“Will America Survive to 2025?” asks the subhead of Patrick Buchanan’s Suicide of a Superpower. It has, though in a more divided state than ever. This book, published in 2011, examines demographic and cultural trends that bode ill for America’s future and can be read as a sequel to Buchanan’s 2002 work, The Death of the West.
Here Buchanan tackles many social and political issues, from the 2008 financial crisis to immigration, welfare, and foreign policy. Particularly interesting are two chapters devoted to the decline of religion in America. “When the faith dies, the culture dies, the civilization dies, the people die,” Buchanan wrote in one of many eminently quotable passages. Barack Obama, he pointed out, was the first president to have explicitly denied the primacy of Christianity in his inaugural address. “The age of Obama marks the advent of post-Christian America.”
Buchanan was right. In 1958, 50 percent of Americans belonged to one of the mainline Protestant denominations. Today, only 13 percent do, and that number falls every year. On the Catholic Church, of which Buchanan is a member, he wrote: “No institution has been more ravaged by the revolution that has swept over America since the 1960s.” Referencing a 2003 book, Index of Leading Catholic Indicators, Buchanan cites numerous statistics of decline. Annual ordinations to the priesthood fell to 450 in 2002 from 1,575 in 1965. Then, only 10 percent of lay teachers accepted Catholic teaching on contraception, while 70 percent of polled Catholics believed that the Eucharist was a mere “symbolic reminder” of Jesus.
As in The Death of the West, Buchanan devotes much space to discussing “Demographic Winter.” Once-Catholic nations like Spain and Italy now have birth rates of just 1.2 children per couple. While Christendom is dying out, Islam is rising. Of the 48 fastest-growing countries today, 28 are majority Muslim or have Muslim minorities of at least a third their population. “The reason the West is dying is simple: children are no longer so desirable,” Buchanan wrote. “The child-centred society has been succeeded by the self-centred society.”
Other fascinating issues in this book include the link between illegitimate births and social outcomes. And, in several chapters, Buchanan provides a convincing critique of the concept of propositional nationhood and of the dogma of egalitarianism. Of the cultural revolution that began in the 1960s, Buchanan states: “Half a century on, most Americans reject and despise its values.” Given the result of the 2024 election, that may still be the case.
—Piers Shepherd
At the time the idea for Chateaubriand’s unsurpassed work of apologetics exploded in his mind, he was in exile in England. The revolutionary terror had forced him to flee his native France. He knew his family members who stayed had suffered immensely under the tender mercies of Robespierre and his comrades.
In 1798, Chateaubriand’s sister apprised him of the dreadful news of their mother’s death. That sadness was compounded by the knowledge that he had caused their devout mother great suffering through his rejection of the Christian faith of his youth.
His mother’s death was then followed by his sister’s. Devastated, the faith of his youth and of his native land flooded back into him with overpowering force. He resolved that nothing less than a full exposition of its truth and beauty would be a sufficient recompense for the pain he had caused the women he loved.
Every page of The Genius of Christianity bears the traces of the overwhelming spiritual transformation Chateaubriand experienced. It is both a vibrant and personal testimony and an encyclopedic treatment of Christian belief, practice, and history. He discussed everything from the Christian transformation of marriage into an institution of the most solemn gravity and life-changing importance to the ways in which the faith’s deep tradition and ritual comfort the dying Christian.
Chateaubriand gave lengthy attention to the contribution of Christianity to the literary and artistic arts. This is unsurprising, given the author’s work in penning several of the greatest Romantic era novellas. He also demonstrated how the fundamental Christian social value of charity, which distinguished it from all other faiths and philosophies of antiquity, led to the Western creation of hospitals and other institutions dedicated to caring for those who suffer. Another basic Christian value to seek the enlightenment of mankind accordingly led the Christian West to invent and perfect the university.
His style alone makes this book a treasure. Chateaubriand was one of the pithiest writers the traditional right has ever produced, and the list of such figures is long and illustrious. Even those outside the faith will find The Genius of Christianity full of literary and philosophical gems to contemplate. Those who share his belief will see it as an indispensable source of spiritual nourishment to return to again and again.
—Alexander Riley
Leave a Reply