Good News Once More
R. V. Young on an Impregnable Darkness That Opens a Door
It is difficult, in such times as ours, to avoid pessimism about the spiritual state of our society and the prospects for restoring it through Christian evangelization. It is not just that increasing numbers of men and women throughout what used to be called Christendom have ceased to participate in Christian worship and life or even to call themselves Christian; we have now reached a stage where a critical mass of our fellow citizens in liberal Western democracies are not just alienated from Christian morals and cultural standards, but are altogether oblivious to them.
While we have, then, no grounds for optimism that we can devise a practical solution by our own wit, we do have grounds for genuine hope. Beginning with the millennial generation and the succeeding demographic cohort, we are dealing with many men and women for whom transgressing Christian moral teachings is no longer an act of daring: these teachings have never been a part of their lives at all and hence have never exerted any pressure on their consciences. Among today's children and youths, many do not even know rudimentary biblical stories: I am acquainted with older children—good students from affluent families in highly regarded schools—who cannot identify Adam and Eve.
THIS ARTICLE ONLY AVAILABLE TO SUBSCRIBERS.
FOR QUICK ACCESS:
R. V. Young is Professor of English Emeritus at North Carolina State University, a former editor of Modern Age: A Quarterly Review, and the author of Shakespeare and the Idea of Western Civilization (Catholic University of America Press, 2022). He and his wife are parishioners at St. Ignatius of Antioch Church in Tarpon Springs, Florida. They have five grown children, fifteen grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren. He is a senior editor of Touchstone.
A Journal of Mere Christianity—Delivered to Your Door
- Essays on theology, culture, and the Church
- Contributors from across the Christian traditions
Six print issues (one year) of Touchstone, plus full online access and PDF downloads for only $39.95.
Get a one-year full-access subscription to the Touchstone online archives for only $19.95.
bulk subscriptions
Order Touchstone subscriptions in bulk and save $10 per sub! Each subscription includes 6 issues of Touchstone plus full online access to touchstonemag.com—including archives, videos, and pdf downloads of recent issues for only $29.95 each! Great for churches or study groups.
Transactions will be processed on a secure server.
more on culture from the online archives
20.7—September 2007
Paul Didn’t Build Bridges to Popular Culture by Russell D. Moore
34.1—January/February 2021
What the World Needs Now It Hardly Knows by Anthony Esolen
22.3—April 2009
Neil Postman's Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business by J. Daryl Charles
more from the online archives
32.3—May/June 2019
on the Implications of Changing the Pater Noster by John M. McCarthy
28.5—Sept/Oct 2015
Remembering Angka & the Idolatry of the Khmer Rouge 40 Years Later by Les Sillars
calling all readers
Please Donate
"There are magazines worth reading but few worth saving . . . Touchstone is just such a magazine."
—Alice von Hildebrand
"Here we do not concede one square millimeter of territory to falsehood, folly, contemporary sentimentality, or fashion. We speak the truth, and let God be our judge. . . . Touchstone is the one committedly Christian conservative journal."
—Anthony Esolen, Touchstone senior editor
