It’s Time to Regenerate the Spirit

In one of the most inspiring passages of The Conservative Mind, Russell Kirk proclaims that “conservatism at its best” is concerned with the “regeneration of the spirit and character” of the nation, as well as the “restoration of ethical understanding.” Mamdani, AOC, and the Bad Bunny show are three sides of the same coin: the opposite of Kirk’s proposal. Swapping Kirk for Bad Bunny is like swapping my future fiancée, Sydney Sweeney, for Sarah Jessica Parker.

There is a morality, there is a natural law, there is a reason for life in society, and there is a motive for the common good. The exact place where the new right can take the lead over watered-down socialism is in the regeneration of the spirit and character. We are more than a piece of meat. We are much more than a number, a bank account, and a ballot.

The postmodern left insists on denying the human condition. Social democracy shares with parts of the Western right an obsession with management. It is important, no doubt. But we are not a factory, nor is prosperity measured by a profit-and-loss statement. A rich nation without children, to put it simply, is a poor and sorrowful nation. A nation, in short, is not an engineering process or a packaging plant. A nation is the soul of each of its members: their physical integrity, their moral dignity, their productivity and aspirations, their family plans, their shared sense of belonging.

Relativism triumphed more in politics than in the streets, although it long ago gave way to woke zealotry, now in retreat. However, some of its nervous tics have stayed with us. Even today, someone will stammer out, as if it were an argument, “That’s your truth!” and it still strikes me as contempt for so many centuries of thought about truth in Western civilization. It is not “your truth.” Such a thing cannot be possessed. It is only a way of not admitting a mistake, or worse still, of refusing to confront someone else’s error. Everything may be debatable, if there is no other choice, but an opinion does not change reality; it only moves closer to it or further away from it.

Outside this relativism, professional moderate politicians move like fish in wet cement, because they refuse to take the step Kirk recommended: regenerating the spirit. A complicated and thankless task, but one that gives solidity and a future to a political project. It is not about always saying what people want to hear, but about telling the truth. It is not about always doing what the majority thinks is right, but about doing what is right. Although it may sound a bit apocalyptic, all conservatism should begin with the awareness that there is a battle between good and evil, and live in the hope of transmitting to the nation not the fervor of that struggle, but the aspiration to be better.

The left always has a proposal built on the stick and the reward. When it gives you the first, you sometimes don’t even notice; when it gives you the second, it tells you about it six times over. Progressivism tries to educate society, which is frightening in itself, but it does so like a bad parent — one who only knows how to move children through threats, coercion, or bribery, and who ultimately produces spoiled and dissatisfied offspring.

Conservatism should not aspire to educate anyone. Every era has its weak point. In this one, what we feel is a yearning for freedom, not for governmental paternalism. But even so, it is possible, through politics, to try to instill and recover the old values that made Western nations great. Values that are still relevant, against which the only argument — we hear it so often — is, “Hey, it’s 2026, and there are still people who…!” which makes you want to reply: Congratulations, ma’am, your almanac is very effective. Please reserve one for me for next year. (RELATED: In Search of Freedom)

We must return to the classics. We must return to the basics. We must once again distinguish between good and evil. We must once again say so. We must pray together again. And we must stop talking so much about rights and invite people to ask themselves about their obligations as well. We must dream, and remember a thousand times, that the left — with its revolutionary mother and totalitarian father — has built nothing; it has only torn things down, leading nations to a worse place. It is the right — or rather, conservatism, tradition, and the efforts of individuals — that have brought prosperity to nations for centuries. All of this remains true. And the moment is now. The Christian West can still rise again. Let us blow on its smoldering ashes so the flame may grow once more.

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