We shall be free; th' Almighty hath not built
Here for his envy, will not drive us hence: [ 260 ]
Here we may reign secure, and in my choyce
To reign is worth ambition though in Hell:
Better to reign in Hell, then serve in Heav'n.
But wherefore let we then our faithful friends,
Th' associates and copartners of our loss [ 265 ]
Lye thus astonisht on th' oblivious Pool,
And call them not to share with us their part
In this unhappy Mansion, or once more
With rallied Arms to try what may be yet
Regaind in Heav'n, or what more lost in Hell? [ 270 ]
There are people, multitudes of people who hate God and they hate Him knowingly, knowing that it will mean an eternity of misery. The agree with Satan that it is “Better to reign in Hell than serve in Heaven.” Their loves are directed, destructively, towards themselves, and they know it, and they persist in doing evil – they persist in rejecting Christ and loving what is wrong.
WHY?
Because they would rather love themselves in Hell than love God in Heaven. They would rather be narcissists in misery than worshippers in joy.
The Progressive Utopian project cannot abide Christianity because its whole purpose is to replace Christianity. It is an excuse to hate God. That’s all it ever was and all it’ll ever be. It’s just one more lie that will end up in the rubbish heap of history – sadly not without wrecking and ruining the lives and eternities of countless millions – but it too shall pass because it is a lie and no lie can last forever when God is truth.