R.R. Reno unveils valuable insight into our shifting priorities, focusing on politics over culture, in his article “Culture Matters More Than Politics” published in “First Things.” Also recently published in “First Things,” Makoto Fujimura writes “A Letter to Young Artists.”

“These days, the ability to talk about politics in a knowing way is treated as a mark of sophistication…

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It was not always so. Far from indicating effete and irrelevant erudition, the capacity to talk about Jane Austen or T.S. Eliot or James Joyce was once seen as clear indication of a highly developed and socially relevant mind.

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The traumas of the Great Depression and World War II profoundly disoriented Americans…and many felt the need to answer basic questions about society and human destiny.

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In this atmosphere, the pressing question about politics was not “Who is going to win?” but instead the question “What is politics for?” It was a question that required examining our more fundamental views of what human life is for, and what role society plays.

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…the most potent force in political life is the human imagination, not control over the levers of state power.

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At the end of the day, elections don’t shape or influence our cultural imaginations…our imaginations influence our elections.”