Jim Kalb

I’m young and novice, so naturally I’m heavily indebted to people who have been experiencing, thinking, and articulating longer and more seriously than I have. One of those people is Jim Kalb, an independent writer who keeps a website here, and whose recent book has been fairly described as “a blockbuster that belongs on the shelves of any thinking conservative who wants to understand where we are today, and where we are going.”

In his writing he focuses on overall tendencies, general trends, and basic issues, instead of emphasizing particulars. That seems to leave a lot of room for people to adapt their answers to particular questions in ways that suit their circumstances. To that degree you might say there’s a level of agnosticism to his approach. Still, he favors the Catholic Church as the institution best fitted overall for housing civilization’s renewal.

Among those with whom he’s made some sort of common cause, in writing, analyzing, and pointing toward ways out of the current crisis, not all share his Catholic bent. That’s not really alarming—things in general are highly fragmented, and people with a variety of loyalties and inclinations are going to reach a variety of conclusions on central questions, even when they’re pulling in the same right-wing sort of direction. I wonder, though, if that point of diversion is something Jim has had occasion to deal with directly. I wonder what he would say are the strongest criticisms he’s seen on this point, and how he would respond to them, and how much he thinks the question matters in the scheme of things.

Update: Jim follows up with remarks about his approach.