Challenging the Secular Culture

Faithful Catholic and other traditional Christian scholars and commentators write a great deal about the troubling developments in secular Western culture and its many components: morality, social life, politics, law, the situation of the family, etc. While critique of the secular culture—even trenchant critique—is often necessary, it is not adequate. Christians have to be careful not to just “curse the darkness.” After all, one of the great theological virtues, which are the highest of virtues, is hope. It was in that spirit that the Veritas Center for Ethics in Public Life at Franciscan University of Steubenville assembled a group of traditional Christian scholars and writers for a conference in April 2015 to consider what things need to be done—and, in fact, realistically can be done and how they might be done—to begin to challenge the secular culture and restore the traditions that the Western world emerged from. Their papers at the conference—spanning education, family life, sexual morality, politics, law, the media, and the arts and architecture—are assembledinto this book.To challenge and try to change the secular culture is no small concern. Not only are Christians called to “re-establish all things in Christ” (Eph. 1:10), but they increasingly have no choice in the matter as the culture—whether by its propagation of immoral public practices or the increasing threats to religious liberty—inevitably impinges on them as they now may have to act simply to protect themselves. It is the hope of the scholars connected with the Veritas Center that this book may spawn further, ongoing reflection about how Christians and all those concerned about a sound culture that respects true human dignity should engage and, where necessary, confront a culture that has moved so sharply away from its religious foundations.The contributors to this volume are James Kalb, Benjamin Wiker,Anthony Esolen, Robert R. Reilly, Allan C. Carlson, Sheila Liaugminas, Duncan Stroik, Lawrence M. Stratton, and the book’s editor Stephen M. Krason. There is a foreword by Anne Hendershott.