(Part 1 of a multi-part series on The Moral Triumph of Western Civilization.)

Nothing in history has benefited the human race like the ascendancy and dominance of Western Civilization. In this multi-part series we’ll prove it.

Many think of Europe when Western Civilization is mentioned but Europeans got a very late start toward civility. “Half of man’s recorded history had passed before anyone in Europe could read or write.”1

When the Roman Empire officially ended in 476, the European continent was a wasteland of crumbled “roads” and barbarian marauders. How then was it possible, that this disorganized, illiterate, unconnected region would come to dominate the world over the next millennium?

This is the first of an occasional series on the unlikely miracle of Western Civilization. Much to the dismay of multiculturalists, modern civilization grew and matured in Europe due to an amazing confluence of events unquestionably directed by a very patient God.

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To many of us, America in 2020 is almost unrecognizable.

As a nation, we were universally outraged by the George Floyd homicide in Minneapolis but the subsequent and seemingly endless ANTIFA disruptions and riots along with the national genuflecting to the anti-American, Marxist organization, Black Lives Matter, has made many of us believe we’re in a foreign country.

But we’re not. We are in America and we’d best quickly get over our shock and take our places on the front lines of this cultural revolution. We are this generation’s defenders.

Last August The New York Times ran its own series of articles that were short on factual history but long on attempts to further divide the nation. In its mission statement the Times’ 1619 Project intended to “reframe” American history by marking 1619, the year African slaves were first brought to Jamestown, as America’s true founding year, not 1776.

The “project’s” lead author, Nikole Hannah-Jones states, “our democracy’s founding ideals were false when they were written.”

So we’re now told America is founded on racism; America is “systemically” racist; White Americans must acknowledge their “privilege” and “institutionalized” racism; American culture and its parent, Western Civilization are not special and must be condemned for their racist foundations.

To these revolutionaries, White Americans have had their privilege and power long enough. Patriotic Americans are imperialistic, xenophobic, homophobic (especially when it comes to the nuclear family), immorally capitalistic, Eurocentric in our system of justice, arrogant with our nationalism and exclusionary with our beliefs in Judeo-Christian principles.

And it’s not just in our minds, it’s hopelessly incurable in our DNA. Former President Barack Obama said a few years ago, “The legacy of slavery, Jim Crow, discrimination [is] in almost every institution of our lives. You know, that casts a long shadow and that’s still part of our DNA that’s passed on.”

To them, America is not only not great, it has never even been good. It’s flag and anthem deserve no respect; those who defend them warrant no thanks or recognition. The United States is nothing more than an illegitimate military power to be summarily eradicated from the world’s stage. Right?

Of course not. These beliefs are either born of complete ignorance or tainted by ideological toxicity. The United States of America, as both a people and a constitutional republic has no historical equal. It is the culmination of 4,000 years of the development of one of the greatest God-given gifts ever to humanity: Western Civilization.

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Saul Alinsky could be said to be the Godfather of political community activism. He died in 1972, long before most of his millennial followers were even born but his timeless, “Rule for Radicals” has likely influenced more community “organizers” and domestic revolutionaries than any similar instruction manual. We are currently watching the results of his training in real time.

Alinsky wrote, “…there are no rules for revolution …, but there are rules for radicals who want to change their world…”2 Of course he then goes on to provide those specific rules for revolutionaries.

The manual begins with a charge to join, even loosely, with other organizations that have the same target: the oppressors. These aligned groups must then prepare to move quickly in the name of the oppressed when the eventual public outrage or catalyst inevitably occurs (in this case George Floyd).

The goal for Alinsky or Black Lives Matter or Antifa or virtually another other Marxist revolutionary group is always the same: seize political (or military) power to impose progressive goals of social justice. Oppressors versus Oppressed. Or as Alinsky says, “Haves versus Have Nots.”3

The Have-Nots are at the bottom of society. “They are chained together by the common misery of poverty, … political impotence, and despair…. Caged by color, physical or political, they are barred from an opportunity to represent themselves in the politics of life.”4

What’s pervasive throughout his writings is that since life is a zero-sum game (to them, wealth is not created but distributed by the powerful), political power is the only way out of poverty for the masses. And because they represent the majority, they should use this power to confiscate and redistribute the wealth of the few. To all Marxists, wealth is distributed by government, not created by work or ingenuity. To the economically ignorant, the allure of Marxist thought can be irresistible.

Alinsky: “Justice, morality, law and order are mere words when used by the Haves, which justify and secure their status quo.” “The end is what you want, the means is how you get it.”5 There is no moral element.

Alinsky maintains that anyone who speaks of the moral consequences of the ‘means’ is only serving the Haves and the status quo. Objective morality to atheists like Alinsky doesn’t exist. To them moral principles are simply a set of arbitrary rules acting as a protection device for the wealthy and politically omnipotent.

“If a choice is required between an individual’s “conscience and the good of mankind, the choice must always be for the latter.”6 “Mankind” is a softer way of saying, “the collective.” Like all of Marxist ideology, the individual is always subordinated to the group.

At its core, this is the defining difference between atheistic Marxism and Western Civilization ideals since nothing in history ever elevated the individual like the Western world.

Marxism is a human-devised “ethical” economic system designed to give “moral” cover to the atheist. It is the belief that if there is no God, “morality” must have evolved in DNA with certain “gifted” individuals higher on the “morality” scale.  Hence, the anointed elite believe they have an obligation to impose their superior “moral” understanding on those of us less evolved. Such has been the thinking of every tyrant and Leftist group in history.

If there is no God, there can be no moral law that transcends human behavior because there is no being that transcends humans. There can be no moral laws, only subjective “moral” opinions. To build a civil society on such flimsy subjectivity is like building a house without an objective measuring device. Eventually it will collapse.

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Philosopher and author Jordan Peterson has said, “The Bible is … the foundational document of Western Civilization.” He’s right. It began when God told Abraham he would be the father of His chosen tribe that would ultimately change the world.

Judeo-Christian principles are the very foundation of Western Civilization.

Because God (Yahweh) didn’t force any individual to believe in Him (making them brainless robots) but so valued a person’s free choice (to hopefully choose and believe in Him), the concept of liberty was introduced to humanity.

Few Americans know that the inscription in the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia was written about 3,400 years ago. It is from the book of Leviticus 25:10: “Proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all inhabitants thereof.”

Though the concept was born with the Jewish people, it was Christianity that spread the idea of freedom throughout the world and ultimately overpowered tribalism.

This concept of freedom along with human reason, in time, produced an explosion of knowledge, inventions and scientific advances that ultimately resulted in improvements in standards of living previous generations could only dream about.

It was an amazing confluence of events that produced Western Civilization and what it brought to human history: liberty, self-government, science, innovations in transportation and agriculture, music notation, energy development, free enterprise, property rights, civil order and many more. Nothing has done more to destroy slavery, elevate women, protect children, promote freedom and reduce poverty worldwide than what began in the Middle East, grew and flourished in what became Europe and culminated in the United States of America.

It is divinely inspired and directed but as with anything involving humans, it is clouded by ungodly behavior; unrighteous beliefs and violent acts of depravity.

And though the progression of the West has often been flawed and dark, at its core and compared to anything else, it is an astonishing, praiseworthy story of human achievement.

No other civilization comes close to its triumphs in fighting evil and advancements in human freedom, equality, dignity and production of wealth. Nothing is more important to teach to our youth to produce a new generation of solid, responsible citizens inspired and energized to perpetuate this heaven-blessed republic.

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1- Palmer, R.R. and Cotton, Joel. A History of the Modern World. Alfred A. Knopf, Inc. 1950 to 1971.

2- Alinsky, Saul. Rules for Radicals. Random House. 1971.

3- ibid.

4- ibid.

5- ibid.

6- ibid.