Rod Dreher: Resisting the Zeitgeist

The European Conservative is happy to announce today our new collaboration with the American writer Rod Dreher. Rod will be writing exclusive content for our website that will contribute to our mission of opening up debate about controversial issues and taking conservative ideas of all kinds seriously.

For decades, Rod Dreher has been a conversation starter. From coining the term “crunchy cons” in 2006 to reviving the immortal expression “live not by lies” (originally used by Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn as the title of a 1974 essay), Dreher’s observations and opinions have driven the conversation—and, at times, sparked controversy—in many important ways.

The theme of Dreher’s 2017 work, The Benedict Option, and that of his most recent (2020) work, Live Not by Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents, have become especially entrenched in public discourse. With concepts and ideas used from East to West—even by people who have never read his books—his writings demonstrate his ability to consistently capture and push back against the zeitgeist. Dreher’s work embodies what the Southern U.S. writer Flannery O’Connor meant when she admonished people to “[p]ush back against the age as hard as it pushes against you.”

In his prolific writings—in recent years, primarily for The American Conservative, and more recently, through his own Substack—Dreher has documented and reported on religious transformations in Eastern Europe, the proliferation of ‘woke’ ideology, and emerging conservative movements across the European continent, among other topics. And with his recent move to the Continent, he has positioned himself as a reliable source for those seeking a deeper, more detailed look at the European political and cultural landscape.

We consider his ‘voice’ to be unique, provocative, humorous, sometimes outrageous but never dull—one that is worth sharing widely, both among our readers and new audiences on both sides of the Atlantic. As we said in the editorial/leader to our Summer 2023 print edition, “[b]eing intellectually promiscuous, perhaps even rebellious, is a sure way to fend off total servility to a dominant group.” Rod Dreher’s incisive commentaries will surely help us in this mission.

We hope you will agree—even if you find yourselves sometimes disagreeing with him. Let’s keep the conversation going.