Summer Reading Announcement

Thursday, June 1, 2006

Dear All (and Sundry),

The Chesterton Society would like to announce our summer reading for 2006. If you’re interested in joining us this fall, or just following along with what we’re up to, we encourage you to read G.K. Chesterton’s novella The Man Who Was Thursday. It’s not too long, and it is an entertaining and thought-provoking read.

Why Thursday? In many ways, this book was our inspiration for starting the club. We liked the idea of a close-knit group of Last Men fighting against the encroachment of anarchistic, anti-Christian culture. These themes are just as relevant now as when Chesterton wrote the book. Chesterton also had a delicious knack for the well-turned phrase. We think you’ll enjoy the book.

You can read the book online at the Christian Classics Ethereal Library: http://www.ccel.org/ccel/chesterton/thursday.toc.html

We’d also like to give you a sneak peek at what we’ll be discussing this year. At PHC, our mission is to be preparing ourselves to shape our culture for Christ, whether through politics, or writing, or teaching, or raising families, or film-making, or business — really, whatever God calls us to do. We soon, however, encounter the obvious but difficult question: What does it mean to shape the culture for Christ? We believe this comprises more than evangelism, although evangelism is indispensable. Not only do individuals need regeneration, but our culture, our institutions, our laws and systems of government, and our traditions ought to honor Christ.

However, if we stop here, we commit another error, for we assume we actually know what a Christ-honoring culture would look like. This is foolish. We have grown up in the United States. We have never known anything different, except for those fortunate few of us who have had formative experiences in other countries. In some ways, they have much to teach us because they can think outside the American frame of mind; but no one has experienced a national culture that truly glorifies the Lord. We have no example; no frame of reference; no point in time we can look back upon and say, “Yes, that is what we should be.” Some periods in our national history seem more Christian in retrospect, and we often feel a sense of nostalgia in remembering these bygone times. But our nation has always had horrible flaws, and often even in the name of Christianity. From the very beginning we allowed human slavery, one of the worst evils mankind has ever inflicted on itself, and almost as soon as we got rid of it, new evils sprung up; the worst being the rejection of God in a wide variety of national institutions and churches and the substitution of humanistic philosophy for a foundering Christianity. These faults came about in large measure because of an inaccurate understanding of the Gospel.

So if we want to influence the culture for Christ, we must know what a Christian culture looks like; and to have a Christian understanding of culture we must understand what Christianity is. We must understand that it revolves around the Gospel and God’s revelation of Christ through the Bible, and that the Gospel applies directly to every question, every theory, every tradition, every system of government, and passes judgment on them. And we must affirm that the regenerating work of the Holy Spirit is as necessary for regenerating a culture as it is for every human heart. In short, only by pursuing a sound Christianity can we hope to have any beneficial influence on the world around us.

With these goals in mind, we would like to recommend for optional summer reading two books. T.S. Eliot’s four-chapter essay Christianity and Culture discusses what’s wrong with a humanistic concept of culture and why a distinctly Christian culture is so important. Graeme Goldsworthy’s According to Plan: The Unfolding Revelation of God in the Bible is a simple introduction to Biblical theology that will serve us well and inform our discussions of what this Christianity is that we are attempting to bring to our culture. Get and read both of these books if you possibly can. Goldsworthy especially deserves careful study and personal application.

Have a Gospel-centered, grace-filled summer! God bless all of you.

Peter Schellhase and Jacob Holt

An Explanation

Dear brothers and sisters,

When Jacob Holt and I decided to form the G. K. Chesterton Society (GKC), we understood immediately that there would be several objections and misunderstandings we would be subject to in the process, and we sought to structure and explain it so as to avoid those misunderstandings. Unfortunately, some of the objections we sought to avoid have come up anyway. I would like to take this opportunity to address these.

The GKC does not oppose the Alexis de Tocqueville Society (ATS). Someone (we don’t know who) has been spreading the rumor that GKC is “A Christian version of ATS.” This is silly and inaccurate on multiple levels. First of all, it implies that ATS is not a Christian organization. I disagree. From what I understand of its aims and ideological focus, ATS is indeed a very Christian organization. In this respect, we are and must be the same. Also implied in the rumor is the idea that Jacob and I are subtly condemning ATS in some way. This is in no way our intention. As I have gotten to know some of the members of ATS a little better over the past semester, I have become increasingly impressed with what they are trying to do.

We also see that GKC differs significantly from ATS, not in our Christianity or our goals, but in the focus of our studies and our general organization. As far as I can tell, ATS focuses more on how a Biblical worldview applies to politics and culture, while GKC focuses more on the theological and philosophical aspects of a Biblical worldview. There is, of course some overlap, but we find that our focus and approach are sufficiently different enough to make starting a new club the best choice. Also, the structure of GKC is more open and informal than ATS. We plan to hold weekly or biweekly meetings to discuss a non-fiction work of literature, and also possibly publish a year’s-end pamphlet or blog of essays. We have much less of a structured approach. This is not a criticism of ATS’s structure, but merely an acknowledgement that for optimal effectiveness, different studies require different approaches.

We have also observed that several ATS members have become a strong political coalition on campus, and we haven’t wanted to join ATS because we felt the political activities of some of its members would distract from our goals, which are very non-political in nature. We do not want GKC to be a politically-oriented club. This was one of our reasons for making membership as open as possible; we wanted to have a politically neutral club in which people from various factions could lay aside their differences in the common pursuit of the knowledge of Christ. There is a place for political organization on campus. I wish more of our political factions would acknowledge their own existence as honestly as these ATS members and their friends have done. But GKC is not a venue for political expression.

There is a second objection to this club which has not been made. I almost do not want to suggest it for fear that it will raise unfounded suspicions. But I believe it is best to be forthright. The GKC does not oppose the professors or the administration of Patrick Henry College. We believe we are placing ourselves in a position to more fully realize the College’s goal of shaping our culture for the purpose of a more Christian society. We also will not oppose any of the administrative policies of the college, or any personalities within the administration or faculty.

In spite of this attempt at clarification, I fear I may have raised more questions than I have answered. If you have any questions or criticisms, I am grateful for your input. I promise to listen to you humbly even if I don’t agree with you. Let’s make this school a place where we can talk about things honestly instead of judging each other and feeding off rumor and suspicion.

In Christ,
Peter C. Schellhase
President, The G. K. Chesterton Society of Patrick Henry College

We’re official!

As of now, the Chesterton Society is now an official Patrick Henry College student club.

Stay tuned…

Hello! If you've stumbled upon this blog, greetings in the name of Christ!

This is the official blog of the G. K. Chesterton Society of Patrick Henry College. Our last meeting was Sunday, April 30. The reading assignment for this summer is Chesterton's The Man Who Was Thursday. We will discuss it upon our return.

If you are a Society member and are interested in co-blogging on this site, please contact me.
Go with God!

- Peter Schellhase