Vacation Reading: Crunchy Cons

Just finished reading Crunchy Cons for the second time while we were on vacation. This is a rather big picture, but I wanted you to be able to read the subtitle. Isn't it a hoot? I decided not to type all that out.

This was an amusing book to read in a serious sort of way, if that is possible. The book doesn't really answer how these people will save America or the Republican Party, but I imagine it was just too hysterical of a title to pass up. What it is about: there is this fringe group of conservatives who take their "religion" seriously and make a conscious decision to live in the physical world in a way that is only a continuation of their spiritual views. Dreher calls this "sacramental living". This has incidental political consequences. Politics is not the point of this book.

But there are some amusing anecdotes to tell along the way. These "crunchy cons" find it hilarious that THEY of all people, are taking up a lifestyle that is stereotypically in the domain of the far left. Their opinions on conservative social issues have remained the same, but disagreement with fellow conservatives begins when you start talking about food, money (and big business), the environment, education, etc.

I've had amusing moments like that before. I still remember the first time we went to a little co-op store in an urban residential area in the nearest big city to us. They had this new-agey eastern mystic music playing, and it smelled like patchouli. Everywhere there was hemp-this and hemp-that. And every "flavor" of incense you could possibly imagine. Not to mention all the soy/tofu stuff. I felt like a real oddball. I knew I had to have been the only conservative Christian to ever shop in that store. It just made me want to laugh out loud.

Of course, the book isn't all about anecdotes like this. He uses them to lead up to his main idea, which is this: it is vital that we live our lives consistently by our beliefs, and to truly prioritize family, not just give lip service to the importance of what we say we believe. Make your family's culture your religion externalized.

For anyone interested in this book, here is Mr. Dreher's "Crunchy Con Manifesto":
1. We are conservatives who stand outside the conservative mainstream; therefore, we can see things that matter more clearly.

2. Modern conservatism has become too focused on money, power, and the accumulation of stuff, and insufficiently concerned with the content of our individual and social character.

3. Big business deserves as much skepticism as big government.

4. Culture is more important than politics and economics.

5. A conservatism that does not practice restraint, humility, and good stewardship - especially of the natural world - is not fundamentally conservative.

6. Small, Local, Old, and Particular are almost always better than Big, Global, New, and Abstract.

7. Beauty is more important than efficiency.

8. The relentlessness of media-driven pop culture deadens our senses to authentic truth, beauty, and wisdom.

9. We share Russell Kirk's conviction that "the institution most essential to conserve is the family."

I have to say, I share most of the same convictions that the author shared in this book (I say most, not all). I guess that makes me a Crunchy Con. However, one of the characteristics of "crunchy cons" is that you can't nail 'em down with a book. We just are who we are, whether anyone puts us in a book or not. It's nice to be recognized as a force, though.