Politics should not seek a totalizing uniformity that dominates those who are different, but a humble harmony that gives justice to all, welcomes others into community, and forges unity in plurality.
Justice
Is Unity Possible?
What makes political authority legitimate? How is it perceived as legitimate? These two questions are at the center of what we’ve been considering at Breaking Ground for the past few weeks, because they’re at the center of what it means to have a transition of power,...
One Nation, Sinful Under God
Shadi Hamid
So many of us have felt dread, that inchoate sense that something isn’t quite right: not with our politics nor our country nor even, perhaps, our own souls. We don’t often have the language for that thing, whatever it is, but the inability to give that something a...
We, the People . . .
Mack McCarter
This was written four years ago, in January 2017, as part of Mack McCarter’s “weekly word” to the global community of those committed to renewing our relationships from the foundations on out. We thought it appropriate to re-post today, on this Inaugural week in the States.
Forerunners: Sojourner Truth
Susannah Black, Jason Landsel
In 1844, in a field outside the town of Northampton, Massachusetts, a gang of young men showed up at a revival meeting, making trouble. The meeting’s organizers grew angry; the men – more than a hundred – redoubled their uproar. One of the meeting attendees, a...
Order and Justice
Susannah Black
These days it feels like we’re seeing political theology, good and bad, play out in front of our eyes: if we thought history was over and ideas didn’t have consequences, if we thought that all of this was abstract, we’re sure disabused of that notion now. Last Friday...
What Is Policing For, and How Do We Reform It?
Anthony Barr
To rebuild the public realm, we must reform the police; to do that, we should turn to the policing principles first set out in 1829 by Robert Peel: the “police” are just members of the public “who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence.”
Justice in a Time Out of Joint
Brad Littlejohn
Trapped within his own private reality, the vigilante can no longer be sure whether he is acting to vindicate the corrupted order of public justice or merely to achieve some private catharsis.
Politics and Political Service
Oliver O'Donovan
The fabric of common speech that binds us together is vulnerable… What recourse do we have when we face a breakdown in political discussion, when everyone speaks to themselves and nobody listens?
Illiberal Feminism
Leah Libresco Sargeant, Jennifer Frey, Susannah Black
“Free is not your right to choose, it’s answering what’s asked of you, to give the love you’ve found until it’s gone.”
In this event, co-sponsored by Breaking Ground and Sargeant’s newsletter Other Feminisms, Sargeant is joined by Susannah Black and Jennifer Frey to discuss what the politics of dependence looks like, and how our present culture asks women to reject their own nature.