Theological Conservatism in the Secular State

The main subject is the speaker's belief in the necessity of conservative movement's theological foundation for preserving societal values.

### The Role of Theology in American Conservatism
* 🏛 Dr. Albert Mohler, a prominent Southern Baptist theologian, delivered a keynote speech at a conservative conference, emphasizing the **importance of theology in the conservative movement**.
* 🛡 He argued that the future of conservatism in the US will be increasingly tied to **explicit theological claims and confessions**, stating, "if conservatism as a movement has a future, it is a future that is going to be increasingly tied to **explicit theological claims and confessions**, or there will be nothing left to conserve."
* 🙏 Mohler highlighted the historical and ongoing tension between secular and religious worldviews, pointing out that "**there is no such thing as a secular space**," and that **secular spaces are inherently filled with metaphysical and moral claims**.
* 📜 He discussed the history of secularism, from Rousseau's call for a civil religion to the French Revolution's atheistic cults, arguing that even supposedly secular states end up adopting **religious-like beliefs and practices**.
* 🇺🇸 Mohler challenged the notion that the American constitutional tradition emerged from a secularist impulse, arguing that it was grounded in a "**sacred canopy**" of Judeo-Christian values.
* 🌐 He warned that the "**post-Christian religion of the woke**" is becoming the new dominant ideology, with its own **liturgy, doctrines**, and even **excommunication practices**.
* 👥 Mohler emphasized the importance of a **pre-political commitment to foundational values** like marriage, family, and human dignity, rooted in **theological truths**.
* 🙌 He concluded by calling for **unity among Christians, Jews, and other conservatives**, stating, "when you get us, you get all of us... I show up with a full weight of Baptist conviction, which means, yes, I'm ready to argue with a Methodist, not to mention, you know, Roman Catholic, or anyone else in the room."

[Applause.] Well, good evening. It is a great honor to be here with you. And the decision to invite a Southern Baptist in this conference is an act either of desperation or of opportunity. But it was an act that was nonetheless reckless, as you shall see. One of the big questions about inviting a Baptist is whether my role here at the end is to give an invitation or take an offering. And the answer is probably both. It is a great, great joy to be here. I have drawn strength from being with all of you and from the exchange of ideas and the encouragement from the exchange of heart that has taken place, session by session, room by room, sometimes conversation by conversation. I have been involved in conservative meetings and conservative conferences for my entire adult life. And at least one thing I'd like to offer is that this is not as new as some of you think. As a theologian, one of the academic principles I teach is that the history of the Christian Church indicates an

ongoing tension between what may be assumed and what must be articulated. And this is why at certain moments the church has had to come together in moments of theological crisis. And those moments of theological crisis are often marked by the great Creeds of the Christian Church throughout its many centuries. Sometimes those Creeds were made necessary simply because what could have been assumed just as common knowledge, common Faith, common confession, just a matter of uh say a few years before, now requires overt articulation. And let me just say that uh a lot of what is being affirmed here at this meeting and has been in the other netcon conferences is what conservatism understood itself to be, uh an unashamed appreciation for and seek for the conservation for of the nation. And that means first of all this nation, but then the idea of Nations and the Integrity of Nations. I want to thank the Edmund Burke foundation for sponsoring this event, your RAM hazoni who has given so much intellectual content and helped to substantiate and shape out.

what such a movement would look like friends and fellow conservatives. It is just a great joy to be here. All good things must come to an end, and such it is with this conference tonight. But perhaps some closing thoughts would be helpful. You know, when you do get religious people together, things can get awkward. You may have noticed. Sometimes the closest of denominational neighbors can find themselves in awkward situations. About a hundred years ago, the great Methodist evangelist Sam Jones was preaching in Cartersville, Georgia. And this is when the Protestants had long meetings. They called protracted meetings, and that's because they protected them, and they were going for days and days. In the classic protected meeting, you didn't know when it would end. It ended when the Holy Spirit indicated it should end. Sam Jones was a famous Methodist evangelist. He was preaching in Cartersville, and in the morning, they had sessions for men to pray very early in the morning. And then later, women gathered together. He's speaking at one of the women's Gatherings during the

time of this meeting in Cartersville. And uh he asked how many in the room were Methodists. And evidently all in the room, of all these ladies, were Methodists except for one who raised her hand. And he said, Well then what are you? And she said, I'm a Baptist. Sam Jones said, Why are you a Baptist? Now I just want to tell you as a Baptist, this is a bad Baptist answer. She said, Because my mother and father are Baptists, and my grandparents are Baptists, and all my folks are Baptists. And Sam Jones then turned to her, taking the rhetorical advantage, and said, Well what if your parents were fools, and your grandparents were fools, and all your folks were fools? And she said, I get it. I would be a Methodist. And uh you look at that and uh right apologies sort of to the Methodists who might be in the room. God bless you if you're here, but it just points to the fact that there's both awkwardness and opportunity. And I want to lean into the opportunity and say

that if this is something you find awkward. Welcome to the future because insofar as conservatism as a movement has a future, it is a future that is going to be increasingly tied to explicit theological claims and confession, or there will be nothing left to conserve. It is not an accident that as we gather here, there are those who represent, in the main just in terms of visible identity and overt conversation, those who represent especially the Orthodox strain of Judaism, and both Catholic and Protestant Christianity. Better get used to being in the room together. And this is where, as a Baptist, I just have to remind myself and all of us that we have theological ecclesial rooms and we have social cultural rooms. And so, we have different theological convictions and we respect that. Amazingly, the secular world wonders how in the world this can happen. We actually respect one another more. I respect a genuinely Catholic Catholic when I'm in conversation. I respect a genuinely Protestant Protestant when I'm in conversation. And I'm glad to say I've been greatly

honored to have those conversations through the years, and also with Jewish friends, ongoing conversation of which this conference is another down payment for the future. I want to speak about one of the most dangerous ideas of the Modern Age. During covid when everything was in disequilibrium, I taught a class and everything was online. At this point, we were all trying to scramble, and we have thousands of students, and I was trying to figure out how I can most help. I thought one way I can encourage is to teach a class that will get their attention. So, I intended this primarily for undergraduate students. But I entitled the class the most dangerous ideas of the Modern Age, a class. I might offer that in terms of the curriculums, much easier to start than to finish, but nonetheless, I was astounded when hundreds of students signed up. Hundreds of students, all the way from doctoral students in The Graduate School all the way down to homeschooled students who were 14, 15 years old.

heard about it, and their parents signed them up. And it is because I think people alive today of conservative conviction understand that we are surrounded by a battle of ideas, and it's a very dangerous Battle of ideas because so many of the ideas are inherently dangerous. To be human is to be uniquely capable of perceiving intellectual and ideological threats. Animals can perceive physical threats; otherwise, they don't survive. We alone are capable of recognizing ideological and intellectual threats, and that's actually a part of our responsibility. So with this opportunity, I thought that I would discuss one of the most dangerous ideas of our age, and that is the very dangerous illusion of the secular state. In this class, one of the most dangerous ideas in the Modern Age, I discussed Marxism, materialism, fascism, scientism, pragmatism, post-modernism, critical theory, deconstructionism, lots of isms. I want now to speak about secularism, in particular, is represented in the secular state. In order to do so, first, I want to share with you a fairy tale, an interesting way.

to begin tonight, but uh, I want you to think of this fairy tale. Tonight, there once was a day when people were religious. They believed in strange gods and strong doctrines, and engaged in bizarre rituals that represented tribal identities and Supernatural superstitions. That took on totemistic significance and were passed on through intergenerational transmission. The fairy tale continues. Such supernaturalistic systems of belief were representative of ancient Humanity's attempt to reckon with and to explain the world around them. The Consciousness within them and the cosmos above them. Surely to be pitied, they found emotional refuge and also found meaning in their mythopoetic systems. They developed ethical systems that reflected their backwardness and often argued with the Rival belief systems. And sometimes worse than an argument. All these belief systems to greater or lesser degrees of explicitness reflected the faulty moral beliefs of the old of the tribes, including patriarchy, sexual repression, mandates concerning marriage, the family, and human reproduction, and the raising of children. Beliefs about spiritual and ethical

superiority. The assumption that absolute truth exists and that dangerous extensions into the political sphere threaten. And according to this fairy tale, and certainly in its earliest forms, there was the insistence that the purpose and end of human existence should be some form of emancipation. And sure enough, the fairy tale came with a tale of emancipation. It came in the form of the modern project. As Humanity came of age, the Enlightenment would bring emancipation from ancient creeds and religions and worldviews, and allow Humanity finally to come of age. Emancipatory liberalism would free all Humanity from the shackles of tyranny, despotism, superstition, dogma, prejudice, and ignorance. The suggestion was that this emancipation would retain some form of religious morality while deconstructing religious doctrine and authority. It was very interesting. And just when I teach the history of theology, one thing I point out is that Protestant liberalism, especially in the first half of the 20th century, was largely driven by the argument, We'll ditch the theology and

keep the morality. How'd that work out with the rainbow flags outside those churches? You can't have the morality without the theology. Take it from a theologian. According to this fairy tale, humanity would finally come of age with a truly rational, cosmopolitan, and consensual moral ethic, personal and social. But they cannot yet imagine what an ethic might be, and they could not escape their religious tentacles of the moral expressions they found inevitable. And yet, they were sure such a secular option would eventually emerge. The early versions of this fairy tale also assumed a rather restrained assault upon the ultimate citadels of truth and knowledge and morality. They reassured the public that Enlightenment would make sense to all, or at least on the major pillars of Enlightenment thought. As we know, later versions of this fairy tale, updated constantly, would repudiate the early version, arguing that even they were hopelessly mired in the mud of traditional moral judgment and metaphysics. Biological reality, all that would have to change according to the fairy tale. Along came four.

friendly Giants to emancipate the elves. I'm thinking here primarily of Nietzsche, Darwin, Freud, and Marx. They were the Giants that emancipated the elves by their Prophecies of modernity. Then came new Marvels: technology, modern universities, contraceptive devices, pills, automobiles, no-fault divorce, social media. The list goes on. And then we can follow the modern experiment through early modernity, and then modernity, and what's now called late modernity. It used to be kind of called post-modernity, but the problem is that it doesn't really break down that carefully and distinctly. It's not like you have the pre-modernation also in this modern. Everybody knows it's modern, pre-modern Left Behind. It's not like the postmodern means the modernity is Left Behind. It just means it's a later stage, that's a more accurate development. And then of course, according to this fairy tale, more Giants have arrived, and even more will arrive. And emancipatory modernity is inevitable, never to be resisted, and only to be

welcomed. Well, we understand that this is a fairy tale, but it's the fairy tale that basically drives the progressives in this culture. They're absolutely certain that it's not a fairy tale, but it's the truth. And what puzzles them, perplexes them, and infuriates them is that there are people who will not go along with the fairy tale. Not only that, it's also very perplexing, especially, and I will say in the Christian world, that the very people who follow the fairy tale end up with churches that are evacuated of actual people. And people tend to gravitate toward those who hold to the ancient truth and preach the timeless truth. Well, amongst the assumptions of this fairy tale is that the state itself must be secular. No religious authority, no religious privileges, no theological truth, no acknowledgment of religious roots, no comprehensive doctrines, as said John Rawls. Of course, of course, the comprehensive doctrine of secularism, which is no comprehensive doctrines, turns out to be a comprehensive doctrine. So anyway, the secular dream here was

supposed to end with a secular state. Everyone wants to live happily ever after in a secular State of Mind, liberated and free, unrestrained, undeterred, unoppressed, uninhibited by even the slightest risk of a theological thought. Now, in one sense, of course, that didn't happen. I mean, the very fact it's a fairy tale is that it didn't happen, and yet you'd have to say it didn't happen, except where it did. So, in other words, where this fairy tale worked out pretty much like the tellers of it had predicted was Western Europe, northern Europe, amazingly prophetic in terms of how this would play out. The American college and university campus, which is more European than American in many ways when you think about secularity in them, the intellectual climate. It didn't happen everywhere, though, in the Modern Age, especially even in the modern industrialized world. Some of you know the name Peter Berger, the religious sociologist, a brilliant person and one of the very rare human beings who was still making intellectual

contribution in his 10th decade of life. Just think about that, still writing books in his 10th decade of life. Now, if you do live that long and as an academic, you have to go back and revise your theories because really some of them have been disproved by time. One of them was the theory of secularization. Peter Berger, the young Peter Berger, held that secularization was the inevitable result of industrialization, and mass culture, and high technology. It happened everywhere, inevitably, pretty much on the same timetable, except it didn't happen. Berger came back to revisit his own theory of secularization. And by the way, he did it first of all in the pages of First Things. Peter Berger was once asked about the current situation in the United States, and he spoke about a longitudinal study that had been done of relative religiosity. I know that's very exciting, a dinner session, the latitudinal study of varied religiosity. The basic point is they did a study.

Nation by nation, as to now without theological claims, just which nations tend to be more religious and which less. And it turned out that, as he said, the most religious nation, just marked by religious fervor, religious holidays, the time invested in religion, was India, and the least secular, excuse me, the most secular, uh, Sweden. So, the most religious, least secular, India, the most secular, least religious, Sweden. And then he was immediately asked by a reporter, Well, what about the United States of America? And he famously said, It is a nation of Indians ruled by an elite of Swedes. It's pretty much the way it is. It's a population of Indians, but we have reality, or at least would have reality, defined for us by an elite of Swedes. Now, at least a part of what's going on in this meeting is that the Indians are refusing to go along with the Swedes. And I am proud to be one Indian in this sense with the many others refusing to go along. We understand that one of the reasons why is because secular space is not

empty space it is space hostile to human dignity. It is space dangerous for human good. It is simply another fairy tale to believe the secular space is empty of metaphysical and moral claims of ultimacy. It is face hostile to truth and in space that celebrates the dissolution of the good, the beautiful, and the true. It is space that eventually will be hostile to human dignity and virtue once Transcendence is denied, once God is denied, a host of alien doctrines establishes a new religion and a new public Orthodoxy in various forms and places. Including recent history has space has been been filled by Marxism, communist ideology, critical theory, post-structuralism, identity politics, and woke activism, all driven by a religious passion and with ideas that invariably take on a religious shape. More about that in a moment after the fairy tale, however, I want to offer some corrective history. This is important too because many people who explain the Modern Age would say that it's inherently secular and that secular means absolutely non-religious, and yet it never was.

witness number one. It was Rousseau who wrote In His discourses and other early political writings. I would wish then that in every state there were a moral code or kind of civil profession of faith containing positively the social maxims everyone should be bound to acknowledge and negatively the fanatical maxims one should be bound to reject not as impious but as seditious. Rousseau was openly calling for an explicit civil religion and it would include Orthodoxy and heresy as every religious system inevitably does. It would be a civil religion imbued with theological Authority that eventually took the shape of what Rousseau called the catechism of the citizen. Emilio Gentile referred to this process as sacralization. In the modern world, the sacralization means that the state eventually takes on the role of the Sacred. And the point is as we're so understood something's going to take on the role of this of the Sacred. And if you deny God, then the state is

the most likely suspect to show up and make the demand of ultimacy. It's not only Gentile, it's also Eric Vogel and Raymond Aronne. Iran referred to secular religion as the doctrines that promise salvation in this life. There's some corrective history think about the French Revolution. People say, well it was absolutely irreligious. No, it was anti-Christian. It was not hardly irreligious. Remember that as a part of the early period of the Revolution, they stormed into Notre Dame Cathedral and removed the Madonna and child and replaced it with goddess reason and actually put in place the cult of the goddess and the cult of reason. There was a state-sponsored religious cult. It was atheistic, man make no mistake. It was explicitly religious and in a cathedral, no less, not by accident. Eventually in the Revolutionary history, in a sad tragic unfolding, there would be the release of the cult of the Supreme Being under Robespierre. Again, a cult of a Supreme Being. It takes on not only ideological shape but explicitly

religious shape. I mentioned Emilio Gentile in describing what he calls the political religions. He says, The Enlightenment made an important contribution to the sacralization of civil society and the nation by elevating them to the status of supreme bodies and values for the modern citizen. He continued, The Enlightenment was convinced that a well-ordered society could not do without some form of collective religion, but educated the individual to place the public good above personal interest. Now, just think about this. Fast forward to Marxism, communism, the Bolshevik Revolution. Marx would refer to religion, of course infamously, as the religion which comes down merely to the opium of the people, a force for oppression, and any kind of transcendent and theological language was simply nonsense in his materialist worldview. However, Marxism, and in particular the Bolshevik revolutionism, took on a religious shape and eventually even took over religious properties and filled them with a new secular and incredibly lethal cult. In 1925, the League of Militant Atheists, a communist cult, had hymnals.

I was in a used bookstore the other day. I bought one of the wobbly hymnals. If this was a communist workers' movement and they had songs and they printed up, it looks just like a Christian hymnal. I need Sam Jones, the Methodist evangelist, to come into that meeting. You know what would surprise many people is that people now associated intellectual figures now associated with critical theory and with Neo-Marxism. Someone like Antonio Gramsci made the very same point. Gramsci said this: Once religious faith in the traditional sense of the word had gone, people desperately searched for a new system of beliefs and general principles around which to regroup themselves and in which to find reason in their innermost cells for living in a worthwhile fashion. They thus created an endless number of new churches, put in quotation marks, according to their social class. Some found followings in the salons, others amongst individuals, and still others among the working people. Gramsci himself was very much influenced by Benedetto Croce who also said, Religion derives from the need for a

concept of reality in life and for direction. In relation to them, without religion and without this direction, you cannot live happily. He meant no secure political system. Now, I mentioned this not because I want to point to the social utility of religion. I'm pointing to this because I believe in the Imago Dei. I believe every single human being made in the image of God is a religious being and can never be anything other than a religious being. And this is why I enjoy debating atheists, and I dare say they do not enjoy it. I do not mean by that that I just somehow Trump them on every question. I just mean I kind of enjoy infuriating them because when I meet an atheist, I always ask, What kind of atheist are you? And they say, An atheist atheist. I said, No, there are no atheist atheists. There are atheists who are rejecting some specific God, at least that's where it starts. There is no generic atheism. In which God do you not believe? And even if they try to get out of

it I say well well, at least you don't believe in God. They're saying that well, no, it's just that God is completely absent in my worldview. And I said well, you say you're an atheist, that's a Greek Alpha primitive in front of the word theism. In other words, you can't, there's no, there's no intellectual possibility being an atheist without the existence of God. They do not like the argument, and there may be some who believe you to be yourselves to be atheists, and I understand that the structure of thought that is possible. I'm just saying as a Christian theologian, based upon what I believe to be revealed by our creator, or it is inevitable that every human being will worship something. And of course, we see the deadly political consequences of this. Charles Taylor and others go on to say this is just secularization working, and secularization is just inevitable because the societies move through modernity. There's less and less dependent upon any kind of transcendence, any kind of divine authority, everything

from the social systems, the financial systems, the academic systems, the moral systems, they all just have to move to a new basis of rationality. Robert Aldi, American, you know, goes go so far as to say that the only way that we should allow any civil discourse in this country is if uh you have no religious structure of thought and no religious motivation to what you think. So even if you show up without a religious argument, if in your heart you're religious, you are not a good American. John Rawls famously argued for just basically the same thing, absolutely no comprehensive doctrines. And by the time you read roles, you recognize that is a comprehensive Doctrine. In the 20th and 21st centuries, we've seen major Revelations of this and unexpected Moments. One was in the period of drafting and adopting the constitution for the European Union and the draft treaty for the Constitution for Europe of there was an acknowledgment originally of the Christian Roots of Western Civilization that was just too much and eventually not not for all nations, not for all delegations, but for

the majority, and by the way, the vote. I went back to look at this, uh, I somehow would remembered it being closer than it was. It wasn't all close. The European Parliament refused to acknowledge even the Judeo-Christian roots of the European project, and instead they adopted this language, and this is like the smurmiest language you've ever heard. I don't mean to offend all Europeans, but it's inevitable. In this sense, the European Union, not Europeans, the European Union. There'd be proud Europeans in this room who would very much stand apart from this statement. Quote, drawing inspiration from the cultural, religious, and humanist inheritance of Europe, the values of which still present in its heritage have embedded within it the light, the life of society, the central role of the human person and his or her in viable and inalienable rights, and respect for law. That's all there is. They just happen that came out of the ether. Europeans digging for potatoes found them. We can now leave them behind. You come to the modern age, you come to

the United States. You come to arguments very current here Charles Taylor's Canadian but vast influence here in the United States. He writes about the requirements of the secular State. Now get this, he says this: There must be equality between people of different faiths or basic belief. No religious Outlook or irreligious or religious can enjoy a privileged status, let alone be adopted as the official View of the state. So with time being brief, I just want to make an historical argument after telling a fairy tale and just offering a bit of corrective history. I just want to make an argument, and that argument is that one of the great myths is that somehow the American constitutional tradition emerged out of a secularist impulse. And by the way, historians know the word wasn't even really intellectually available during the founding era in the United States. I'm going to argue that what Peter Berger would refer to as a sacred canopy, that canopy of theological fixed meaning that was grounded in some form of Christianity explicitly when it comes to the American experiment.

created the space whereby the two principles of the first amendment of free expression and no establishment of religion could be adopted. Because even as Charles Taylor recognizes, the big issue then was to avoid strife among Protestant sects, to use his word. We're in a very different world now, and yet it's a world uninformed by history, either constitutional or political. It's the assumption that somehow we have a secular state that just emerged virgin-born. Charles Taylor recognizes, quote, the whole range of comprehensive views or deeper reasons, speaking of deep theological reasons. They were, in the original sense, varieties of Protestant Christianity with a smattering of dias. So, in other words, they could afford to say no establishment of religion, something that I actually agree with when it comes to the establishment of a state church. But there also is, by extension, the argument that there was no acknowledgment of religion whatsoever, which is just historically false. And, by the way, Charles Taylor arguing against the recognition of religion in the sense and then nonetheless has to acknowledge that throughout most of

American History. It was the norm. Justice Joseph's story in the 1830s. The goal of the First Amendment was, quote, to exclude all rivalry among Christian sects. But he also argued that, quote, Christianity ought to receive encouragement from the state. By the 1890s, 37 to 42 state constitutions recognized the authority of God. By 1892, the Supreme Court would just simply say, This is a Christian Nation. Now, I want to back up and say, I'm a Baptist. I'm a conversionist. I believe that salvation comes to those who come to a personal knowledge and confession of the Lord Jesus Christ and repent of their sins. I do not believe you become a Christian by being born in a nation predominated by Christians, but I am thankful to live in a society that is the inheritance of a Judeo-Christian civilization because it has established the very freedoms that we know. Where else do we have access to any stable notion of human dignity? Where else do we have any access to the

notion and defense of human rights in any substantial form. You know, you go back to December 22nd, 1952. It's an interesting moment. Dwight David Eisenhower was president-elect of the United States, and he went to speak at a meeting. It's believed to have been to the Waldorf Astoria, but he apparently wrote his notes on another hotel stationery, driven historians nuts ever since. But he got up, and he simply said, Our form of government, quote, has no sense unless it is founded on a deeply felt religious faith, and I don't care what it is, end quote. That's one of the oddest presidential statements of all time. The historian William Lee Miller said, quote, One might say that President Eisenhower, like many Americans, is a fervent believer in a very vague religion. Um, and there's a sense in which that was true, a very fervent believer in an extremely vague religion. But you had secular historians and even liberal Protestant historians who've taken that and said, Look, he's just throwing that

out just nothing but the social utility of faith, and they miss the entire context, which is that at the very time he was giving that statement, just short of a hundred percent of Americans identified either as Jewish or Protestant or Catholic. Indeed, Will Herberg, the famous religious sociologist who was himself Jewish, would publish a book just a matter of a couple of years later entitled Protestant, Catholic, Jew, and that was the American population. And his point was that the United States, by the way, was refuting the sociological prophecy about the end of religion. As he pointed out, there's this vast increase in attendance at synagogues, in churches, cathedrals. Will Herberg was also enough of a theologian to recognize that that doesn't necessarily represent lasting, authentic, organic religious faith, but it certainly is not secularism. That's the one thing it certainly is not. Well, the Christian faith has had a great deal to say about life in this world, in this age, in the in-between time. The most classic work, short of scripture, that is in our

Christian tradition is the great Church Father Augustine's work The City of God, in which he made very clear there are two cities. Even as Jesus has said, Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar's, and unto God the things that are God's. There are two cities driven by two loves. Christians, by faith, are part of the city of God in the Eternal Kingdom of Christ. But by God's Own sovereignty, we're left in this world with a responsibility. In this age, we are to be good citizens in the city of man and to seek the good of the city of man without any compromise of our primary allegiance to the city of God. That's really tricky these days. Ernst Wolfgang Buckin for a day. Don't you love that name? Aaron's to Wilfing Bach and Forte. You'd have to name something for him. It's known in the law as the Buckan Fort of Paradox. He asked the question, Does the Free secularized State exist on the basis of normative presuppositions it cannot guarantee?

that's the paradox. Does the Free secularized State exist on the basis of normative presuppositions that it itself cannot guarantee? And the answer to that is absolutely, or at least it is trying to exist on the basis of normative principles that it itself cannot guarantee. You can make assertions about human dignity, but unless you believe that human beings are made by God, then eventually we're just some form of dignified or undignified dust. Unless human rights are grounded in the righteousness and Justice of God, then they are nothing more than political fictions to be endlessly negotiated and renegotiated. Well, why about all this tonight? I want to suggest that if there is to be a future for conservatism in the United States, it's going to increasingly be a conservatism of strong theological arguments. And even here, you've heard some strong theological arguments. Even now, I'm hoping you hear some strong theological arguments. And you should get accustomed to hearing strong theological arguments. That does not mean that conservatives are limited to those who make strong

theological arguments. But I will say to other conservatives, you're kind of riding on the wake of strong theological arguments. You are living off the capital of the Old and the New Testament of Israel in the Christian church. And that Witness, we see the great alternative before us: the post-Christian religion of the woke, demonstrating again the Imago Dei, demonstrating the fact we will worship something, we will be religious, that religion is going to work its way out. And by the way, predictably as others have noted throughout time in very religious form, the new woke religion has its own liturgy, it has its own doctrines, it has its own catechesis, it has its own cathedrals, it has its own doctrine of sin, its own promise of salvation, it has its own notion of sanctification, it has its own written canon of scriptures and slogans, it has its own crusading flags and choirs, it has its own Inquisition and holy office, it has its cherished dogma, and it enjoys

the right of excommunication known more popularly is cancel culture. Well, I want to thank you for having Christians as a part of this conversation, and Jewish friends as a part of this conversation, having Protestants as a part of this conversation, and Catholics as a part of this conversation. And I just have to say as the closing speaker and as a Baptist, when you get us, you get all of us. I don't just mean every one of us, I mean all that we are, individual as Believers. I've got to show up in full Baptist battle dress wherever I go. I show up with a full weight of Baptist conviction, which means, yes, I'm ready to argue with a Methodist, not to mention, you know, Roman Catholic, or anyone else in the room. I mean, what fun is there in life if you cannot enjoy a good argument over what matters? We may be the only people on the planet who know we show the greatest respect to one another when we honestly disagree with one another and respectfully honoring God and the truth seek rightly.

to come to an understanding not only of one another, but of the one true and living God. So what do we do now? Well, I want to argue that a part of what it means to be conservative is to be committed to the pre-political. Politics is important. There's so much political discussion here, and frankly, there simply has to be so much political discussion here. But at the end of the day, the pre-political is more important, more foundational than the political. The political is an extension of the pre-political. If you don't believe that there is an institution before the state, then honestly, you idolize the state. [Applause] I mean this: to be a conservative is to have to conserve the whole. We have to recognize a prior commitment to the pre-political realities of creation, order, marriage, family, community, nation - a real commitment rooted not merely in ourselves, nor in human will, but in the entire structure of creation as the revelation of the Creator's glory. We define them biblically. We strive to conserve them all. And that's to say that

a conservative movement that does not conserve what it means for God to make human beings male and female in His image. That does not conserve marriage as the lifelong Covenant Union of a man and a woman. That does not define the natural family as the essential heart of human society. That does not protect life in the womb and life in the family. That does not acknowledge the theological roots of our political Life as a nation is by no means conservative and can never be. Such a society or such an intellectual project would be unable to sustain a defense of community and Nation. And the nation will not survive the undermining of the prerequisites of marriage and family and human dignity grounded in ontological truth. I have Great Hopes as evangelicals. It is good to be with such worthy and thoughtful Catholic and Jewish friends and others as we think about our duty to conserve what must never be lost but must always be honored. In that conserving project, we cheer each other on, pray each other well, and bear honest witness to one another.

respectfully, lovingly, continually, we have a common enemy in the image of a supposedly secular state, and the looming threat of a new progressivist religion raised up with an official state ideology and idolatry. And so, here we are, John Courtney Murray, a major Catholic figure during Vatican II, who helped to define the modern Roman Catholic notion of religious liberty. In 1948, offered a very stern word of warning the Protestants who were living on the false idea that there could be some kind of neutrality in a secular State. And I have to say that liberal Baptists were at the top of that list of culprits. He said, this at the myth of democracy as a religion is to be triumphant and achieves its establishment as our national religion, the Triumph will be over you. He said the Protestants, your God will have been supplanted by an idol. If the last word is the secular State, then our God is supplanted by an idol. If all we have to offer is the argument of secular sterility, then

Our God has become an idol. If conservatism can be somehow severed from creation and severed from Creator, then ultimately there is nothing left to conserve. So again, we came here in great hope. I leave in great hope. It has been a great privilege to be with one another and a worthy discussion that began before we entered these rooms on these days and should surely continue. I'm very thankful for the dedication of those who've worked so hard to make this conference happen. No small thing. Join me in expressing appreciation. One of the great privileges of being here together is that at least a part of our disappointment is that we did not have conversations, personal conversations, worthy conversations with just about everyone in the room. We leave with great hope, cheering each other on, praying for one another, and understanding that we do have a common enemy, and that enemy is advancing swiftly, the enemy of a new progressivist woke religion that is raising itself up as the official state ideology. You say, Well, that's not a very hopeful word on which to end.

well Christians know that we are neither optimists nor pessimists because of Christ. We live in joy, we live in hope. Hope is not optimism, and hope is not pessimism, but joy is security, and joy is motivation, which reminds us that we have work to do. So, brothers and sisters, friends, it's been good to be together. Now let's get to that work. God bless you all. Thank you.

Albert Mohler | Your God Will Have Been Supplanted by an Idol | NatCon 3 Miami

National Conservatism

The Role of a Southern Baptist in a Conservative Conference

A Southern Baptist speaker reflects on the history of the Christian Church and the tension between assumed and articulated beliefs.

He emphasizes the need for explicit theological claims in the future of the conservative movement.

The speaker also highlights the importance of different religious identities coming together and respecting each other's theological convictions.

The Danger of the Secular State: A Critical Analysis

A professor taught a class on the most dangerous ideas of the Modern Age, attracting hundreds of students from various backgrounds.

The focus of the class was on the dangerous illusion of the secular state, discussing its impact on morality, ethics, and religious beliefs.

The class delved into the Enlightenment's promise of emancipation from religious dogma and the evolving narrative of secularism's role in truth, knowledge, and morality.

The Influence of Giants and Modernity on Religion

Prominent figures like Nietzsche, Darwin, Freud, and Marx are seen as the "Giants" who brought about modernity and emancipated society.

The idea of emancipatory modernity driving progressive culture is a dominant belief, but not everyone subscribes to it, especially in the Christian community.

The theory of secularization, proposed by Peter Berger, was challenged by the reality of religious fervor in different nations, leading to a resistance to the secular fairy tale.

Secular space is not empty but filled with metaphysical and moral claims, as seen in various ideologies and movements.

Throughout history, secular space has been shaped by religious passion, taking on a religious form, from the French Revolution to Marxism, critical theory, and woke activism.

Intellectual figures like Rousseau and Gramsci have also pointed out the religious nature of secular beliefs, highlighting the inherent need for a system of beliefs in human society.

The Role of Religion in Human Life and Society

Religion provides a sense of direction and purpose in life, according to the speaker, who believes that every human is inherently religious.

The debate between the speaker, a Christian theologian, and atheists revolves around the idea that all individuals ultimately worship something, whether it be a specific god or a non-religious belief.

The speaker argues that the American constitutional tradition is rooted in a religious impulse, contrary to the myth of its secularist emergence.

The Evolution of Religion in the American State

The First Amendment was initially aimed at preventing conflict between Protestant sects while also promoting Christianity.

Over time, the US saw a shift towards recognizing the authority of God in state constitutions and was even declared a Christian nation by the Supreme Court in 1892.

The complex relationship between religious faith and secularism in American history has shaped the nation's identity and continues to be a topic of debate.

The Role of Theological Arguments in American Conservatism

The future of conservatism in the US is likely to be increasingly influenced by strong theological arguments.

The speaker emphasizes the importance of pre-political realities, rooted in the structure of creation, as a foundational commitment of conservatism.

He also highlights the rise of a "woke" post-Christian religion with its own set of beliefs and practices, contrasting it with the role of theological arguments in conservatism.

The Challenge of Conservatism in Modern Society

A conservative movement is urged to conserve the traditional understanding of gender, marriage, and family.

The speaker expresses hope in joining forces with Catholic, Jewish, and evangelical allies against the rise of a progressive, secular state ideology.

Despite the challenges, the message ends with a call to action and hope for the future.