|
|
|
|
Dear John,
In our times, we are ceaselessly bombarded by moral challenges that require thoughtful, timely, and courageous responses. Take, for example, COVID-19 and the rush to develop and distribute vaccines to quell the pandemic. Where is there a trusted resource that has compiled voices speaking to the moral permissibility of using a vaccine that is tangentially implicated in abortion? Where can resources be found that are simultaneously thoughtful and erudite yet accessible? Where can a person turn to find guidance on real-life practical matters of how we ought to order our lives and our communities?
Public Discourse: that is where. On this topic and many others, it is the go-to resource that speaks clearly with a voice not shared by other platforms. Other publications are apt to commission think pieces that meander with discursive pointlessness, the type of pieces that seem to extoll curiosity for curiosity’s sake. At Public Discourse, we are not concerned with ideas for the pure sake of innovation. Learning is certainly worthwhile for its own sake, but the intellectual life is ultimately meant to serve a greater end—the truth.
That’s one of the reasons I wanted to be a part of this adventure, and why I am so proud of being a contributing editor at Public Discourse. From pieces I’ve helped commission on the 2020 presidential election, to the reckoning of racial narratives in America, and even Protestant conceptualizations of the Common Good, Public Discourse is anchored in a conception of truth. We are not skeptics or postmoderns. We believe what is true, good, and beautiful are necessary prerequisites for the just
ordering of society. We are, in my view, the antidote to those who the Apostle Paul spoke of so forebodingly—those who are “always learning and never able to arrive at a knowledge of the truth” (2 Tim. 3:7). Public Discourse stands for truth, unvarnished.
As time wears on and social conservatives stare down a culture that looks more broken than ever, I grow only more thankful for the voice of Public Discourse. As we prepare for a Biden administration that will almost certainly find the values of Public Discourse readers under siege, we will be here as a ballast. Only those anchored to an end worth serving will be capable of speaking, and we, as ever, must be a forum for measured calm. But measured calm means little unless it is serving a proper end: The truth.
By donating now to stand up for the truth, your gift will be doubled thanks to the generosity of Witherspoon Institute Trustee Michael Maibach and Trustee Emeritus Boyd Smith.
As 2020 comes to an end, yet another year of witnessing to the truth is catalogued in Public Discourse’s archives. As 2021 begins, we will be here with thoughtfulness and courage, but in service to the truth. Will you join us?
Sincerely,
Andrew T. Walker
Contributing Editor, Public Discourse
Associate Professor of Christian Ethics and Apologetics at The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary
|
|
|
|
|
