The Christian faith has become its own gravedigger. In one of the world’s great ironies, the Christian faith contributed decisively to the rise of the modern world, but has been undermined decisively by the modern world it helped to create. Echoing JFK, Guinness wants his essay to be taken as one model for fostering civility around the world and helping make the world safe for diversity. Furthermore, although Guinness notes that he is a European, the book is oddly marked by the old rhetoric of American cultural imperialism. ![]() For all Guinness's rhetorical vim, his proposals ultimately feel anodyne: his boilerplate conclusion is that in order to restore civility we need leadership and a remarkable articulation of vision. ![]() Nor is Guinness a fan of the nascent religious left-he prefers a depoliticized faith. The religious right-whose discourse of victimization, says Guinness, is silly and anti-Christian-comes under fire. To that end, he calls Christians to rethink their enthusiasm for government-sponsored faith-based initiatives, and to remember that evangelicals were the victims of earlier church-state establishments. He forcefully defends religious liberty, noting that it was crucial for the founding generation and should be just as crucial today. If Americans don't find a way of living with our deepest differences, the republic will decline. Popular evangelical writer Guinness (The Call) worries that the culture wars are destroying the United States.
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