Rod Dreher’s new book, ‘Live Not By Lies: A Manual For Christian Dissidents‘, posits that soft totalitarianism is coming fast, and that, once instutional influence is gained by radical Leftists, networks of the openly religious will need to form and associate ad hoc networks on their own, to maintain resistance.

Review here.

—

As posted:

Arguably, the influence of religious belief as well as Natural Law/Natural Right doctrines, traditionally profound influences on American civic life, continues to diminish.  So, the thinking goes, we are fast arriving at an increasingly divided civic and political life.  The logic of Left political radicalism becomes ever more entrenched in our universities, media and politics, entrenching a more Right-radical, European-style response.

It didn’t have to be this way.

Rod Dreher (The Benedict Option), points to what he believes are signs of the obvious failure of modern, liberal doctrines to replace the kinds of meaning such religious doctrines have provided.

Here are two recent blog posts containing this worldview of his, about which I’ve provided additional summary and commentary (please let me know what I’m missing).

‘Advice For A Weary Ghost‘-A 35 year-old woman feels empty inside, writing to ‘The Cut‘ for advice.  She doesn’t have a husband and can’t seem to maintain deep, meaningful relationships.  She’s had jobs but not a career.  Maybe it’s not just her.

The adviser promotes a surburbanely popularized vision of the rebellious and Romantically-inspired artistic life, reaffirming much of what Dreher and his commenters see as inadequate for most people, most of the time.

This view, I presume, utilizes the wrong maps to steer one’s (S)oul and inform life decisions.  Perhaps it allows one to succumb to materialist concerns and potentially materialist doctrines (too strongly measuring one’s life largely by economic, professional and outward successes/failures).  It also perpetuates the woman’s confessedly empty, Self-interested pursuits, cutting her off from the happiness of family and loved ones without much to show for it.

The ‘-Isms’ (feminism, environmentalism, political activism etc.) are poor substitutes for a moral, meaningful life.  The Church might just the place to be, but Catholic Church leadership, too, is corrupt and covered with the dust of this world.  There will increasingly be witch hunts upon religious believers by the new SJW believers.

The lady’s probably not going to be an (A)rtist, the lady giving advice probably ain’t so great an (A)rtist either.

Can the humanities become a lifelong source of wisdom and meaning?

‘Manufacturing Consent To Gender Ideology‘-Boys wanting to be girls, and vice versa, is the latest (C)ause. These outliers upon distributions of human sexual behavior, often shunned, mocked and condemned to limited lives, must not only be included in everyone’s moral concern, but celebrated.  Through social activism and protest, they are to become exemplars of the new normal.

Doctrines promising radical liberation, hinging upon revolutionary praxis, go about attacking and reforming current traditions, institutions, laws and arrangements, often grossly mischaracterizing and misrepresenting them to gain advantage. The grudging acknowledgement of freedoms gained through progressive activism and radical thought always come with costs.

And, given the natural ignorance of the human condition, and the basic desire humans have for group meaning, authority, security, identity and purpose, this latest (C)ause which promises liberation, will end-up delivering something quite different.

Cycles of utopianism and dystopianism await, and more disgruntled individuals drifting around aimlessly looking for an ad hoc ethics and politics, sometimes flirting with authoritarian and totalitarian Leftist doctrines as those doctrines become more mainstreamed:

How to live and what to do?

—

A reasonable summary and comentary?

Are you convinced of such a vision?

On this site, see:

Roger Scruton On Moral Relativism And Ross Douthat On Bill Maher…Catholics, Punditry, Progressives & Rubes-Ross Douthat At The NY Times

Moral Relativism is actually quite hard to define:

Ross Douthat made similar arguments some years ago while promoting his book ‘Bad Religion:‘

‘…what is the idea of universal human rights if not a metaphysical principle?  Can you find universal human rights under a microscope?‘

The Brothers Weinstein put forth one of the deeper defenses of Enlightenment principles I’ve heard while also remaining of the Left, simultaneously pushing against the radical elements of The Left: