Resurrecting the Idea of a Christian Society<\/a>, Rusty Reno finds a \u201cfalse view of freedom as unimpeded choice and self-definition\u201d at the root of many of our political, economic, and social pathologies. In the name of freedom, we have \u201cderegulated\u201d culture, a policy shift with far wider and deeper consequences than market deregulation \u2013 far wider and deeper economic consequences. Our aspiration to absolute freedom \u201chas benefitted the strong and hurt the weak\u201d and so it\u2019s in the name of the lower classes of American society that Christians need to advocate for Christian society (5).<\/p>\nOne of the best things about Reno\u2019s analysis is his admission that he is himself bewitched by the dream of freedom. He\u2019s worked on oil rigs, climbed sheer cliffs, tramped the lonely mountain trail. Reno\u2019s is a critique of the American dream from a dreamer.<\/p>\n
Reno is hardly the first to say that America is about freedom, but he expounds in in surprising ways. He sees it behind multiculturalism, which he describes as \u201can egalitarian cultural therapy\u201d: \u201cThe curricular decision to sideline \u2018dead white males\u2019 and highlight minority writers is the cultural equivalent of the progressive income tax that funds a substantial income supplement for the poor. . . . Far from an anti-American perversion, multiculturalism serves the American dream \u2013 everyone must have the greatest possible freedom to make his own future. Every cultural barrier must be dismantled!\u201d (21). We must throw off the shackles of our own inherited civilization as much as we threw off the shackles of monarchy and class hierarchy.<\/p>\n
On Reno\u2019s reading, even anti-Americanism is an expression of the American dream of untrammeled freedom: \u201cIf we prize the dream of freedom above all else, the most American thing to do is to renounce the authority of Western culture! Anti-Americanism is thus a kind of hyper-Americanism\u201d (23). And if so, asserting \u201ctraditional American values\u201d is hardly an effective antidote.<\/p>\n<\/body><\/html>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In his Resurrecting the Idea of a Christian Society, Rusty Reno finds a \u201cfalse view of freedom as unimpeded choice and self-definition\u201d at the root of many of our political, economic, and social pathologies. In the name of freedom, we have \u201cderegulated\u201d culture, a policy shift with far wider and deeper consequences than market deregulation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3021,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[842,1411],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18269","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-american-culture","category-freedom"],"yoast_head":"\n
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