My mom was a nurse for sixty (60) years. During our weekly talks she asks me about my physical health: exercise, diet, doctor visits, and these days, vaccination. Her concern for my safety is also triggered by my writing. If I put something out on social media that causes a cultural “stir” mom will inquire about my health in a different way. “Are you sure you’re going to be alright?” Within the context of my writing mom is asking if people will come after me for my beliefs. My response has always been the same,
“Authoritarian states always come after academics first, intellectuals who stand against The State. Totalitarian leaders hate people who traffic in ideas, especially ideas that go against the accepted despotism. Tyrants want to silence people like me, people who speak for freedom against dictatorship. When the day comes to silence opposition, the dictator will come for me first.”
I do not type these words lightly, nor do I want to exaggerate any claims. My concerns come in the form of warnings. The flashing “red light” of warning is to stop, consider, understand, and plan. The downfall of any people can come in a long, slow slide of destruction; the barbarians taking over Rome comes to mind. A national downfall can also be immediate, cataclysmic, as is the history of the ancient Mayan and Aztec nations.
Further, I do not believe I am a “cry baby,” as Tim Keller suggested in a March 10th interview. Within the context of “Christian Nationalism” and Evangelical treatment of the gay community Keller stated in a podcast series entitled “Woke in the PCA”
I am not in denial about the fact that ten years from now, if you have evangelical convictions about sex and gender, you may not be able to work for a major university or for the government or for a big corporation. And it’s not that Christians haven’t faced that other places in the past. We shouldn’t be crybabies. Nevertheless, having said all that, yeah, we nurtured this. And Christian nationalists use that. And therefore, we brought it on ourselves.
I am anything other than a Christian Nationalist. [See my 2017 response to a White Nationalist who accosted me on social media here.] And I certainly have not attacked anyone because of sexual beliefs or practices. But I DO work for a major university. And I have encountered a fair amount of critique for my Christian beliefs. [On a side note, working at IUPUI is one thing, working at Berkley (CA) or Columbia (NY) is quite another. One of my unbelieving friends on campus admitted that I would not be able to work at either of the aforementioned universities.]
But I certainly push-back on Keller’s remark that “we brought this on ourselves.” And the “not being able to work” comment is not ten years out but is happening around us all the time (see tip-of-the-iceberg evidence here and here and here).
The kind of suffering that Dreher rehearses in chapter ten runs the gambit from execution, torture, imprisonment, and forced separation from children. For those who have not suffered, young people in The West, consider suffering “anything they find difficult” (184). Individuals being taught “the good life is free from suffering” (185) have no resistance against tyranny. Testimonies from Eastern European believers who lived through the awfulness of tyranny say, however, that suffering for The Faith is a marker of Truth (186-87). The stories of heroism Dreher recounts in chapter ten should help stiffen the resolve of anyone willing to listen. 
And for those willing to watch, Dreher highlights an important resistance film by Terrence Malick, A Hidden Life (188-89). Yet, testimony to the difficulty of resistance is clear. As the old painter in Dreher’s story reflects, “We create admirers, we do not create followers” (189). And then we encounter Soren Kierkegaard’s punch in the face, “The admirer never makes any true sacrifices.” Whoa. And then we are reminded of our Lord’s words “Love your enemies” (191). To be charitable toward those who first mock, then defame, then ostracize, then accuse, then steal all your earthly goods . . . I think about how hard that would be. Testimony from one who was hauled to court, having personally experienced such personal griefs responded in a way that made my eyes go wide when I read it:
We will not allow ourselves to be led to hate, to rebel, or even to complain . . . That is where our strength and superiority lie (193).
And then to reread Solzhenitsyn’s words, words I had read in his Gulag Archipelago as a teenager “Bless you, prison, for having been in my life” (194). The stories on pages 197-98 and 199-201 are, frankly, heart-stopping. Reread those stories over and over. And then do as Dreher instructs, “These stories are near the core of the lived Christian experience and form an essential part of Christian cultural memory. Learn them, so you will know when and how to live them” (206).
Because stories are SO important, I offer here a few stories in film that would be fitting for us to consider. Watch them on whatever viewing service you use. Purchase them to show in large groups. “Never forget” are words we use for situations and people that remind us to retell the stories of. We retell stories to strengthen ourselves and others.
List of movies:
A Hidden Life
The Boy in the Stripped Pajamas
Life is Beautiful
Into the Arms of Strangers
Chronicles of Religious Persecution in China
China Cry
Truly, truly, I say to you, unless a grain of wheat falls into the earth and dies, it remains alone; but if it dies, it bears much fruit. Whoever loves his life loses it, and whoever hates his life in this world will keep it for eternal life. If anyone serves me, he must follow me; and where I am, there will my servant be also. If anyone serves me, the Father will honor him. Jesus, John 12:24-26
If a man has not discovered something that he will die for, he isn’t fit to live. Martin Luther King Jr.
Freedom Rally Cobo Hall, Detroit, MI, June, 1963
Amen.