Andrew Walker: Beyond an election

NICK EICHER, HOST: Today is Tuesday, February 25th. Good morning! This is The World and Everything in It from listener-supported WORLD Radio. I’m Nick Eicher.

MARY REICHARD, HOST: And I’m Mary Reichard. Cultural and political winds have changed direction of late. But WORLD commentator Andrew Walker warns: it’s a mistake to assume they’ll continue.

ANDREW WALKER: There is an air of triumphalism in many corners of the American right since Donald Trump’s re-election and inauguration. After years of feeling like political and cultural underdogs, victories are stacking up.

Big changes are evident everywhere. Mainstream media’s influence seems to be at an all-time low. Corporate America is repealing its commitments to woke capitalism. Censorship regimes are falling while renewed commitments to free speech spring forth. The “demographics are destiny” canard that Democrats based their future upon is now matched by a Republican coalition that is as diverse as it has ever been. Add to that the rapid-fire sequence of executive orders undoing four years of Joe Biden’s chaos at the border, lawfare, and gender ideology…it seems like the wind in the right’s sails has never been stronger.

But let me offer a word of caution: As welcome as all this newfound momentum is, it will be nothing but a halfway revolution if we do not combine our cultural momentum with a moral vision. Until we address the deeper cultural rot that has corroded our national soul, we are celebrating prematurely. The mere act of defeating an opponent does not mean we have built something in its place. “Owning the libs” may make for an entertaining political spectacle, but it is not a strategy to build a culture of marriage, stem the tide of pornography consumption, or revive our civic and spiritual health.

What would it mean for America to be “back”? In short it would mean that a cultural consensus emerges that uniformly celebrates the Declaration’s famous dictum: “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” American society must return to God. Not just the idea of God, but God himself. The pillars of Western civilization that had Judeo-Christian values as their foundation would once again be normal. Only by returning to the truths of nature and Nature’s God could America ever really be “back.”

If the American right stops at the political and fails to rebuild the moral and social fabric of the nation, we are merely winning skirmishes while losing the war. The real battle is not over tax rates or regulatory reform but over the nature of family, the dignity of the human person, and virtue itself.

The progressive left did not create all of these problems, but its policies and philosophies have exacerbated them. The right’s response must be more than just defeating them at the ballot box—it must be about offering something better. Conservatives should hope that our efforts create a new mainstream.

Most importantly, we must reclaim the idea that truth exists, and that human nature is not infinitely malleable. We know that human flourishing is found not in endless self-reinvention but in anchoring ourselves to eternal truths—truths about what it means to be men and women, about our responsibilities to each other, and about our duty to God and country.

This is the true revolution we need—a counter-revolution to the chaos of the last six decades. If you are wondering how to start this revolution, begin at home. Eat dinner together around the table. Take yourself and your family to church. Read your Bible. Tell someone you care about that you love them. Invite another family over for dinner. Make ordinary things normal again.

If we fail to seize this opportunity before us, if we are content to simply play defense while the cultural decay continues, then all current victories will be temporary. A nation cannot thrive on policy wins alone—it must build a moral and spiritual foundation to sustain those wins.

I’m Andrew Walker.

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