One Cheer for Christian Civilization? A Response to Paul Kingsnorth

Paul Kingsnorth’s 2024 Erasmus Lecture, “Against Christian Civilization,” is the best kind of audacious. Delivering his ideas under the banner of First Things—a publication devoted to religion in public life and with a history of defending the Christian faith’s cultural contributions—Kingsnorth takes a contrarian stance, critiquing the concept of “Christian civilization.” As a recent convert to Christianity (he was baptized in the Romanian Orthodox Church in 2021), Kingsnorth in this lectu