Reynolds Delivers a "Message of Hope" in a Post-Christian Era
Posted Feb 7, 2018
Last night, John Mark Reynolds, President of the St. Constantine School in Houston, TX, spoke on the St. Constantine Option and contrasted his hopeful message with Rod Dreher’s The Benedict Option. The basic message of The Benedict Option is that the United States is moving toward a post-Christian era where those who hold traditional Christian views will face mild social persecution. This “persecution” can be seen currently in the government trying to force Christian bakers, florists, and photographers to participate in same sex weddings which they believe is contrary to their religious beliefs. As Christians lose much of their previous cultural power, Dreher argues that Christians need to consider withdrawing from society to create faithful Christian communities that can withstand a culture that challenges much of orthodox Christianity. Reynolds presents a contrasting position which he argues can help Christians realize that cultural power is a burden also and that we can respond in a more hopeful fashion to re-norm American culture and create a Christian golden age in the next century.
One of his theses is that our media elites get their cues from college elites and our media elites produce celebrities who then govern the culture. We now have a culture of celebrity where celebrity is more important than accomplishments and celebrities are famous for being famous (i.e., Paris Hilton, Kim Kardashian) instead of doing something to garner celebrity. Celebrity is important because celebrities are held to the celebrity standard rather than the standard of the field they speak in. Thus, Donald Trump is not held to the same standards as other politicians because the public views him as a celebrity rather than a politician and judge him by those standards.
This culture of celebrity is antithetical to Christian teaching and beliefs. The bible teaches the older to teach the younger, that wisdom is more important than rhetoric, and that inner beauty is more important than outer beauty. Yet, the cult of celebrity is the opposite and that will have consequences for our country as we listen to celebrities instead of experts. Think of someone like Bill Nye the science guy. Nye got his start in engineering but then moved into entertainment. He is now a science educator rather than a scientist. Yet, we listen to him and believe what he says because he is a “science guy” rather than a scientist. So instead of listening to the expert (i.e., a real scientist), we listen to the science communicator. Many believe Nye who is basically telling us what other scientists say. We just have to hope he is correct. Yet, we would not google our disease and then argue with the doctor. We need to listen to those with expertise not those who are entertaining.
Another thesis of his talk is that revolution (e.g., cultural, political, violent) occurs when people’s life is improving but not as fast as we think it should. He used the example of his grandfather who grew up dirt poor in West Virginia. His expectation was to survive so that when he gets to live in comfort and sees all the advances in society in his life time he can be very content. Today, people have much higher expectations for their life and if they do not achieve those expectations soon enough, they are likely to look for something different. This not fulfilling expectations connects with the culture of celebrity as we believe celebrities who may mention conspiracies that we believe which could potentially lead the nation to seek a strong man to govern us.
So how do we respond to a celebrity culture? Dreher argues that we should remove ourselves to a Christian community and prepare for a better day. Reynolds takes a different view. Reynolds believes that there are several things we must do to challenge the culture of celebrity. First, we need to return to our natural roots and identify the wisdom of the past. Second, we need to love our culture because we cannot know who we are unless we understand our culture which means we need to be part of it. Third, we need to love our country. We are Americans and we should love it even with its flaws. Yet, we should seek to right the wrongs and we can’t do that unless we understand how we went wrong and care enough about our country to do something about it.
Fourth, we need to recover the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love. Many people having no problem loving others. We are people of faith so faith is not a problem. However, many struggle with hope. We need to remember that whatever problem you see, God can help us overcome it. And since that is true, we do not need to be pessimistic about the future. The cult of celebrity tends to spread fantasy which means that it will ultimately faith. Christians believe in truth which means that we will ultimately succeed, even if we struggle for a short period.
This background leads him to his St. Constantine strategy. The Emperor Constantine was a flawed person but he got the big thing right. He saw that the Roman Empire was struggling and its location in Rome was part of the problem. Thus, his solution was to pick up the capital and move it to a safer place. He also saw that paganism was dividing the Empire and used Christianity to help unite it.
His decisions led him to take the best that Rome had produced and took it with him to safeguard thus protecting Western Civilization.
Reynolds argues that we don’t need a new emperor but instead we need a republican form of Constantine. We need people who get a vision of the cross that says “in this sign you shall conquer.” The cross is an instrument of suffering and self-denial. We need to consider the problems of our society and the strengths of our society and create alternative solutions to the problems of race, poverty, ignorance, loss of meaning, and other things. If we do this, we can help lead our society from the culture of celebrity into a new golden age, an age where Christianity can once again exert cultural power.