On the forgotten Christian origins of Western liberalism and prosperity

I enjoy writing in this blog because it gives me a chance to learn about topics that fascinate me - including sociology and history, especially as it relates to religion. But I readily admit that I am no expert, just learning as I go. Oddly, and sadly, I get the impression that all the insights I am gaining were at one time common knowledge and simple common sense, but have been obscured over the last 50 years or so. 

For example, in my post on National Conservatism I wrote about the Christian origins of classical liberalism and Western prosperity, something I read about recently in a book by Larry Siedentop that was self-consciously going against the grain of modern scholarship - “to say the least, not fashionable,” as he wrote in the prologue. Here is my summary of the insight, from my previous post: 

Christ taught us 2000 years ago that we are all children of God, and therefore spiritual brothers and sisters, no matter what family we come from, what gender, what degree of wealth, or what nationality. As these Christian moral intuitions seeped into culture and legal codes over the centuries (as described in Larry Siedentop’s Inventing the Individual: The Origins of Western Liberalism), the West (and only the West) came to overcome tribalism, and eventually arrived at the liberal tradition and egalitarian moral intuitions we take for granted today. The results are apparent in any analysis of Western Civilization - freedom, prosperity, science, the arts - human flourishing like no other society in history, ever.

I remember feeling this insight like a revelation that changed how I saw the world, and I know from conversations with others that this idea is foreign and counterintuitive to most people today. But as I read more writings from before the 1960s or 1970s, I am coming to think that this was once just the commonly-accepted common-sense understanding of the world and the West. For example, I am just now reading The Road to Serfdom (1944) by F. A. Hayak. He is an economist not especially fixated on religion, yet he writes:

Individualism, in contrast to socialism and all other forms of totalitarianism, is based on the respect of Christianity for the individual man and the belief that it is desirable that men should be free to develop their own individual gifts and bents. This philosophy, first fully developed during the Renaissance, grew and spread into what we know as Western civilization. The general direction of social development was one of freeing the individual from the ties which bound him in feudal society.

Perhaps the greatest result of this unchaining of individual energies was the marvellous growth of science. Only since industrial freedom opened the path to the free use of new knowledge, only since everything could be tried – if somebody could be found to back it at his own risk – has science made the great strides which in the last 150 years have changed the face of the world. The result of this growth surpassed all expectations. 

Note that this paragraph on the Christian origins of classical liberalism and Western prosperity was written kind of in passing, as a minor point in political book, as if no further elaboration was needed. The focus is slightly different from that of Siedentop, but Hayak is telling the same story as if we would all understand. Something happened between 1944 and today that wiped this intuition from our minds.

C.S. Lewis, an observer of society and theologian, made a similar point in Mere Christianity (1952, based on lectures given in 1941-1944) hinting at the impact of Christian moral intuition on the development of Western liberalism and human rights theory:

If individuals live only seventy years, then a state, or a nation, or a civilization, which may last for a thousand years, is more important than an individual. But if Christianity is true, then the individual is not only more important but incomparably more important, for he is everlasting and the life of a state or a civilization, compared with his, is only a moment.

In other words, the teachings of Christ becoming ingrained in peoples minds led to intuitions that were incompatible with totalitarian despotism. Perhaps unconsciously, these new intuitions led to the development of new theories and philosophies around liberty, equality, and human rights that eventually came to define the West. I have become a firm believer that Christian teachings were foundational for the Western liberal tradition to which we owe so much for our comfort and prosperity today. 

I see the development of liberalism from Christian intuitions as evidence of God working through history, even through the roughest patches of the Middle Ages, to bring about a better state for humanity. 20th century historian Herbert Butterfield thought a lot about the hand of God working throughout history. In his Christianity and History (1949), he makes a point worth mentioning - that the societal gains from Christianity in The West are not necessarily due to the ecclesiastical church organizations themselves, but rather to the Christian ideas and ideals placed into the heart of the common man and woman.

Even serious students, like our great Cambridge historian, Lord Acton, have been greatly interested in church history while regarding it as a form of politico-ecclesiastical history, and they have tended to overlook that more intimate thing, the inner spiritual life of the Church. The ordinary historian, when he comes, shall we say, to the year 1800 does not think to point out to his readers that in this year, still, as in so many previous years, thousands and thousands of priests and ministers were preaching the Gospel week in and week out, constantly reminding the farmer and the shopkeeper of charity and humility, persuading them to think for a moment about the great issues of lite, and inducing them to confess their sins. Yet this was a phenomenon calculated greatly to alter the quality of life and the very texture of human history; and it has been the standing work of the Church throughout the ages- even under the worst of popes there was a light that never went out. 

…It is impossible to measure the vast difference that ordinary Christian piety has made to the last two thousand years of European history; but we shall have some inkling of that difference if the world continues in its present drift towards paganism.

In The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, we tend to emphasize the Apostasy in order to highlight the need for a Restoration. It is pretty clear, especially under the worst of popes, that there was a loss, and that the True Christian Church with inspired leaders directed by God, like Peter and Paul, was no longer upon the Earth. But I think that we, like Lord Acton (about whom I know nothing - maybe I should read more about this guy), tend to miss the fact that core elements of Christ’s teachings were still being spread and believed by the masses, despite the antics of popes and cardinals, and that these religious ideas constituted a revolution that was changing the course of the world for the better. Though the Church of Jesus Christ was lost, His ecclesiastical mission did not end in failure. His teachings re-made the world wherever they spread, however imperfectly, and we of the West now reap the blessings. 

Unfortunately too many of us now take these blessings for granted. It is now all too common for students to be deliberately taught to despise our Christian cultural heritage. We (even as faithful Christians!) (reference The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self, of which I hope to write more) are starting to lose the Christianity-derived cultural intuitions that built The West, and I fear that we are starting to see Herbert Butterfield’s dark warning come true.

[Update August 16, 2022] I am slowly making my way through Culture Counts, by the late great Sir Roger Scruton. He uses the word “culture” in a way that encompasses what I am trying to convey when I say “cultural intuition” or “moral intuition.” In this view, religion (and other factors) over hundreds of years influences culture. The culture then tends to pass down the values and ideals of a society in a largely unconscious way that bypasses reason but forms our moral intuitions. (The importance of unconscious culture-based moral intuition is an insight stressed by Jonathan Haidt today, echoing David Hume. The important role of culture - especially art and literature - in building our moral intuitions is an important insight stressed in The Rise and Triumph of the Modern Self.) Scruton says:

The decline of religion had not bereft mankind of intrinsic values. Through “aesthetic education” —in other words, culture—we could reconnect to those primordial experiences of wonder and awe which show us the lasting meaning of our life on earth. That is why culture matters: it is a vessel in which intrinsic values are captured and handed on.

Unfortunately, however, subversive forces also became aware of this truth. Postmodernists and other influencers undertook a deliberate and conscious effort to strip traditional values from art and culture - to undo in one or two generations what had been built over many centuries. To the extent that they were successful, our culture has been weakened of its former power to instill traditional values. Scruton’s legacy will be that of one who dedicated his life to a worthy but ultimately ill-fated cause of preserving Western culture against the besieging forces.

Just as our culture could for a while pass down Christian-inspired ideals even after being stripped of its Christian religious foundation, faithful Christians can be strong in their faith even after the culture that forms their unconscious intuitions has been stripped of its religious ideals. One consequence of this loss is that many or most Christians today - and I’m talking about even the most salvation-worthy in my church and every church - do not have the same set of cultural and moral ideals and intuitions that once built Western Civilization. While these stalwart individuals can and will still be saved in spite of the culture, the long-term fate of Western liberalism is in question and I don’t see what is left that could bring it back.

[Update August 17, 2022] My wife gave me the feedback that I ended on a very pessimistic note. I should add that, individually, we can create a family culture or a special niche culture among a sub-group within our larger society. This family culture or subculture can be passed down through the generations and do much good. I always say regarding converts to The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, that joining The Church causes a big change, but the greatest change is what happens over generations as descendants stay faithful. That family culture is powerful. I will also make my next post a bit more optimistic.

In other news, to give life to the CS Lewis quote above, this (Saudi Arabia arresting a student and mother of two during a return visit home during a break between school terms, and sentencing her to 34 years in prison for making Twitter posts critical of the regime) makes sense when a state or civilization is seen as more important than the individual. In a liberal society with Christian moral intuitions, that type of un-freedom goes against every deeply-held feeling, and cannot be stably maintained. 

[Update August 22, 2022] I just came across a book called The Victory of Reason: How Christianity Led to Freedom, Capitalism, and Western Success, (2006) by sociologist Rodney Stark. I wish I had seen it sooner. I haven’t read it yet, but based on the title it looks like more delicious confirmation bias material for my pet ideas. The promotional blurb definitely frames this as a novel and contrarian take in 2006, though I am still convinced these ideas were commonplace or at least less controversial 80 years ago:

In The Victory of Reason, Rodney Stark advances a revolutionary, controversial, and long overdue idea: that Christianity and its related institutions are, in fact, directly responsible for the most significant intellectual, political, scientific, and economic breakthroughs of the past millennium. 

I just hope he gives adequate place for the doctrine itself in his discussion, and not extraneous factors. I found this book after reading a link on Marginal Revolution yesterday about the passing of Rodney Stark in July, and then googling to learn more about his work. From that brief exposure, It sound like his passing was a loss to the world. We need more scholars to step up and take his place in communicating to the world the rational case for Christianity.