Russell Hittinger on Church, State, and Catholic Social Teaching

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Politics and idolatry — FROM VOL. 109 Theologian William Cavanaugh explains how the modern state is a unique kind of political entity, inviting a new kind of idolatry. (26 minutes)
Power to the people — Nathan O. Hatch on the DIY spirit of early American Christianity
Christian unity and civil society — Oliver O’Donovan introduces listeners to Dutch lay theologian Hugo Grotius, arguing that the questions he tackled relate to perennial concerns about the relationship between divine and human agency, and between civil and ecclesiastical authority. (Lecture 2 of 3; 57 minutes)
In defense of “society” — Dr. Russell Hittinger discusses the development in 19th-century Catholic social thought of the idea of society as a spiritual and cultural reality. (60 minutes)
Hillbilly Augustinian — Ralph Wood on Flannery O’Connor’s refusal to adapt her fiction to the national temper
Liberalism’s self-destructive dynamic — T. S. Eliot on the social need to move toward something and not just away
The fraught marriage of liberty and equality — In this essay, Patrick Deneen examines Alexis de Tocqueville’s complex and insightful portrait of “democratic man” living in the context of perpetual societal tension between the excesses of liberty and equality. (39 minutes)
Privacy and a right to kill — FROM VOL. 60 Russell Hittinger explains the legal history behind the “right to privacy” and how it was used in landmark cases involving abortion and physician-assisted suicide. (33 minutes)
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The kingdom of God has public consequences — Lesslie Newbigin on the subversiveness of the Church’s message to the world
Human dignity, cosmic hierarchies — Political scientist Robert Kraynak on how Christianity opposes worldly hierarchies with hierarchies of its own
Challenging the “gospel of democracy” — Robert Kraynak argues that assumptions many modern Christians hold about liberal democracy are rooted in some false ideas about the nature and purpose of civil government. (46 minutes)
Before Church and State — Andrew Willard Jones challenges some of the conventional paradigms of thinking about political order, arguing that modern assumptions of the relationship between Church and state color how we understand history. (54 minutes
Republican freedom — and ideological flexibility — Mark Noll on the novelty of America’s Christian republicanism
The tasks, conditions, and limits of democratic politics — Excerpts from three interviews with Jean Bethke Elshtain about her concern that democracy might not be able to survive widespread distrust or the dynamics of identity politics. (37 minutes)
Conventional “charismatic” speech, in service of the Zeitgeist — Richard Stivers on how the rhetoric of democracy invites tyranny
Post-liberalism of an earlier generation — Allan C. Carlson discusses an anthology of articles from Free America, a magazine published between 1937 and 1947 whose writers believed that political democracy could only survive if coupled with decentralized economic democracy. (26 minutes)
Questioning the “sacred-secular” division — With the stage set by Michael Sandel, Jean Bethke Elshtain, David L. Schindler, and John Milbank, Andrew Willard Jones examines a medieval alternative to the modern liberal paradigm. (61 minutes)
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Skepticism and totalitarian drift — John Paul II on how a loss of confidence in the reality of truth accentuates the will to power
“Freedom” as tyranny — Stanley Hauerwas and William H. Willimon on democracy, desire, and freedom
Civil religion and other forms of cultural captivity — Oliver O’Donovan on the danger of accommodating the demands of the Gospel to the expectations of society
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