More Profundity from David Brooks

Jonathan Sacks

New York Times columnist David Brooks says in "The Week Trump Won" that America was founded on a (however oxymoronic) "secular religion" that held that "the heart of society was in the covenantal realm: 'marriages, families, congregations, communities, charities and voluntary associations'," exactly as Rabbi Jonathan Sacks has recently pointed out. These are, Sacks says, values that derive from the Hebrew Bible, a.k.a. the Old Testament.

"America’s Judeo-Christian ethic," Brooks points out, "celebrated neighborliness over pagan combativeness; humility as the basis of good character, not narcissism. It believed in taking in the stranger because we were all strangers once. It dreamed of universal democracy as the global fulfillment of the providential plan."

The presidency of Donald Trump represents a complete upending of this foundational idea. Sacks has noted, "Today, one half of America is losing all [their erstwhile] covenantal institutions. It’s losing strong marriages and families and communities. It is losing a strong sense of the American narrative. It’s even losing e pluribus unum because today everyone prefers pluribus to unum ... ."

Don't miss reading Brook's full column about this ugly turn of events!