William F. Buckley’s Advice for Christian Activists
William F. Buckley (1925-2008), who was perhaps the most well-known conservative in America over the last fifty years, passed away yesterday. He was 82. Like many political and ideological conservatives, I am a Buckley fan, though admittedly a latecomer to Buckley fan-dom; I am a bit too young to have known much about Buckley when he was active in public life. But I like what I do know. Check out the numerous summaries and assessments of Buckley’s life and contribution at National Review Online, the website of the influential conservative periodical that Buckley founded in 1955.
In memory of Buckley, Christianity Today has reprinted a 1995 interview that Michael Cromartie of the Ethics and Public Policy Center conducted with Buckley. The topic was the role of Christian conservatives in politics. It was a major (and controversial) topic in 1995, just a year after Newt Gingrich and company captured control of Congress with no small assistance from the Christian Coalition. It remains a major (and controversial) topic in 2008 as Christian conservatives wrestle with the realities of the current political landscape. I commend the article to you.
Did you get a chance to hear WFB when he spoke at BPC? I can’t remember the year, maybe somewhere between 1997-1999 in the Saliba. Not sure if that was slightly before your time or not?
All I can remember about seeing WFB is that I could barely understand him! He had a huge vocabulary and an awful accent.
I read the article, and it was fascinating. I was a big fan of Buckley's, and have been since the early 1960's.
The thing he said that always tickled my funny bone was his response to a request to define "conservative". His quote, and I think I recall it accurately, was:
"Conservatism is the paradigm of essences toward which the current national phenomenology is in continuing approximation".
Right on, Bill. R.I.P.
Big Daddy,
I was not at BPC when Buckley came. I transferred there in fall 1999, so he must have come before then.
NAF