Reflections on Postliberalism

Part 8, Rejecting Coercion in the Face of Pluralism

Over the last few posts I’ve been reflecting on the vision of postliberal theology.

Specifically, postliberal theology posits a hard (or clear) church/world contrast. The point of this contrast is to create a thick cultural community where the Christian virtues can be formed. This “community of contrast” exists as a “colony of heaven” within the larger pluralistic and liberal culture. Such communities can be called “Benedict Option” communities.

Given the church/world contrast, David Congdon worries about an implicit dehumanization that can tip over into political illiberalism. A postliberal ecclesiology becoming a postliberal politics. And you see examples of this trend. Rod Dreher, the author of The Benedict Option, shilled for Orbán’s political vision for an “illiberal state” (Orbán’s own description) in Hungary. Doug Wilson built a Christian community in Moscow, Idaho, and using Canon Press to promote an ethnocentric and misogynistic vision of Christian nationalism.

For my part, as a post-progressive Christian, I also work with a strong church/world contrast. I think the church matters. But the boundary markers are not the culture wars. To be sure, a moral vision is espoused, catechesis and formation are necessary, but moralism is not the boundary marker. Witness Jesus’ embrace of sinners here. Moralism wasn’t his boundary marker. The main boundary marker of the post-progressive church/world contrast is sacramental. Making God visible. The church is that place where, in the midst of the world, God is encountered, confessed, and worshiped.

Okay, so having sorted through some of my thoughts about postliberal ecclesiology, noting all the dragons to the right and left, let me turn now to the issue of postliberal politics, the illiberal and authoritarian projects of Christian nationalism and Catholic integralism.

Maybe this is an oversimplification, but it seems to me, having pondered Congdon’s article, that the critical issue here is cultural pluralism. Liberal democracy produces cultural pluralism. Indifferent to the good, the liberal and democratic state allows its citizens scope for “the pursuit of happiness,” however they envision that happiness. In the space created by this liberty Americans move in many different directions.

According to the postliberal political thinkers, people like Patrick Deneen, and leaning upon the earlier work of Alasdair MacIntyre, this pluralism in relation to the good within liberal democracies tends toward cultural dissolution and conflict. Unable to “pull together” as a nation toward a shared vision of societal flourishing, the nation slowly falls and/or comes apart.

And so postliberal political thinkers draw the straightforward conclusion: The state must impose a Christian vision of the good upon the populace. Crucially, if this effort is to be both comprehensive and stable, lasting longer than the short four years of a presidential term in office, the democratic values of freedom and liberty must be suspended and subordinated to the state. For the nation to flourish a turn to illiberalism and authoritarianism is necessary.

The logic here is clear and uncomplicated. But few Christian thinkers are willing to grasp the nettle here. For doing so is to reject a core feature of America’s founding, freedom from a coercive state and the liberty to pursue your own happiness as you see fit. And yet, with the rise of Donald Trump, postliberal political thinkers have been increasingly willing to flirt with or embrace an illiberal politics. The most well known example is how Patrick Deneen followed up How Liberalism Failed with Regime Change.

Okay, so how does a post-progressive Christian think about illiberal, postliberal politics?

Well, let’s lean into the progressive side first. Postliberal political thinkers tend to describe liberalism as a cesspool of depravity and moral relativism. But this is not true. Liberalism has a moral vision, and as Tom Holland has pointed out, it’s the vision it inherited from Judeo-Christianity. The two most important examples here are slavery and women’s rights. Consequently, it’s diagnostic that the postliberals have to deal with misogyny and racism within their ranks. And I will commend both Rod Dreher and Doug Wilson for the work they have done pushing back against these elements on the postliberal right. But the fact that these two sins—misogyny and racism—haunt postliberal politics illustrates the bankruptcy of the claim that liberalism is morally relativistic. Liberalism has secured moral goods for the world. To ignore and deny those goods invites some dark forces back into our world, the very same forces the liberal state defeated. This is why the postliberals might be better described as antiliberal, given how they refuse to recognize, praise, and secure the moral goods of liberalism precisely as the moral goods of liberalism.

A progressive Christian view of liberalism, by contrast, given its liberationist vision of the gospel, will praise liberalism as an emancipatory power within world history. Precisely because this emancipatory power is rooted in the Judeo-Christian tradition. Thus, to deny or ignore these moral goods of liberalism is to deny the gospel itself. In this sense, the antiliberalism of the postliberals is also antichristian.

For their part, many on the postliberal right see this clearly, the moral incompatibility between Christianity and illiberalism. They are aware that the illiberalism and authoritarianism they are espousing is better served by Nietzsche’s will to power than the Crucified Christ. The “strong gods” of paganism are much more suited for the postliberal political vision.

That said, the moral report card of liberalism is mixed. Postliberals look past liberalism’s moral achievements to decry its existential bankruptcy and decadent libertinism. On these points I often find myself, as a post-progressive, in common cause. Hunting Magic Eels describes what I call “the Ache” produced by our culture. In The Shape of Joy I survey our mental health crisis. I blogged through Louise Perry’s The Case Against the Sexual Revolution, noting how the sexual politics of our liberal and progressive culture have produced some very bad outcomes.

Notice, however, how my concerns and criticisms about liberalism are being expressed. Instead of throwing culture war bombs I’m offering immanent criticism from within the liberal order. On its own terms liberalism fails. Which is why, as a post-progressive, I believe liberals need the gospel. The moral goods of liberalism shouldn’t be jettisoned, the demons of racism and misogyny shall remain locked up, but the ailments of liberalism demand medicinal interventions. The church beckons.

Which brings me to a final reflection. My post-progressive perspective remains exclusively ecclesial. The tools of social transformation are persuasive and evangelistic rather than authoritarian and coercive. This commitment is not defeatist, as many on the postliberal right describe it, but theological. The church follows a crucified Messiah. The power revealed in Jesus is persuasive, invitational, and self-giving rather than coercive. Jesus did not seize the levers of imperial power to impose the kingdom of God. In the temptation narratives Jesus explicitly rejected this diabolical option. Rather, Jesus proclaimed good news, healed the broken, welcomed sinners, and suffered violence rather than inflicting it. If the church is the body of Christ its methods must mirror the life of Christ. More, faith cannot be compelled, for the moment belief is produced by political pressure it ceases to be faith and becomes conformity. Which is why the church’s tools of social transformation are proclamation, witness, repentance, and conversion. In keeping with its sacramental vocation the church makes God visible in the midst of the world and leaves the response to the freedom of those who encounter that witness.

Now, this is not to say, to go back to my colleague Brad East’s essay on Christian nationalism, that Christians cannot participate in democratic elections as Christians to win victories for their preferred policies. That’s just regular old democracy, and they shouldn’t be decried as “Christian nationalists” for such efforts. That said, should Christians experience political losses or reversals, they must lick their wounds and resign themselves to the will of the people. Crucially, given what I’ve shared in this series, they cannot let their political desires cause them to become unwitting or functional Christian nationalists, trafficking in conspiratorial and prophetically couched election denialism. Scripture describes Christians who are deluded like this as being in league with the Antichrist.

Stepping back and taking in the whole of this debate, I can see how a strong church/world contrast can be tempted toward dehumanization and make one sympathetic, or supportive of, authoritarian politics. The slide David Congdon frets over has happened and does happen. That said, a whole lot depends upon how one envisions both the church and world sides of the equation. I would never contend that the views I espouse don’t have their own particular temptations. No matter where you stand, there are dragons to your right and your left. To say nothing of those above, below, facing, behind, and within you. Sin will hunt you precisely where you are. You and I are not immune. Duly noting this, however, I’ve tried to sketch across these posts a vision of the church/world contrast that, I think, is necessary yet avoids many of the pitfalls one finds on both the liberal and postliberal sides of this debate.