Month: December 2010

Reagan: The Principled & the History Makers

  

As we close the book on 2010, and as we consider the challenges that loom, some select quotes from Ronald Reagan may help us focus on our responsibilities. There are some quotes from Reagan with which many people are familiar, but I’ve chosen to pull out some that are less well known, yet just as insightful. Just two months into his presidency, right before the assassination attempt, he spoke at the Conservative Political Action Conference dinner: We’ve heard in our… Read more »

Chambers & Counterrevolution

  

More wisdom from Whittaker Chambers today. Reflecting on the sad state of society in 1925 with respect to its grasp of the dangers it was facing, he penned these poignant words: The dying world of 1925 was without faith, hope, character, understanding of its malady or will to overcome it. It was dying but it laughed. And this laughter was not the defiance of a vigor that refuses to know when it is whipped. It was the loss, by the… Read more »

Chambers: Death of a Nation?

  

Those who have read this blog long enough know my affinity for Whittaker Chambers, a man I consider one of the true heroes in American history. He had joined the Communist Party in the 1920s, thinking it was the answer to all the world’s crises. Only later did he come to grips with his error, but when he did, a whole new understanding opened to him. As he notes in his masterful autobiography Witness, his mind had to be renewed… Read more »

A Tocqueville Prophecy

  

Yesterday, I drew from Alexis de Tocqueville’s classic Democracy in America to show the positive influence of Christianity on early American society. Today, I would like to once again draw from that well of wisdom to highlight what I would consider to be a prophecy of America’s future should it ever succumb to the lure of a large and intrusive federal government. I urge you to read what Tocqueville had to say about this and ask yourself: has this already… Read more »

Tocqueville & American Christianity

  

Alexis de Tocqueville, a Frenchman who toured America from 1831-1833, was a keen observer of what he experienced. He put those observations into a famous book, still used in political sciences courses, called Democracy in America, first published in 1835. Tocqueville quotes can be found throughout the Internet; unfortunately, some of them dealing with religion in America are more legend than fact. I know, since I’ve read the entirety of his book without finding them. However, he did make clear… Read more »

The Weight of Glory

  

Yesterday, I employed a few choice quotes from C. S. Lewis. Today, I’d like to extend his remarks. This is a longer passage excerpted from a sermon he gave entitled “The Weight of Glory.” I think it is sublime as it redirects our thoughts to how God would like us to view the potential He has placed within each person. I urge you to read this passage all the way through and allow it to renew your mind: We are… Read more »

God, Reason, & C. S. Lewis

  

C. S. Lewis has popped up on this blog a number of times recently. I gave a thumbs-up to the movie Voyage of the Dawn Treader. I would like people to read more of Lewis, so I’m going to use a few of his quotes today so they will understand the depth of his meditations. For instance, I wonder how many have pondered the issue of objective moral law vs. subjectivism. Here’s Lewis on that topic: The very idea of… Read more »