Politics, identity and religion in a post-revolutionary world

In October 2022, the PM Glynn Institute at Australian Catholic University (ACU), hosted a speaking tour by one of America’s foremost Catholic public intellectuals, Mary Eberstadt. The primary purpose of her visit was to deliver the Greg Craven Lecture on Ethics and Politics. Her topic for this lecture was ‘Understanding secularization in the census’. Whilst in Australia, she undertook a number of other speaking engagements, the texts of which are reproduced here, together with the Craven Lecture. These engagements included the following:

• ‘What are the roots of today’s political rage?’
Delivered at Parliament House, Canberra, at a luncheon hosted jointly by ACU and the Saint Thomas More Forum;
• ‘Standing firm against identity politics’
Delivered at the Centre for Independent Studies at a public conversation with the Reverend Peter Kurti;
• ‘The future of humanity passes by way of the family’
Delivered at the Catholic Leadership Centre in Melbourne at a luncheon hosted by the Most Reverend Peter A. Comensoli.

The addresses in this volume have been arranged thematically. They begin with Mrs Eberstadt’s thoughts about the family, then progress to her approach to society more broadly (in particular, ‘identity’ and society) and, finally, her remarks about responses to the state (‘political rage’).

Mrs Eberstadt also delivered a lecture on ‘How the West Really Lost God’ at the Mint in Sydney for the Ramsay Centre for Western Civilisation and Campion College. As this lecture largely covered much of the material contained in the Craven Lecture, it is not reproduced in this volume.

While in Australia, Mrs Eberstadt was interviewed by Tom Switzer for ABC Radio, Peta Credlin for Sky News, and the Honourable John Anderson AC for his podcast series, as well as giving interviews for News Weekly and Catholic Weekly newspapers, and these interviews are available on their respective websites.