December 18, 2002

As liberal democracy spreads across more and more of the globe, the influence of John Rawls seems likely to spread. Rawls, who died on November 24 at age 82, wrote the 20th century’s most complete philosophical defense of that form of government. He takes his place with political thinkers from Locke and Jefferson to Bentham and Mill who shaped the Anglo-American vision of liberalism. He also provides a framework for thinking about democracy and justice across a wide range of economic conditions and cultural traditions.

New Testament scholar N. T. Wright, who has taught at Cambridge, Oxford and Montreal, recently became the canon theologian at Westminster Abbey in London. He is both a vigorous investigator of the historical Jesus and an effective communicator of the gospel. His scholarly works include a two-volume project on the origins of Christianity: The New Testament and the People of God (1992) and Jesus and the Victory of God (1996).

Glenn C. Loury had a lot going for him in the 1980s. The first black to be tenured in economics at Harvard, Loury was a famed black neoconservative and opponent of affirmative action. He dined at the White House and joined the Reagan administration. Conservative journals vied for his work. He was on the “A” list for events hosted by people like William F. Buckley Jr. and William Bennett.

"We weren’t really sure what to do,” Daniel Davison said, after his entire rap-metal band Luti-Kriss got “saved” at an Assemblies of God revival service. “But we figured we should stop cussing so much in our songs. And . . . maybe we can write songs about God!” Inexplicably, the group changed its name to Norma Jean and by this August they were on the cover of HM magazine, the Christian music industry’s premiere publication covering hard rock artists.

Martin Scorsese's obsession with pain and suffering--and, more to the point, martyrdom--dates back to his breakthrough 1973 film Mean Streets, whose main character repeatedly puts his hand into a burning church candle to see what the flames of damnation will feel like. This fascination with violence continued in Taxi Driver ("Someday a real rain will come and wash the scum off the street"), Raging Bull, The Last Temptation of Christ, Goodfellas, Casino and Bringing Out the Dead.

Innocence always calls mutely for protection when we would do so much better to guard ourselves against it: innocence is like a dumb leper who has lost its bell, wandering the world, meaning no harm." So Graham Greene writes in The Quiet American, a novel that plumbs the moral dangers of innocence. That quality is embodied in the character of Pyle, an idealist in early-1950s Indochina who turns out to be a CIA operative working to help a ruthless general gain power.