Transcription
Neil, we're going to start with you. Uh, you're the historian of the bunch. Uh, talk about national uplift times. Countries have revived themselves. Times offer us some hope.
Well, David, I enjoyed your comments and, of course, I'm obliged to say that I enjoyed my wife's comments even more. Uh, and my fellow Scotsman, uh, Douglas Murray, was good too. And as I, he's always brilliant. As I listened to these three outstanding speeches, which touched on morality, on God, on how culture changes, I kept reflecting on the role that war has played in the past in causing national resurgences and national collapses. And your thoughts, uh, your remarks put me in mind of Tolstoy. Tolstoy's *War and Peace* is the story of ordinary people trying to live their private lives, and they have their private lives turned upside down by war. And that has been the experience of friends of mine in Israel. Has been the experience of friends of mine in Ukraine. But for most people in this auditorium, in this country, and in the United States, that's a very distant, remote experience. I have to think back to my grandfathers to understand what it's like for war to strike at the very heart of Britain. And you have the same. So a lot of what we talk about in these contexts is, from a historian's point of view, detached from the reality that it's very often the shock of war that brings about the biggest transformation, revivals, or collapses of national culture. So that's the thing that sometimes gets left out of these conversations.
In the United States, you spoke semi-ironically, disparagingly about American elites. But American elites helped win World War II. It was American elites who built the capabilities that defeated the dark forces of national socialism. And it was British elites who also contributed to that, that great victory in 1945. So let's, let's remember before we slag off the elites, uh, that they, they played a key part in preserving Western Civilization.
I'll say one more thing. When I'm trying to educate my children, who are even further away than I am from that experience of, of conflict, of war and peace, I try to get them to read the literature that will inform them of that searing experience. And if you can't get them to read the literature, then at least get them to watch *Rogue Heroes*. SAS, one of, one of the best television series I've seen in ages. And the spirit of David Stirling, I find terribly uplifting. That spirit that created the Special Forces, the spirit that said, "We're simply going to break the rules and get in behind the enemy lines and completely bugger up the way they fight this war." It's terribly inspiring to be reminded that we British, indeed we Scots, came up with the completely mad idea of the SAS. But that's the spirit, the real spirit of Western Civilization, that will never, I think, die, as long as we remember, as long as we remember that our civilization was built in the crucible of war.
Okay, Amy, um, what are the spiritual resources we have to, that you see, to to tap into?
I think we're, um, living in a time of real spiritual thirst in the West. The studies suggest that Generation Z are much more likely to be spiritual and open to the idea of God than their parents. And I think the, the Judeo-Christian worldview has two really powerful and wonderful things to offer this generation, this generation that have sustained our civilization. The first, we've talked about a lot at the conference, the idea of being created in the image of God. God within the Bible is not an idea. God is in actuality a person. And so to be created in the image of God is to have extraordinary dignity and value. And that, to a generation that have been raised at being told your identity is, you know, uh, dependent on yourself, you have to generate it yourself, and your, your identity is defined by intersectional injustice, and then you're propelled by grievance into this world. What a contrast to view yourself and other human beings as sacred image bearers of a living God, who we can have connection with.
And I think the second most powerful idea is the idea of redemption, the possibility of grace and a second chance, the possibility of forgiveness. My grandparents came to this country in 1948, escaping Soviet occupation. They landed with my father and my aunt at RAF North Weald in the clothes they were standing up in. They had experienced the horrors of the Nazis and then of the Soviets. As a generation, they knew the reality of evil, the darkness in the human heart. Potentially, the Bible talks about the Fall as a real category. So we've been created in the image of God, but every single person also is wrestling with, with sin and darkness. And so what the, the Judeo-Christian framework gives us is this possibility of redemption, a new start, a fresh start. And that isn't just about an individual connection with our creator, although it is about that, and what a wonderful way to live with attachment to a loving God as the core of our, our being. But it also propels people's lives for good. You know, the parable that Jesus is most famous for, the Good Samaritan, is cited all the time as a kind of example of why we should do good and love our neighbor. But the earliest histor, the early earliest, um, thinkers in the church, the P, the Patristic writers, realized that the central character of the Good Samaritan was Jesus himself. And what he was essentially saying is, to be human is to feel like being beaten up and left at the side of the road to die. And we all need rescue. We need forgiveness. We need deliverance. We need help from outside. We need redemption. And once we've experienced that, we can rebuild our world. We can love neighbor. We can do prison reform. We can care for the poorest. We can create systems that reflect a loving God and the value of every human being created in His image. And all of us have the possibility of a second chance. Business is when we, when we fail, we can get up and start again. We can create wealth through this power of redemption and forgiveness.
Okay, thank you, Rod. And I have been friends for years. We disagree about Donald Trump. We disagree about JD Vance. We probably disagree about Victor Orbán. But, yeah, I think the friendship we have is one of the ones I value because of that disagreement. Um, now, uh, your books, going back to the *Dante* book, *The Benedict Option*, the current book on *Enchantment*, they're part cultural contribution, but really the things I found personally most valuable is spiritual uplift and a spiritual path. So if I could ask you to talk, talk about that part of, of your work.
Yeah, I, um, my work in recent years has been about trying to save civilization broadly considered. But the meaning crisis is at the heart of the, of our civilizational struggle. And the meaning crisis is ultimately a religious crisis. And, uh, I don't believe that we can solve this problem by simply, you know, returning to some past that is irrecoverable. And we can't solve it either by arranging our thoughts in the correct way. Marshall McLuhan, uh, said that there are two ways of perceiving things. Well, you can, you have percept, which is truth that you perceive, and concept, which is what happens in the left brain. When religion becomes concept, it begins to die. So I think the real challenge for us today in this dying civilization is to reconnect to our ancestral faith, Christianity or Judaism, and to do so in a visceral way, a direct way. One of, of the real prophets of our time is a psychiatrist named Iain McGilchrist. I've seen him around here today. And Dr. McGilchrist has a theory of culture based on brain hemispheres. He said that in the left hemisphere is the analytic side, the right hemisphere is, of course, the, the perceptive side. The problem with the West, he says, is that at the beginning of the Modern Age, we leaned very heavily into the left hemisphere because it gave us power. Someone yesterday quoted you, Yuval Noah Harari, saying we exchanged meaning for power at the beginning of the modern period. And that has made us all rich and technologically advanced in all the good things. But Dr. McGilchrist says it has left us utterly bereft spiritually, creatively, and so forth. And we're not going to see recovery until and unless we achieve balance.
So, um, what I write about in *Living in Wonder*, my new book on re-enchantment, by re-enchantment, I don't mean sprinkling little Disney fairy dust somewhere in creating Disney World. I mean, rather, having a visceral, establishing a visceral connection to transcendent values, and ultimately to the Living God. There are ways we can do that. We have done that in this civilization. And so, uh, and there are practical things we can do too. I think of what Pope Benedict XVI said, that the best arguments for Christianity in this time are not the propositional arguments that's made for an age of reason, but rather the art the church produces and the Saints. By which he means, you see these principles embodied materially in art, uh, in music, things like that, and also in goodness, radical goodness, holiness of the Saints. These things speak to the heart, and the heart can't deny them. And what they do, once you accept, take this into your heart, it opens a mind up for the propositions. I think that we are not going to recover until and unless we become re-enchanted and seek a, a form of Christianity and indeed of Judaism that is more mystical, that, uh, valorizes this, uh, direct perception of, of the Holy Spirit, of holiness, and of transcendence. And I, I also think that this is where the Benedict Option idea comes in. It is not, please God, about heading for the hills. There are no hills to head to. It is about forming small communities. They can be schools, they can be church communities, they could be any number of things, where people who share a common faith, uh, practice spiritual disciplines together, so that when they go out into the world, as we all must, unless we're called to the monastery, we can faithfully represent Jesus Christ and, and bring him and the gospel to the world. So, uh, I think, David, to conclude, that we are desperate for meaning. And that meaning is there. Our ancestors in the pre-modern period knew it. And my general idea is that if we can return to a pre-modern form of Christianity, what the, uh, theologian, an Anglican theologian, Hans Urs von Balthasar, calls the Great Tradition, then we have a chance of doing that. It's not going to happen overnight. This is not, uh, a quick fix. But, and it's certainly not something that can happen only by politics. Uh, our old friend Victor Orbán once said that I can't give you meaning as a politician. I can give you things. Meaning, I can give subsidies. I can create laws that allow these other institutions to flourish. But if civil society doesn't step up, if each of us do not step up within our little platoon or in our families and so forth, then anything politics and economics might accomplish for us are in vain.
Thank you. I should, I should say, I ordered a McGilchrist new book, which is the two-volume, great big tomes, from Amazon, and somebody stole volume one off my driveway, which shows the hunger for epistemology in Washington. And it probably strained his back carrying away. Johan, you were just talking about the role politics can and cannot play. You, unlike the rest of us, have served in political office. How do you think about politics in, in a time like this?
David, thank you. A couple of days before I came over, with my mind on higher things like AR in London, and if I really got to go there in the dead of winter and put up with the jet lag and what have you, I absentmindedly filled my farm, you'd call it in Australia, truck, you'd call it in America, with the wrong fuel. You'll get the point straight away. Uh, I put diesel in a petrol vehicle. And as the vehicles I drove off down the road started to absorb the wrong fuel, it started, initially, to, you know, it still ran, but there was actually happened, gray smoke going everywhere. It became less and less powerful, and then died on the side of the road. And you think, well, this is very inconvenient. And I wonder what this is going to cost me, because I've probably done a lot of damage, etcetera, etcetera. How bad is it all going to be? The amazing thing was that we drained the dead fuel out of it, or the wrong fuel out of it, and refueled it with the right fuel. Uh, a lot of British engineering in that vehicle. So amazingly, it started and ran perfectly. Now, the point is, out of that, that we should not be overly despairing. The reality is that our forefathers have visited upon us the institutions of freedom. That just like that motor car, the engine was still there, the wheels were still there, the gearbox was still there. Put the right fuel in it, it all started to work again. And as Neil has just said, of course, we need elites. You've got to have elites. Someone's got to lead. Somebody's got to be highly enough educated to lead in the field of medicine. Somebody's got to be gifted enough to actually lead and inspire in the area of theology. Somebody's got to be good enough to aspire a nation. Think of Britain in the '30s. The Oxford Pledge, "Under no circumstances will this House fight for King and Country," passed overwhelmingly. A few short years ago, under strong leadership, the young people of this nation were fighting for the very survival of everything that matters. It's a remarkable story you've written about. Well, lots of you have written about it. Probably those institutions can be resurrected with the right people.
Point two, have you noticed how many remarkable young people have come here to Ark in London? I've had the opportunity and the privilege, and, and the horribly difficult task of helping decide who gets to sit around a cabinet table. I met people here who have all of the ability necessary to make up competent cabinets. Well, how about you give some thought to stepping up to making the sacrifices involved? Because we need you. And I'm always deeply torn when a young person of real ability, many of them with no little ability, and I say, "Go away, it's not for you." Real ability who say, "I'm interested in politics. I want to serve." Because it's, it's not fun. But on the other hand, it's the battlefront. If you're involved in culture, well, you've got to be prepared to be involved. You have to step up. You've got to be looking for the opportunities.
Third point, you've seen many wonderful examples of people who have gone out on a limb, who have displayed great courage, who have done deep thinking, and they've come here today. I mean, I don't want to be sort of create a hierarchy here, but I thought what an Al-Haq has done in recent times has been remarkable. What an example. What an example of courage. And tomorrow, tomorrow, there'll be a great privilege for me to see on the stage, and you will meet somebody well known to Australians, perhaps not so well known outside yet, a very dear friend of mine, Peter Costello. We served in the Parliament of Australia together for roughly two decades. That man had a highly successful legal career and every reason to pursue his own self-interests, but he gave it up for the grind of politics. He presided over 11 budgets in Australia where we managed completely to pay down all Commonwealth debt and leave a surplus in the bank. That's reform. That's ending intergenerational theft. That's building a platform for tomorrow's kids and for our grandchildren. You'll hear from him tomorrow. There are examples everywhere. But take note of him. He didn't have to do it, but he did. And I'll just make two points about, uh, because I served with him on what we called the Razor Gang for years. Woe betide anybody who walked through the room, any minister, saying, "I've got this great new program." And he'd say, "This looks like rent-seeking to me." And the minister would say, "No, it's not rent-seeking." And Peter would say, "Yes, it is, and for these reasons, you're not getting it." But equally, justice and fairness. Woe betide a minister who came in with a proposal for saving money that would have hit somebody genuinely in need. That distinction is terribly, terribly important. So let's not give up. The machine is still operable. The institutions of freedom that our grandparents gave us, with the right fuel, with the right elites, with the right people, motivated by the right, if you like, spirituality, for want of a better word, we can recapture freedom. It's not too late. So you young people, be encouraged, but be challenged as well.
Okay, we're, uh, we're out of time. Neil, John, Amy, and Rod, thank you so much. Thanks.