He was the first “born again” president and he was elected during Newsweek magazine’s “Year of the Evangelical.” So what are evangelicals saying about the recent death of Jimmy Carter? Christianity Today is running an obituary by historian David Swartz. […]
Archives for December 2024
Kai Bird: “Mr. Carter remains the most misunderstood president of the last century.”
We included this article/post in our recent Jimmy Carter/The Way of Improvement Leads Home roundup, but I reread it this morning and thought it was worth reposting. Here is Carter biographer Kai Bird’s February 2023 New York Times piece: Mr. […]
Carter: “I come here speaking to you today about your subject with a base for my information founded on Reinhold Niebuhr and Bob Dylan.”
This morning I read Randall Balmer’s piece at Politico, “Jimmy Carter: The Last Progressive Evangelical.” Here is the part of Balmer’s article that focuses on Carter’s 1974 Law Day address at the University of Georgia: One of the venerable traditions […]
Return to Turkey Mountain
Thanks to everyone for the nice comments on my “Life on Turkey Mountain” feature at Current. (This piece was originally published earlier in the year, but it got more attention this time around. Thanks to Current editor Robert Erle Barham […]
Almost all things must pass
Reminders from Boethius for the end of year.
The Author’s Corner with James Chappel
James Chappel is Gilhuly Family Associate Professor of History at Duke University. This interview is based on his new book, Golden Years: How Americans Invented and Reinvented Old Age (Basic Books, 2024). JF: What led you to write Golden Years? […]
Commonplace Book #296
Despite Charles Kesler’s loathing of nihilism, his political theory thus has a hidden nihilistic side–not in theory but in practice. In theory, Kesler was battling for the restoration of a natural right anthropology, one grounded on the self-evident truth that […]
Winged Words
There’s more than one way to fly
Greg Abbott sends his condolences to Rosalynn Carter
Yes, you read that correctly. Here is the Texas governor’s official statement on the death of Jimmy Carter: “Cecilia and I mourn the loss of former President Jimmy Carter alongside millions of Americans across the country. Our nation remains the […]
Eric Miller on Christopher Lasch and the Carter “malaise” speech
Yesterday, upon hearing of the death of Jimmy Carter, I posted his July 15, 1979 “Crisis of Confidence” speech (also known as the “malaise” speech). In his award winning book Hope in a Scattering Time: A Life of Christopher Lasch, […]
The Author’s Corner with Holly M. Karibo
Holly M. Karibo is Associate Professor of History and Director of Graduate Studies at Oklahoma State University. This interview is based on her new book, Rehab on the Range: A History of Addiction and Incarceration in the American West (University […]
The story of 2024 in Current features
Documenting the year that is coming to an end through Current essays.
Three Evenings in Plains
The Carters bear witness to a more excellent way
Commonplace Book #295
In a strangely prophetic passage that suddenly began to be quoted widely in 2016, [Richard] Rorty even predicted that a hyper-moralized leftist politics indifferent to material conditions would eventually drive “members of labor unions, and unorganized unskilled workers” into the […]
Sunday night odds and ends
A few things online that caught my attention this week: Anti-elitist should not mean anti-education. The moral wisdom of Joe Biden’s pardons Should Trump erect an arch for the country’s 250th anniversary? Sitting in empty churches What was your first […]
Jimmy Carter at Messiah College
On February 18, 1986, Jimmy Carter visited Messiah College as the inaugural speaker for the college’s Religion and Society Lecture series. Here is a taste of Randy Frame’s coverage of the lecture at Christianity Today: Last month, Messiah College in […]
Jimmy Carter at The Way of Improvement Leads Home
We’ve spent considerable time covering Jimmy Carter over the years here at The Way of Improvement Leads Home blog: Albert Mohler “hopes and prays” that Jimmy Carter is saved (December 19, 2024) Happy 100th anniversary Jimmy Carter! (October 1, 2024) […]
Jimmy Carter: “…owning things and consuming things does not satisfy our longing for meaning”
In his famous July 15, 1979 “Crisis of Confidence” speech (often referred to as the “malaise speech”), Jimmy Carter said: In a nation that was proud of hard work, strong families, close-knit communities, and our faith in God, too many […]
Consider adding CURRENT to your 2025 reading routine. Become a member today!
If you answer “yes” to any of these questions, you might find Current interesting: I am often asked if Current is a “Christian” magazine. It will occasionally become obvious that the positions taken by many of our contributors are informed […]
Commonplace Book #294
As a public philosophy, conservatism largely abandoned its public appeal to religious faith. Christian conservatives still made up the plurality of the conservative electorate, but the public appeal to religious ideals and the effort to ground conservatism in Christian theology […]