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Glenn's Show Prep

Everything could change this week if Supreme Court rules in favor of gay marriage

June 24, 2015
Staff

WRITER

Your livelihood, the way you work, the way you pray, how you associate with others, could radically change this week. Why? Because the Supreme Court will rule on a gay marriage case, and it has the potential to completely change the country. To help explain just how dire the situation is, Glenn invited Kelly Shackelford from the Liberty Institute onto the program. Once you hear this conversation, you’ll understand why this issue goes far beyond traditional marriage vs. equality.

Listen to the interview from Wednesday’s radio show below:

Below is a rush transcript of this segment:

GLENN: When Barack Obama said the fundamental transformation of the United States of America begins in five days, he was five days away from his -- his election in -- in 2008. And we have seen a fundamental transformation of America, but I believe we haven't seen anything yet. I believe everything leads to the Supreme Court decisions. Your -- your livelihood, the way you work, the way you pray, how you associate with others, everything is at stake now. We're talking about the Supreme Court's decision as it comes out probably on Monday. It could come out tomorrow. On gay marriage.

People are talking about this ruling as if, oh, you know, we have to defend traditional marriage. Or, hey, finally equality. They've tried to make this into an argument about, who are you to say if I love somebody else?

I think most Americans are fine with that. I think most Americans are like, look, I don't need to celebrate your marriage. I don't need to agree with your marriage, whether you're straight or gay. And I don't want to be in your bedroom, and I don't want to be talked to you about love. That's none of my business. That's your business.

But also most Americans, because we are tolerant, we feel this way, but we expect tolerance to go the other way. We expect if you're saying, celebrity diversity, that you understand that I might disagree with you.

Our churches are about to come under attack. And I had one of the most sobering conversations I have had in a very long time last night on the TV show. Because I had Kelly Shackelford with me from the Liberty Institute. Kelly joins me on the phone now, and we're going to talk a little about this because you need to wrap your arms around how your country could change in the next five days, dramatically so.

Kelly, welcome to the program. How are you?

KELLY: Great. Thanks for having me, Glenn.

GLENN: Kelly, tell me first of all what your institution does.

KELLY: Liberty Institute is the largest legal organization in the country that exclusively, solely handles religious freedom, you know, First Amendment cases all across the United States, free of charge for people of all faiths.

GLENN: Okay. And you've been doing this for a long, long time. And you've seen all kinds of cases, but you've never seen cases like the cases that are coming across your desk now. And this is only the beginning.

KELLY: Yeah. I think you hit it on the head when you said -- most people look at the case coming up -- let's say on Monday, is when most people think they're going to hand down the same-sex marriage decision, and they just think about it just affecting marriage. They don't think about the impact that it will have on the First Amendment and religious freedom. We filed a brief on behalf of, you know, all kinds of national groups. National religious broadcasters. Big ministries that people would know about. We've seen what happens in other countries when they do this. And the First Amendment -- Canada took no time to have hate speech laws and other things. And now Christian organizations can't even -- can't even come into existence and be like law schools or things like that because they violate the new right.

So I just want people to think about -- and I can run through real quickly -- if there is a new federal constitutional right created by the Court -- and that's two of the three arguments -- that's what they're asking that they do, then this new federal constitutional right for same-sex marriage will be -- you know, immediately, the question will be, well, all right, how does this constitutional right compare to this other constitutional right of freedom of religion or free speech? And we don't have to wonder -- I mean, some of this came out in the oral argument. The solicitor general of the United States was asked, hey, look, if this is a new federal constitutional right and if people are discriminating, in the past, we've taken away tax-exempt status from religious groups, for instance, who discriminated on the basis of race. So won't we have to take away the tax-exempt status of all the nonprofit groups that disagree with this new federal constitutional right. And everybody thought that the solicitor general would say, oh, we're not going that far, et cetera.

His answer was: That will be an issue. So you can start with tax-exempt status of all nonprofits who disagree with this new federal position will be open for discussion. Christian colleges, school accreditation will be under question and attack. Faith-based adoption organizations, foster providers. Federal contractors and grantees, including with those with just loans at religious schools. Religious staffing at faith-based organizations will now be under attack. Those in the military, you don't follow this new agenda will suffer the consequences as well. We're already seeing those cases

PAT: Kelly, are you saying -- are you saying that a student who gets a loan to go to a school like BYU, for instance --

GLENN: Or Liberty University.

PAT: Or Liberty University would not be able to get the loan based on this ruling? Or the school would be under pressure to, what? How does that work?

KELLY: Yeah, absolutely. And let me say something. I'm not saying that we will have lost all these. I'm saying, there's like a -- a battle line opens. One way to put it is, it's not that this case will be the end of the battle. It will be the beginning of the battle, and all these things now are going to be attacked. So they, yeah, it could say, we can't allow you to get a federal loan to go to an institution that engages in discrimination.

PAT: Wow.

KELLY: And it goes further. Faith-based businesses, which you've already seen, will certainly be under attack. There's all these federal laws that triggers will into place now when they change the definition of marriage. Things like Title VII, which covers employment of anybody who has 16 or more employees. Housing and Urban Development. Department of Labor. Think of education. The SCC, I mean, there's a lot of people that are thinking about this case that they're not even thinking about, hey, this might impact my minister that I listen to or watch on TV or something. Do you think the FCC will allow a license to people who engage in discrimination against this new federal constitutional right?

GLENN: So, Kelly, let me ask you this. Let's go through a couple of things.

First of all, there already is a case that you guys are handling of a guy who was -- a person who had a scripture taped to the bottom of their monitor of their computer. Tell that story.

KELLY: Yes. This is a marine who was actually court-martialed. And by that, I don't mean they were charged. I mean, they were convicted. Court-martialed for having a scripture verse taped to the bottom of her computer at her workspace. We're now appealing that. We weren't involved. And when we saw it, we immediately jumped in to get involved. Because this kind of precedent will affect everybody in the military. And so we've now appealed to what's called the Court of Military Appeals, which is sort of the military Supreme Court.

But, you know, Glenn, that's just one of many examples. We have a chaplain we're representing who after 19 and a half years of incredible service for our country -- he was not just a chaplain. He was like a chaplain to SEAL Team 6, to Special Forces, and after an impeccable record for 19 years, he's been essentially -- you would call -- it's called detached for cause. But he's essentially been fired because he was asked in 101 Counseling what the biblical answer was to sex outside of marriage and what the Bible would say about that. He answered according to his faith, and that person complained that he was intolerant. And a commander has literally fired him from doing his job. Now they're considering kicked him out of the entire Navy. Losing his pension and everything. So this is the kind of thing that is already happening before the decision -- when it becomes a federal constitutional right, you can imagine how that goes on steroids.

GLENN: Then it's done. Let me ask about the pastor that was fired from I think his second job because somebody went back and looked at sermons that he had online. Can you tell me that story?

KELLY: Yeah, this is a wonderful guy. Eric Walsh. He was the director of public health for the city of Pasadena, California. And the state of Georgia said, hey, we'd like you to come be our director of public health for about a third of the state, an area director. He accepted. Then the next thing he knew, some activist from California called the state of Georgia, said, hey, you need to check out what this guy believes about marriage. And he goes to a church where he's allowed to preach. You need to review his sermons.

We now have the copies of the emails from the Georgia government officials, back and forth, divvying up his sermons to decide which government official is going to review which sermon. The next day they fired him. Again, not for anything he ever did at work, but because of what he said at his own church on a Sunday on issues. So that's an example.

Unfortunately we're having a number of these kind of cases now where people are losing their jobs, not because of what they do at work, but because of what they believe and the intolerance, like you mentioned, that's now coming out against those of faith and not want allowing them to hold their own beliefs.

PAT: That's a lot like the Firefox CEO. Right? The web browser CEO because he contributed to --

GLENN: But that is political pressure being applied. Those are these people -- yeah, this actually will be enforced by law. So, in other words, you want to be a firefighter, you want to be a police officer, you want to be a lawyer, you want to be a doctor, a psychiatrist, any of these things. You're not going to be allowed because you will be defined as somebody who is a bigot. And so you will not -- how are you going to be a doctor if you believe in traditional marriage? You're a bigot. How could you possibly be a -- a lawyer? You're a bigot.

So you will start -- you will see people lose their jobs because of what they believe. The right of conscience is about to go away. Am I overstating this, Kelly?

KELLY: No. This has not only started -- it will happen if what we think the Supreme Court does -- if they do.

But this is the battle line that is opening. I mean, currently what should happen if you lose your job, there are federal laws and state laws that protect religious freedom in the workplace. And those corporations, those entities should not only lose. But they should pay a painful penalty for engaging in that type of religious discrimination. This will be an attempt to now change that.

So what I'm saying, not that we'll lose all these religious freedoms and First Amendment rights overnight, but there will now be a weapon to attempt to lose -- there will be lawsuits in all these things I mentioned. I can guarantee you. It's just a matter of us winning. We have to win these cases. We have to preserve how this country was founded. Which is on the right to dissent. The right to disagree with the government and hold your own conscience and religious beliefs

GLENN: If we -- I'm a Libertarian so I believe you have a right to be married, but you also do not have a right to tell another person how they have to live their life or how they need to worship or what can be done in their church. Libertarians slowly take over the world and then leave everyone alone. But I believe that there is so much hatred out there that people even like me, people like Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, all of us will be off the air because we're on federally held license. Our radio stations, they will lose their license if you have a -- a hatemonger or a bigot that is defined now by the Supreme Court as bigotry. We won't be able to broadcast. Would you agree with that?

KELLY: There's no doubt in my mind that that attack will come. That there will be an attempt to get Glenn Beck and Rush Limbaugh off the air. This is the exact argument they will try to make. These are the kinds of battles that I talk about are coming. I certainly hope and pray for our country that we will win those battles. But nobody can say because, again, this whole group of attacks is about to come into existence. So we haven't all these battles yet, but we're about to. We've seen the rumblings. We've seen the bakers and the florist and all those cases where the government is punishing people because they won't do something that's against their faith with regard to same-sex marriage. We've seen it with chaplains. We've seen it in a lot of different ways. I can give you examples of almost all these things where certain things have happened, certain cases. But this is about to be on a whole new level, and it will be across the country.

GLENN: Kelly Shackelford, he is the president of the Liberty Institute. LibertyInstitute.org. They take on religious freedom cases, pro bono, to try to set things right. I appreciate all of your hard work. We pray for you, Kelly. And we'll talk to you again soon with all these rulings coming down, I'd like to get some more advice from you and insight from you.

KELLY: Glenn, thank you for having me on. I did neglect to mention. Anyone who is a church or nonprofit, we have online things they can put in their policies if they have those beliefs to put themself in a position to be better protected if they are attacked. So I want to make sure that people know about that as well. That many churches are getting calls. They're getting the setup calls, where they'll probably be sued for not marrying two men or two women. They need to have those things about their beliefs and their doctrine in their legal documents that will help them out, if that ever happens.

GLENN: And you can get that at LibertyInstitute.org?

KELLY: Yes. Yes.

GLENN: Thank you very much, Kelly. I appreciate it. I talked to him yesterday for quite some time. We had him on TV for an hour and talked to him about these things. I highly recommend that your church prepares. And I highly recommend that you prepare. We'll have more on that coming up in just a second.

A nation unravels when its shared culture is the first thing to go

Spencer Platt / Staff | Getty Images

Texas now hosts Quran-first academies, Sharia-compliant housing schemes, and rapidly multiplying mosques — all part of a movement building a self-contained society apart from the country around it.

It is time to talk honestly about what is happening inside America’s rapidly growing Muslim communities. In city after city, large pockets of newcomers are choosing to build insulated enclaves rather than enter the broader American culture.

That trend is accelerating, and the longer we ignore it, the harder it becomes to address.

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world.

America has always welcomed people of every faith and people from every corner of the world, but the deal has never changed: You come here and you join the American family. You are free to honor your traditions, keep your faith, but you must embrace the Constitution as the supreme law of the land. You melt into the shared culture that allows all of us to live side by side.

Across the country, this bargain is being rejected by Islamist communities that insist on building a parallel society with its own rules, its own boundaries, and its own vision for how life should be lived.

Texas illustrates the trend. The state now has roughly 330 mosques. At least 48 of them were built in just the last 24 months. The Dallas-Fort Worth metroplex alone has around 200 Islamic centers. Houston has another hundred or so. Many of these communities have no interest in blending into American life.

This is not the same as past waves of immigration. Irish, Italian, Korean, Mexican, and every other group arrived with pride in their heritage. Still, they also raised American flags and wanted their children to be part of the country’s future. They became doctors, small-business owners, teachers, and soldiers. They wanted to be Americans.

What we are watching now is not the melting pot. It is isolation by design.

Parallel societies do not end well

More than 300 fundamentalist Islamic schools now operate full-time across the country. Many use Quran-first curricula that require students to spend hours memorizing religious texts before they ever reach math or science. In Dallas, Brighter Horizons Academy enrolls more than 1,700 students and draws federal support while operating on a social model that keeps children culturally isolated.

Then there is the Epic City project in Collin and Hunt counties — 402 acres originally designated only for Muslim buyers, with Sharia-compliant financing and a mega-mosque at the center. After public outcry and state investigations, the developers renamed it “The Meadows,” but a new sign does not erase the original intent. It is not a neighborhood. It is a parallel society.

Americans should not hesitate to say that parallel societies are dangerous. Europe tried this experiment, and the results could not be clearer. In Germany, France, and the United Kingdom, entire neighborhoods now operate under their own cultural rules, some openly hostile to Western norms. When citizens speak up, they are branded bigots for asserting a basic right: the ability to live safely in their own communities.

A crisis of confidence

While this separation widens, another crisis is unfolding at home. A recent Gallup survey shows that about 40% of American women ages 18 to 39 would leave the country permanently if given the chance. Nearly half of a rising generation — daughters, sisters, soon-to-be mothers — no longer believe this nation is worth building a future in.

And who shapes the worldview of young boys? Their mothers. If a mother no longer believes America is home, why would her child grow up ready to defend it?

As Texas goes, so goes America. And as America goes, so goes the free world. If we lose confidence in our own national identity at the same time that we allow separatist enclaves to spread unchecked, the outcome is predictable. Europe is already showing us what comes next: cultural fracture, political radicalization, and the slow death of national unity.

Brandon Bell / Staff | Getty Images

Stand up and tell the truth

America welcomes Muslims. America defends their right to worship freely. A Muslim who loves the Constitution, respects the rule of law, and wants to raise a family in peace is more than welcome in America.

But an Islamist movement that rejects assimilation, builds enclaves governed by its own religious framework, and treats American law as optional is not simply another participant in our melting pot. It is a direct challenge to it. If we refuse to call this problem out out of fear of being called names, we will bear the consequences.

Europe is already feeling those consequences — rising conflict and a political class too paralyzed to admit the obvious. When people feel their culture, safety, and freedoms slipping away, they will follow anyone who promises to defend them. History has shown that over and over again.

Stand up. Speak plainly. Be unafraid. You can practice any faith in this country, but the supremacy of the Constitution and the Judeo-Christian moral framework that shaped it is non-negotiable. It is what guarantees your freedom in the first place.

If you come here and honor that foundation, welcome. If you come here to undermine it, you do not belong here.

Wake up to what is unfolding before the consequences arrive. Because when a nation refuses to say what is true, the truth eventually forces its way in — and by then, it is always too late.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Shocking: AI-written country song tops charts, sparks soul debate

VCG / Contributor | Getty Images

A machine can imitate heartbreak well enough to top the charts, but it cannot carry grief, choose courage, or hear the whisper that calls human beings to something higher.

The No. 1 country song in America right now was not written in Nashville or Texas or even L.A. It came from code. “Walk My Walk,” the AI-generated single by the AI artist Breaking Rust, hit the top spot on Billboard’s Country Digital Song Sales chart, and if you listen to it without knowing that fact, you would swear a real singer lived the pain he is describing.

Except there is no “he.” There is no lived experience. There is no soul behind the voice dominating the country music charts.

If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

I will admit it: I enjoy some AI music. Some of it is very good. And that leaves us with a question that is no longer science fiction. If a machine can fake being human this well, what does it mean to be human?

A new world of artificial experience

This is not just about one song. We are walking straight into a technological moment that will reshape everyday life.

Elon Musk said recently that we may not even have phones in five years. Instead, we will carry a small device that listens, anticipates, and creates — a personal AI agent that knows what we want to hear before we ask. It will make the music, the news, the podcasts, the stories. We already live in digital bubbles. Soon, those bubbles might become our own private worlds.

If an algorithm can write a hit country song about hardship and perseverance without a shred of actual experience, then the deeper question becomes unavoidable: If a machine can imitate the soul, then what is the soul?

What machines can never do

A machine can produce, and soon it may produce better than we can. It can calculate faster than any human mind. It can rearrange the notes and words of a thousand human songs into something that sounds real enough to fool millions.

But it cannot care. It cannot love. It cannot choose right and wrong. It cannot forgive because it cannot be hurt. It cannot stand between a child and danger. It cannot walk through sorrow.

A machine can imitate the sound of suffering. It cannot suffer.

The difference is the soul. The divine spark. The thing God breathed into man that no code will ever have. Only humans can take pain and let it grow into compassion. Only humans can take fear and turn it into courage. Only humans can rebuild their lives after losing everything. Only humans hear the whisper inside, the divine voice that says, “Live for something greater.”

We are building artificial minds. We are not building artificial life.

Questions that define us

And as these artificial minds grow sharper, as their tools become more convincing, the right response is not panic. It is to ask the oldest and most important questions.

Who am I? Why am I here? What is the meaning of freedom? What is worth defending? What is worth sacrificing for?

That answer is not found in a lab or a server rack. It is found in that mysterious place inside each of us where reason meets faith, where suffering becomes wisdom, where God reminds us we are more than flesh and more than thought. We are not accidents. We are not circuits. We are not replaceable.

Europa Press News / Contributor | Getty Images

The miracle machines can never copy

Being human is not about what we can produce. Machines will outproduce us. That is not the question. Being human is about what we can choose. We can choose to love even when it costs us something. We can choose to sacrifice when it is not easy. We can choose to tell the truth when the world rewards lies. We can choose to stand when everyone else bows. We can create because something inside us will not rest until we do.

An AI content generator can borrow our melodies, echo our stories, and dress itself up like a human soul, but it cannot carry grief across a lifetime. It cannot forgive an enemy. It cannot experience wonder. It cannot look at a broken world and say, “I am going to build again.”

The age of machines is rising. And if we do not know who we are, we will shrink. But if we use this moment to remember what makes us human, it will help us to become better, because the one thing no algorithm will ever recreate is the miracle that we exist at all — the miracle of the human soul.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Shocking shift: America’s youth lured by the “Socialism trap”

Jeremy Weine / Stringer | Getty Images

A generation that’s lost faith in capitalism is turning to the oldest lie on earth: equality through control.

Something is breaking in America’s young people. You can feel it in every headline, every grocery bill, every young voice quietly asking if the American dream still means anything at all.

For many, the promise of America — work hard, build something that lasts, and give the next generation a better start — feels like it no longer exists. Home ownership and stability have become luxuries for a fortunate few.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them.

In that vacuum of hope, a new promise has begun to rise — one that sounds compassionate, equal, and fair. The promise of socialism.

The appeal of a broken dream

When the American dream becomes a checklist of things few can afford — a home, a car, two children, even a little peace — disappointment quickly turns to resentment. The average first-time homebuyer is now 40 years old. Debt lasts longer than marriages. The cost of living rises faster than opportunity.

For a generation that has never seen the system truly work, capitalism feels like a rigged game built to protect those already at the top.

That is where socialism finds its audience. It presents itself as fairness for the forgotten and justice for the disillusioned. It speaks softly at first, offering equality, compassion, and control disguised as care.

We are seeing that illusion play out now in New York City, where Zohran Mamdani — an open socialist — has won a major political victory. The same ideology that once hid behind euphemisms now campaigns openly throughout America’s once-great cities. And for many who feel left behind, it sounds like salvation.

But what socialism calls fairness is submission dressed as virtue. What it calls order is obedience. Once the system begins to replace personal responsibility with collective dependence, the erosion of liberty is only a matter of time.

The bridge that never ends

Socialism is not a destination; it is a bridge. Karl Marx described it as the necessary transition to communism — the scaffolding that builds the total state. Under socialism, people are taught to obey. Under communism, they forget that any other options exist.

History tells the story clearly. Russia, China, Cambodia, Cuba — each promised equality and delivered misery. One hundred million lives were lost, not because socialism failed, but because it succeeded at what it was designed to do: make the state supreme and the individual expendable.

Today’s advocates insist their version will be different — democratic, modern, and kind. They often cite Sweden as an example, but Sweden’s prosperity was never born of socialism. It grew out of capitalism, self-reliance, and a shared moral culture. Now that system is cracking under the weight of bureaucracy and division.

ANGELA WEISS / Contributor | Getty Images

The real issue is not economic but moral. Socialism begins with a lie about human nature — that people exist for the collective and that the collective knows better than the individual.

This lie is contrary to the truths on which America was founded — that rights come not from government’s authority, but from God’s. Once government replaces that authority, compassion becomes control, and freedom becomes permission.

What young America deserves

Young Americans have many reasons to be frustrated. They were told to study, work hard, and follow the rules — and many did, only to find the goalposts moved again and again. But tearing down the entire house does not make it fairer; it only leaves everyone standing in the rubble.

Capitalism is not a perfect system. It is flawed because people are flawed, but it remains the only system that rewards creativity and effort rather than punishing them. The answer is not revolution but renewal — moral, cultural, and spiritual.

It means restoring honesty to markets, integrity to government, and faith to the heart of our nation. A people who forsake God will always turn to government for salvation, and that road always ends in dependency and decay.

Freedom demands something of us. It requires faith, discipline, and courage. It expects citizens to govern themselves before others govern them. That is the truth this generation deserves to hear again — that liberty is not a gift from the state but a calling from God.

Socialism always begins with promises and ends with permission. It tells you what to drive, what to say, what to believe, all in the name of fairness. But real fairness is not everyone sharing the same chains — it is everyone having the same chance.

The American dream was never about guarantees. It was about the right to try, to fail, and try again. That freedom built the most prosperous nation in history, and it can do so again if we remember that liberty is not a handout but a duty.

Socialism does not offer salvation. It requires subservience.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.

Rage isn’t conservatism — THIS is what true patriots stand for

Gary Hershorn / Contributor | Getty Images

Conservatism is not about rage or nostalgia. It’s about moral clarity, national renewal, and guarding the principles that built America’s freedom.

Our movement is at a crossroads, and the question before us is simple: What does it mean to be a conservative in America today?

For years, we have been told what we are against — against the left, against wokeism, against decline. But opposition alone does not define a movement, and it certainly does not define a moral vision.

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

The media, as usual, are eager to supply their own answer. The New York Times recently suggested that Nick Fuentes represents the “future” of conservatism. That’s nonsense — a distortion of both truth and tradition. Fuentes and those like him do not represent American conservatism. They represent its counterfeit.

Real conservatism is not rage. It is reverence. It does not treat the past as a museum, but as a teacher. America’s founders asked us to preserve their principles and improve upon their practice. That means understanding what we are conserving — a living covenant, not a relic.

Conservatism as stewardship

In 2025, conservatism means stewardship — of a nation, a culture, and a moral inheritance too precious to abandon. To conserve is not to freeze history. It is to stand guard over what is essential. We are custodians of an experiment in liberty that rests on the belief that rights come not from kings or Congress, but from the Creator.

That belief built this country. It will be what saves it. The Constitution is a covenant between generations. Conservatism is the duty to keep that covenant alive — to preserve what works, correct what fails, and pass on both wisdom and freedom to those who come next.

Economics, culture, and morality are inseparable. Debt is not only fiscal; it is moral. Spending what belongs to the unborn is theft. Dependence is not compassion; it is weakness parading as virtue. A society that trades responsibility for comfort teaches citizens how to live as slaves.

Freedom without virtue is not freedom; it is chaos. A culture that mocks faith cannot defend liberty, and a nation that rejects truth cannot sustain justice. Conservatism must again become the moral compass of a disoriented people, reminding America that liberty survives only when anchored to virtue.

Rebuilding what is broken

We cannot define ourselves by what we oppose. We must build families, communities, and institutions that endure. Government is broken because education is broken, and education is broken because we abandoned the formation of the mind and the soul. The work ahead is competence, not cynicism.

Conservatives should embrace innovation and technology while rejecting the chaos of Silicon Valley. Progress must not come at the expense of principle. Technology must strengthen people, not replace them. Artificial intelligence should remain a servant, never a master. The true strength of a nation is not measured by data or bureaucracy, but by the quiet webs of family, faith, and service that hold communities together. When Washington falters — and it will — those neighborhoods must stand.

Eric Lee / Stringer | Getty Images

This is the real work of conservatism: to conserve what is good and true and to reform what has decayed. It is not about slogans; it is about stewardship — the patient labor of building a civilization that remembers what it stands for.

A creed for the rising generation

We are not here to cling to the past or wallow in grievance. We are not the movement of rage. We are the movement of reason and hope.

For the rising generation, conservatism cannot be nostalgia. It must be more than a memory of 9/11 or admiration for a Reagan era they never lived through. Many young Americans did not experience those moments — and they should not have to in order to grasp the lessons they taught and the truths they embodied. The next chapter is not about preserving relics but renewing purpose. It must speak to conviction, not cynicism; to moral clarity, not despair.

Young people are searching for meaning in a culture that mocks truth and empties life of purpose. Conservatism should be the moral compass that reminds them freedom is responsibility and that faith, family, and moral courage remain the surest rebellions against hopelessness.

To be a conservative in 2025 is to defend the enduring principles of American liberty while stewarding the culture, the economy, and the spirit of a free people. It is to stand for truth when truth is unfashionable and to guard moral order when the world celebrates chaos.

We are not merely holding the torch. We are relighting it.

This article originally appeared on TheBlaze.com.