Home
/
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
/
Oliver O’Donovan reviews Kuyper’s ‘Pro Rege’
Oliver O’Donovan reviews Kuyper’s ‘Pro Rege’
Dec 27, 2025 2:23 AM

Last year, in partnership with the Acton Institute, Lexham Press releasedPro Rege, Vol. 2: Living Under Christ the King, the second in a three-volume series on the lordship of Christ (find Volume 1here) by Abraham Kuyper.

At First Things, the esteemed evangelical ethicist Oliver O’Donovan reviews the first two volumes and explains why the Dutch theologian and statesman is still relevant today:

Kuyper is at his most persuasive when he lays out his vision of the moral solidarity of the human race in Christ, the Second Adam, lord over nature and culture. The whole sphere of human society, the ­ugliness of modernity notwithstanding, is Christ’s to claim; the little flock need not be afraid to emerge from the sanctuary to confess his name in public and do battle for his right. The lament has turned into a summons to cultural ambition. For the Church’s cultural mission cannot float on the cultural stream in a spirit of quiet acceptance. It must exert ­counterpressure, deploy the hard virtues of courage and endurance, and issue a word of challenge where such a thing is not often heard. The naming of Christ in all kinds of endeavors is paramount, for it is the name that gives cultural engagement meaning as a witness to the hidden wisdom of God. And on this point Kuyper seems still to have something to say to our present condition, living in a world where the question of effective Christian presence is constantly raised but rarely answered persuasively.

Read more . . .

Comments
Welcome to mreligion comments! Please keep conversations courteous and on-topic. To fosterproductive and respectful conversations, you may see comments from our Community Managers.
Sign up to post
Sort by
Show More Comments
RELIGION & LIBERTY ONLINE
The invisible sources of entrepreneurship
Entrepreneurs take risks, they see opportunities that others do not, and they turn those opportunities into businesses. It’s perhaps counterintuitive, but this risk-taking actually requires stable social foundations. Entrepreneurs need to know that ground is solid before they risk a jump. Read More… There is great enthusiasm for entrepreneurship these days. There are social entrepreneurs, intellectual entrepreneurs, educational entrepreneurs and even intra-preneurs (entrepreneurs within their panies). Entrepreneurs like Steve Jobs and Bill Gates are held up as model citizens. Magazines...
Samuel Gregg: Imitate Sweden’s Economic Liberation, Not Her Failed Socialism
Acton’s director of research Samuel Gregg has a piece over at The American Spectator that may surprise big government liberals. (We know you read this blog.) In “Free Market Sweden, Social Democratic America,” he lays out the history of Sweden’s social democracy — its nature and its effects on the country’s economy — and then draws lessons for the United States. The Scandinavian country isn’t quite the pinko nanny state Americans like to look down upon, and we’ve missed their...
Trade with China, or Blockade Their Ports?
Congress insults our intelligence when it tells us that Chinese currency games are to blame for our trade deficit with that country and unemployment in our own. Legislators might as well propose a fleet of men-o’-war to navigate the globe and collect all its gold: economics is not a zero-sum game. An exchange on yesterday’s Laura Ingraham Show frames the debate nicely. The host asked Ted Cruz, the conservative Texan running for U.S. Senate, what he thought about the Chinese...
Top 5 Lessons from the Solyndra Failure
The green tech firm Solyndra secured at $535 million federal loan guarantee in 2009 and was touted as an example of a promising green future. A month ago, pany went bankrupt. Here are the top five lessons we should learn from Solyndra’s collapse. 5. Both sides of the aisle are involved. Republican support of federal “investment” is routine — in fact, the DOE program that made Solyndra’s loan was approved by President Bush. It is true that Solyndra’s original application...
Unions Go Shoe Shopping
My sister has a small pillow in her bedroom that’s embroidered with the words “She who dies with the most shoes wins.” I’m sure Lloyd Blankfein’s daughter has one just like it. And you’d think that the patchouli-scented Occupy Wall Street crowd might not like such a pillow, but you’d be wrong, as Ray Nothstine pointed out in this week’s Acton Commentary. The anger at Zuccotti Park isn’t sparked by greed on Wall Street, it’s sparked by greed in Zuccotti...
Whole Life Discipleship: Integrating Faith, Economics, and Work
I’m at the “Whole Life Discipleship: Integrating Faith, Economics, and Work” conference today at Regent University. As I have the opportunity today, I’ll blog (and tweet) some of the lectures. First up is Stephen Grabill of the Acton Institute, and here are some highlights: He focused on three basic questions: What is political and economic freedom? How do we use Scripture in our approach to social life? What about natural law? On the first: A Christian anthropology is anti-revolutionary in...
Class Warriors for Big Government
mentary this week addresses the demonstrations in New York and in other cities against free enterprise and business. One of the main points I make in this piece is that “lost in the debate is the fundamental purpose of American government and the importance of virtue and a benevolent society.” Here is the list of demands by the “Occupy Wall Street” movement. It is in essence a laundry list of devastating economic schemes and handouts. Additionally, the demands are counter...
VIDEO: PovertyCure Launch
Acton has been heavily involved in developing a new initiative called PovertyCure, an international network that promotes entrepreneurial solutions to poverty rooted in the dignity of the human person. We are excited to announce the launch of PovertyCure this week. Acton has joined together with over 100 organizations to encourage people to rethink charity and development. In the last three years I’ve had the privilege of interviewing over a hundred people from all over the world—religious and political leaders, small...
Announcing Wisdom & Wonder: Common Grace in Science & Art
I’m pleased to announce that the first fruits of the Kuyper Common Grace Translation project are ing, in the form of Wisdom & Wonder: Common Grace in Science & Art. This is the first selection out of the larger three-volume set that will appear plete translation in English. This book consists of 10 chapters that the Dutch theologian and statesman Abraham Kuyper had written to be the conclusion of his three-volume study mon grace. But due to a publisher’s oversight,...
Ronald Reagan Retrospective at Hillsdale College
I was fortunate to attend some of “Reagan: A Centenary Retrospective” at Hillsdale College from October 2 – 5. I was present for excellent lectures by Craig Shirley and Peter Robinson. Shirley is the author of Reagan’s Revolution: The Untold Story of the Campaign That Started It All and Rendezvous with Destiny: Ronald Reagan and the Campaign That Changed America, a book I reviewed on the PowerBlog. Robinson, a former speechwriter in the Reagan White House, authored the famous “Tear...
Related Classification
Copyright 2023-2025 - www.mreligion.com All Rights Reserved