Free Republic

This piece was first published in 2019. My book Hillbilly Elegy is really an exploration of the American Dream as it was experienced by me and my family and the broader community in which I lived. It chronicled a real decline in the American Dream, not because people weren’t consuming as much as they have in the past – if you look at the trend lines, we’re certainly able to buy more stuff today than we ever have been able to. It’s a story about family decline, childhood trauma, opioid abuse, community decline, decline of the manufacturing sector, and all...

Welcome to Restoration. The great story of Western civilization, our core creeds, and the Judeo-Christian moral framework on which our societies were built are all under siege. At least three ideologies are pedaled as alternatives: 1. Communism: This resurgent communism is cultural. It is firmly embedded in our core institutions. It is international in outlook, and breath-taking in its subversive ambition. And it again has traction among the young. 2. Technocracy: The Technocratic Managerial Regime, as analyzed by N.S. Lyons, is ascendent in most every nation it seeks to dominate. 3. Islamism: A radical and aggressively metastasizing version of Islam...

The singular difference between the United States and all the nations that had gone before was its open, explicit recognition of natural rights, the idea that all humans are created equal and granted unalienable rights by their Creator. And that, therefore, governments can’t arbitrarily and capriciously take those rights away, as has happened in virtually all monarchical and totalitarian governments throughout history. If that is the “godliness” that so disturbs the MSNBC talking head, so be it. The founders did not intend for the United States to be an overtly Christian nation, in terms of an official, government sanctioned religion....

To locate Joe Biden’s electoral problem, you need only to look on Sunday morning. Polling shows the mass-attending Catholic president trails Donald Trump by 10 points among those who attend religious services a few times a year or more. The score is reversed with voters who report they seldom or never attend church, with Biden leading by 10. It’s the starkest divide in the electorate – and one that political journalists rarely mention, perhaps because, as a profession, journalists are more removed from religion than the average American. Trump’s advantage with white evangelical Protestants is widely understood, but he also...

Joe Biden vs. Donald Trump is not the race America needs, but it is the one we deserve. A political system that has spit out a race few voters want is the perfect symbol of a nation – and a people – bent to the point of breaking. Biden vs. Trump appears to be a welcome diversion in a country whose government seems unequipped to face its biggest challenges and whose people are increasingly unwilling to take responsibility for their own problems. Eight months arguing about two angry old men – hearing our own side praise us to the hilt...

(Excerpt) ...Google, meanwhile, withdrew Gemini following the backlash. In the usual bland, fire-blanket press release, it admitted its shortcomings and vowed to learn from its mistakes. But what do we think comes next? What will Google’s response be, back in the lab, once the doors are resealed? Presumably, it won’t be to ruefully explain to everyone involved that sorry, the cunning plan to rewrite all of world history and culture has been rumbled. That AI should now put accuracy ahead of ‘inclusivity’. Most likely, I fear, is that Google will simply try to smooth out the delivery system of the...

“Did God Say??!!” The Hermeneutic of Suspicion versus the TRUTHXCHANGE (TxC) Hermeneutic By Dr. Jeffery J. Ventrella The term “worldview” populates a lot of evangelical conversations and there exist many fine ministries that engage the culture apologetically at various levels. Hardly any of them, however, pull back the veil of confusion at the foundational level like TxC does. The TxC hermeneutic functions as a set of glasses that brings clarity and connection to what’s really at root in the culture. This clarity provides the pre-conditions for effectively executing the Cultural Mandate and the Great Commission. Let’s get to the gist.First,...

The Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, a conglomeration of Lutheran denominations, had over five million members when it was launched in 1988, joining three independent Lutheran confessions with nearly 10,000 congregations and 65 synods. But now, in spite of the word “Evangelical,” this union is in decline. One of its churches, in Edina, Minnesota, throws a pagan sparkle into the deep meaning of “decline.”[1] This June, Anna Helgen, an LGBT Lutheran “minister,” stood in her Lutheran pulpit, dressed in pastoral robes, and recited what she called a “Sparkle Creed” as part of the church service. This liturgy was riddled with...

Churches have remained publicly quiet for decades on the moral issues of the day so as not to appear too controversial or too political. As a result, public debate is often left to those without a biblical worldview. The consequences of this passivity have contributed to the unraveling of American civil society. It is well past time to end the silence. The Progressive Elites talk endlessly about "democracy," but their intention is typically a ruse to implement a top-down liberal agenda. They allow normalizing pedophilia, trafficking children for sex, sexually grooming kids, encouraging transgender surgery for minors, and promoting unlimited...

A new study from the Cultural Research Center at Arizona Christian University has found that just 37% of Christian pastors in the United States have a biblical worldview, demonstrating that spiritual awakening is "needed just as desperately in our pulpits as in the pews," according to the pollster.The nationwide study of about 1,000 Christian pastors found that just slightly more than a third (37%) of the U.S. pastors hold a biblical worldview. The majority (62%) possess a hybrid worldview known as Syncretism.The study, released Thursday, showed that 41% of senior pastors — as compared to 28% of associate pastors —...

The Word became flesh and made his dwelling among us. We have seen his glory, the glory of the one and only Son, who came from the Father, full of grace and truth. (John 1:14)It's been said that the most important event in human history was the birth of Christ. When you examine this claim with an open mind, there can be no denying it, as there is clearly no event that has reverberated throughout the world that effected so many for so long by altering the course of history forever. In a book written by cultural historian Christopher Dawson,...

Not all ideas are equal. Some have less intrinsic value. Some are downright bad. Some are inherently dangerous.Yet one of the reasons that the framers of our nation protected the expression of ideas was so that most could be evaluated and the individual could choose to reject or advance them.Team Biden is full of bad & inherently dangerous ideas. 1. Biological sex is meaningless. 2. Racial makeup means everything. 3. Life has no value. 4. Laws, boundaries & accountability don’t matter. 5. Private property doesn’t exist. 6. Women are bleeding/birthing people. 7. Fathers are oppressive. 8. Faith & Belief are...

On schools, the Father of the Reformation, Martin Luther, said: I am much afraid that the universities will prove to be the great gates of hell, unless they diligently labour in explaining the Holy Scriptures, and engraving them in the hearts of youth. I advise no one to place his child where the Scriptures do not reign paramount. Every institution in which men are not unceasingly occupied with the Word of God must become corruptTragically, the twentieth and twenty-first centuries in America have proven this wise adage true. In the world today, there are few things more corrupt than the...

On the surface of recent polls, Christianity may seem alive and well in the United States. They say around 65% of Americans identify as Christians. But digging a little deeper reveals that not all is as it seems. According to podcaster and author Natasha Crain, a mere 10% of the population actually understand or engages in a Biblical worldview.Watch the show on Locals or listen to it on Apple Podcasts.Crain is a national speaker, author of three books with a fourth on the way, and blogger whose passion is to equip Christian parents to raise kids with an understanding of...

If you don't have time to read my review of Tom Holland's Dominion, here it is in three words: Read this book. A few more words: Buy this book, give this book to friends, and encourage them to read it. "Dominion" is not only rich, seductive, eye-opening, conversation-sparking, and occasionally surprisingly witty, it is urgently necessary. Read this book – before it's too late. Why do I endorse "Dominion" so zealously? Let me tell you a few stories. I was a schoolgirl in New Jersey. I sat next to "Aisha." She moved like a butterfly and, quiet and shy, she...

The hard Left believes its mission is so critical, so morally superior, that all means can be justified to achieve its noble ends. And so almost every institution that the Left has in its line of vision is now petrifying. There was once a tradition of Democratic liberalism. But that wing of the Democratic Party no longer exists and died sometime in the 1990s. Old-style liberalism has been absorbed by Progressivism at best and unapologetic socialism at worst—in a journey on the supposedly predetermined arc of history that bends toward 1984. The new-old leftist aim is not to operate within...

Teleios conducted a survey regarding the benefits to a Christian society with 565 responses. The majority of responders were: female (78%), <35 years (67%), from the United States (60%) or Europe (13%), and evangelical (88%). A slight plurality (46%) believed they were living in a Christian based society versus secular (45%). Respondents noted advantages to living in a Christian society, compared to any other type of society (41%) and compared only to a secular society (18%). Participants indicated the top 3 potential advantages of a Christian society were a stronger moral (82%) and ethical base (71%) as well as greater...

Throughout the years, I have discovered that the average Christian, along with many ministers, lack a biblical worldview. When I use the term "biblical worldview," I’m referring to the practice of interpreting life through the lens of Scripture. That is to say, your view of such issues as politics, the sanctity of life, marriage, economics, education, science, the law, etc., should derive from biblical principles. The average believer usually has only a piecemeal understanding of Scripture instead of a comprehensive world and life view. As a result, we have seen the Church become irrelevant in the public square. If we...

A new survey shows that the majority of Americans no longer believe that Jesus is the path to salvation and instead believe that being a good person is sufficient. As part of the ongoing release of the Arizona Christian University-based Cultural Research Center's American Worldview Inventory, the latest findings — exploring perceptions of sin and salvation — from George Barna, the group's director, show that nearly two-thirds of Americans believe that having some kind of faith is more important than the particular faith with which someone aligns. Sixty-eight percent who embrace that notion identify as Christians, including 56% of self-described...

Is mathematics next on the chopping block to be deconstructed as a form of "Western imperialism"? A young woman describing herself as a teacher, Ph.D. student, and "social justice change agent," recently gained notoriety for tweeting, "The idea of 2+2 equaling 4 is cultural," a product of "western imperialism/colonialism." Yes, even mathematics, held up as the most objective and neutral of disciplines, is being reshaped by critical theory, which claims that all ideas are social constructions by groups using their power to advance their own interests. *snip* Critical theorists argue that mathematics is just another arbitrary human creation that has...