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There is a painting that I want you to see.

I saw it back in January 2014, and the artwork held my gaze for a long time.

It’s more than 500 years old, but even after half a millennium, the artist speaks into the darkness of Charlie Kirk’s murder.

I want you to see Raphael’s cartoon of Paul Preaching at Athens, painted for the Sistine Chapel around 1515–16, now displayed at the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

In this painting, we see the best of Western civilisation on display:

Faith. Reason. Inquiry. Debate. Persuasion.

Charlie Kirk modelled these things at universities across the world.

He stood in a tradition that reaches all the way back to the New Testament.

We see this in Raphael’s painting.

His paintbrush was inspired by biblical events recounted in the New Testament, where the Apostle Paul visited Athens and preached the Gospel and resurrection of Jesus Christ.

In Acts 17, it says that Paul ‘… reasoned in the synagogue with the Jews and devout persons, and in the marketplace every day with those who happened to be there.’

Paul gave a sermon in ancient Athens using Greek religion and culture to build common ground with the local audience.

He met people at their level.

Civil Discourse… or Violence

Not everyone agreed with Paul, as you’d expect.

The scriptures say that some called him a babbler.

Others mocked him about the resurrection.

But it does say that some men and women believed him and joined him.

It’s all there in the painting, in the faces of those listening.

Raphael gives us a snapshot of Western civilisation in action.

A Jewish Christian making his case in the heart of ancient democracy, in the presence of local religious leaders and philosophers.

Faith. Reason. Inquiry. Debate. Persuasion.

That was Charlie Kirk’s model of engagement.

From Oxford University to Utah Valley University, that’s how he engaged young hearts and minds.

That’s why Charlie Kirk’s brutal public murder was so evil and shocking.

It was an attack on Charlie.

It was an attack on his wife, Erika, and two little children.

It was an attack on his wider family and friends.

But it was also an attack on Western civilisation.

It was an attack on our tradition of faith, reason, inquiry, debate and persuasion.

Rather than reason with Charlie Kirk, his assailant silenced him with a bullet.

This pattern of violence is growing.

The Enemy Within

How did we get here? This violence hasn’t arisen in a vacuum.

After the end of the Cold War, people speculated about the future shape of events.

Some wrote about the end of history with the apparent triumph of liberal democracy.

Others wrote about the emerging clash of civilisations between the West and the Rest.

One thinker, James Kurth, grimly forecast that the greatest rupture would take place within the West itself.

In 1994, Kurth wrote in The National Interest that:

“The real clash of civilisations will not be between the West and one or more of the Rest. It will be between the West and the post-West, within the West itself. This clash has already taken place within the brain of Western civilisation, the American intellectual class. It is now spreading from that brain to the American body politic.”

Kurth wrote this thirty-one years ago, where the clash was intellectual. Now the clash is violent, as we saw with Charlie Kirk’s brutal murder.

But we shouldn’t be surprised as university campuses across the English-speaking world became citadels of hostility after Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, 2023.

Antisemitism is now mainstream, not merely an intellectual indulgence on campus.

Political violence is on the rise in Western democracies.

But the violence is symptomatic of a much deeper problem.

Many of our intellectual class no longer believe in Western values—in fact, they despise Western civilisation.

Our universities tear it down, and repudiate it.

Students are no longer schooled to cherish faith, reason, inquiry, debate and persuasion.

Our youth have been severed from the great Christian tradition depicted in Raphael’s painting.

They’ve been taught that life is about a power struggle between the oppressed and the oppressors.

That’s why we see the pronouns, the grievance, the tantrums, and the violence.

The Battle is Joined

What can we do about it?

First, this is a fight for our civilisation and culture.

Politics is no longer just about economics (not that it ever was, really).

Politics is now firmly a contest of ideas for our way of life, and we need to fight for our Western ideas and values.

The innate dignity and worth of every single human being. Ordered liberty under law. Freedom of conscience and speech.

These are all Christian ideas, backed up by two millennia of thinking and culture. We must double-down on them.

Second, we must adopt Paul’s model of persuasion in Athens, as Charlie Kirk did across America on so many university campuses.

There is great power in civility, restraint and decency.

People like to side with the good guys.

That’s Charlie Kirk’s enduring legacy: he always enjoyed talking with his opponents. I wonder how many people joined with him because of the civil manner in which he debated, rather than the persuasion of his arguments?

Our task going forward is to win the argument both in substance and manner.

Third, the radical left are evil and will use violence to win.

Let’s stop pretending they act in good faith.

In the contest ahead, we must be tough and alert. They don’t play by the rules, so don’t let them set the terms of engagement.

Finally, we need to be bold and courageous.

All of us.

Now is not the time to take cover, even as bullets are fired at our friends.

Our movement needs to grow, and we all must speak the truth about the challenges ahead.

That means you, too, in your local community.

We all have a role to play in the fight ahead.

The time is now. If we don’t get moving, the West will continue to decline.

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Image courtesy of Wikimedia Commons.