I stumbled upon your blog several months ago, while in the midst of spiritual doubt and questioning. I’m grateful to you for your thoughts and ideas and introducing me to men such as Solzhenitsyn. This is all aiding me in acquainting myself with a truer conception of my religious beliefs and values and their role in society.

I have doubts about the empirical claim of Western decadence, and about the possibility of creating apparatuses to enforce the ideals that Solzhenitsyn valued. But I think we’d be a better society if the views you present here were more widely discussed.

As to our misunderstanding of Solzhenitsyn, we’re unable and unwilling to understand Russia, to be sure, but it’s equal opportunity noncomprehension. Solzhenitsyn was on our side; so too were the Afghan mujahadeen; so too was Saddam; so too was Vaclav Havel; so was P.W. Botha. My point isn’t to compare all of those figures or call them all evil or good, but to point out that we can view anyone through the prism of “with us or against us,” thereby missing the point.

When Western Europeans opposed our invasion of Iraq, there were ominous hints that we’d have to bomb them, too. Solzhenitsyn’s point about our tendency to view the rest of the world as imperfectly formed Americans is amazingly astute and relevant today.