The Benedict Option: A Strategy for Christians in a Post-Christian Nation in VT Christian Reading Challenge

May 01, 2017 Omar rated it it was amazing · review of another edition

Shelves: finished-in-2017

I was born Amish and raised in a very close (non-amish) religious environment and so have seen that communal living is not the magic pill to cure the world’s problems. With that background, I started reading this book with skepticism, but was surprised by how much I agreed with the author.

I particularly appreciated his summary of history which has brought about the present American society. The first two chapters’ dissection of history and diagnosis of the current societal situation is excellen I was born Amish and raised in a very close (non-amish) religious environment and so have seen that communal living is not the magic pill to cure the world’s problems. With that background, I started reading this book with skepticism, but was surprised by how much I agreed with the author.

I particularly appreciated his summary of history which has brought about the present American society. The first two chapters’ dissection of history and diagnosis of the current societal situation is excellent!

I found it a little difficult to understand exactly what he means by living in “community” — at times he seemed to praise the monastic, secluded lifestyle; yet, at other points he emphasized that christians could not become recluses, but most be bold in our evangelism and stand for right amidst the heathen world.

Naturally, Dreher wrote from an extremely ecumenical mindset; throwing all “christians” into the same basket and basically saying that, whatever your religious beliefs are, you should get serious about living them out in practicality.

That being said, I thought the book as a whole is an excellent wake-up call for christians to see that americans have lost the social war against christianity. There is no “silent, moral majority” and the sooner we realize that and change our actions accordingly, the better. How can we, as christians, survive the social and religious storm we are in? “Start by getting serious about living as Christians, he said. Accept that there can be no middle ground. ...If you recognize that He is the Lord of all, you will order your life in a radically different way.”

Finally, it may be best to let Dreher himself define “The Benedict Option”:
“The greatest danger we face today does not come from aggressive left-wing politics or radical Islam, as many seem to think. ...the greatest danger comes from the liberal secular order itself. And our failure to understand this reinforces our cultural captivity and the seemingly unstoppable assimilation of the next generations. The Benedict Option is not a technique for reversing the losses, political and otherwise, that Christians have suffered. It is not a strategy for turning back the clock to an imagined golden age. Still less is it a plan for constructing communities of the pure, cut off from the real world. To the Contrary, the Benedict Option is a call to undertaking the long and patient work of reclaiming the real world from the artifice, alienation, and atomization of modern life." ...more

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Jul 05, 2017 Mitchell Elliott rated it really liked it

Shelves: non-fiction, apologetics, politics

If you don't buy the fundamental premise of this book –that Christians will slowly, but soon, be pushed out of the public square by pressure from the progressive left (usually in the form of claims of hate speak on the sexual front)– then you need to get out of the Christian bubble a bit more to see just how likely it really is. In only a matter of years the world has completely overturned its view on sex and gender so that the most commonly held beliefs are dictated ultimately by what this book ...more

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