Gracious Reader,

This week, we’ll explore:

• A special guest post on Star Wars and the nature of love

• Philosophy + Film—a possible new Civic Renaissance course!

• What I’m learning right now: Intellectual omnivorism in American history

• Invitation: Can we save Socrates? + a giveaway!

• On the power and possibility of curiosity

Lessons from Star Wars on love, life, and The Great Conversation

Today’s main essay is from my friend Stephen Kent, someone who is passionate about the intersection of ideas and pop culture. He recently published his first book called How The Force Can Fix The World: Lessons on Life, Liberty and Happiness from a Galaxy Far, Far Away, which explores how ideas such as stoicism friend expression in Star Wars and can help us lead better lives. I hope you enjoy his reflection on Star Wars on love, life, and The Great Conversation.

Hello! My name is Stephen Kent and I’m the author of How The Force Can Fix The World. It’s a book about how Star Wars gives its tens of millions of fans a worthwhile moral code to live by… and we should take it more seriously. I love Star Wars, and I also happen to love Alexandra Hudson’s newsletter, Civic Renaissance. So I am honored to be speaking with you today on a day commercially defined by… love.

I’m going to talk to you about:

• Why a true civic renaissance hinges on our ability to love…despite American public life is being torn asunder by contempt, hatred, and ill-will.

• How love is misunderstood in the broader culture and in a galaxy far, far away

• Love according to Star Wars, and how you can learn a valuable lesson about what love is and how to wield it to help fix our broken world.

Returning the kick to the mule

We have an open wound in our political culture today, a disturbance in the Force if you will. It’s not a tidal wave of social change, populism, or wealth inequality. No. It’s that despite being a nation founded on the idea of mutual cooperation, compromise and deference, there’s not an awful lot of it going around. Instead, we have drifted toward a politics of contempt, coercion, and vengeance. Two political parties and their followers are locked in an increasingly winner-takes-all brand of politics, justified by each faction with the diligent logging of receipts for the other side’s sins.

Supreme Court vacancies should ring a particularly raw bell. How did we drift from being a country where nominated justices received almost universal support across the aisle for confirmation, to our current predicament of all-out political warfare over seats? Was it Obergerfell and conservatives being reminded of the consequences of the judiciary? Or perhaps it was the blockade of Judge Merrick Garland by Mitch McConnell or the disgraceful character assasinastion of now-Justice Brett Kavanaugh.

Tit for tat. Score settling. Outright vengeance. In the end, the country itself loses as each side notches wins they can tally as payback.

What did Seneca say of this approach to living? “How much better to heal than seek revenge from injury. Vengeance wastes a lot of time and exposes you to many more injuries than the first that sparked it. Anger always outlasts hurt. Best to take the opposite course. Would anyone think it normal to return a kick to a mule or a bite to a dog?”

There’s a lot of mule kicking going on by our leaders. Imagine if you did that regularly in your own personal life?

Today is Valentine’s Day, a perfectly fun celebration of love, goodwill, fondness, and affection. There is going to be a lot of gift-giving and money spent. Sadly, however, there will also be a great deal of hurt. And you know why.

“I wrote him a loving Valentine’s card and bought him a pricey bottle of his favorite wine…and that man only made me Eggo Waffles and said ‘I love you’ on the way out the door to work”

Are you keeping score? I have. I never mean to, but then you realize too late when you’re doing it. Because it eats at you, keeps you up at night, and steals your peace. Our willful interpretation of the actions of others defines how we relate to the world.

Epictetus once said, “​​It is not events that disturb people, it is their judgments concerning them.”

Decoded, this sentiment from Epictetus is a dotted line to what St. Thomas Aquinas said of Godly love, which is to “will the good of the other.”

I learned this concept first, not from the Bible (though my Mom tried), not from ancient Greek philosophers or poets… but from Luke Skywalker and Star Wars. In fact, this collection of films and TV shows is how millions of young people have unwittingly begun their journey toward the good life. Watching those movies is where I learned to trust in what I could not see, to stop “trying” to succeed at tasks and instead commit to seeing them through, and to see beyond the frightening exteriors of my enemies.

So let’s talk about Star Wars and love. Cause it can help fix our world.

An impossible choice

Last week, Star Wars fans who subscribed to Disney+ got to see a truly magnificent scene. Luke Skywalker of 1983 (Return of the Jedi era) was brought back to life once again, following his initial debut in the second season of The Mandalorian, where de-aging technology and a whole host of movie magic were combined to make the now 70-year old Mark Hamill as good as new. Truly shocking! But what happened in the story was even better.

Luke Skywalker is training a young creature named Grogu (or as you may know him, Baby Yoda) in the ways of the Force. However, the young Grogu is distracted and shows himself to be not fully committed to the way of the Jedi. He wants to be with his old caretaker, the Mandalorian known as Din Djarin, to whom he has become deeply attached. The Jedi have a rule though: love is forbidden, or more so, attachment is forbidden.

But one can rarely come without the other, absent extreme discipline or divine assistance.

Luke Skywalker gives Grogu (Baby Yoda) a choice. He can choose a gift that has been sent to him by the Mandalorian (Din Djarin), or take the Jedi weapon…a Lightsaber that once belonged to Master Yoda. But he cannot have both. To choose the chainmail (on the left) would be an open refusal to let go of the past. The lightsaber, represents a no-going back point in Grogu’s journey. He must go forward, as a Jedi student. No baggage.

Star Wars has been here before.

The Jedi Order was all but destroyed in the prequel trilogy, Episodes I, II, and III, when Anakin Skywalker (Luke’s father) fell in love with Padme Amidala and secretly married her…defying the Jedi Order’s rules around attachment. Anakin’s love turned toxic, controlling, and violent, and in the end, he destroyed himself, his love, and the galaxy. This is why Darth Vader wears that frightening black armor. It’s the iron maiden of his sins and catastrophic inability to love without envy, impatience, and anger.

Fans of Star Wars have endlessly bickered amongst themselves about whether the problem was Anakin, or if the problem was in fact the strict rules that led to his cloak & dagger romance. What I always wanted to know though was….did Star Wars have a compelling message for what love is supposed to be?

This is something I sought to answer in my book, How The Force Can Fix The World, and I’ll share my takeaway. Buckle up for Star Wars lore.

Star Wars for the uninitiated is basically this big ongoing struggle between the cosmic forces of Darkness and Light. The Dark is embodied in the faction known as the Sith (Darth Vader, Emperor Palpatine, Darth Maul, etc). The Light is upheld by the Jedi (Yoda, Luke Skywalker, Obi-Wan Kenobi, etc). The Jedi tell their adherents that love is central to the life of the Jedi Knight, in the sense that compassion for others is important. They of course do not teach their members how to deal with feelings of attachment or want. They simply expect members to shed those things, leave them at the door, and not speak of them.

The Sith are all about passion and marinading in emotion as a source of strength. A Sith also cannot truly love because their way is that of hedonism, self-gratification, and pleasure. Love, as anyone who has ever been in a happy marriage or relationship knows, requires sacrifice and attention to the needs of another.

Did you catch that? The needs of another.

Passion is not love. Pleasure is not love. Attraction is not love.

Love is sacrifice.

It Keeps No Record of Wrongs

Recall Corinthians 13: Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. Bearing this in mind, wrongs will be done to us. Wrongs have been done to ME (your humble author) just this weekend that brought me to tears, by loved ones. It happens. We are then presented with a choice.

Recall that Saint Thomas Aquinas defined love as “willing the good of the other,” or to basically assume the best of people….or, to dispense with the laundry list of reasons someone may have given you to not love them.

In the original Star Wars films, you’ve heard Luke Skywalker say to Darth Vader (Anakin) in Return of the Jedi, “I feel the good in you,” while handcuffed in Vader’s captivity and awaiting his own death. It is a fine example of this “willing” action. It takes effort. You have to defy other emotions competing for control of your mind and actions, such as fear or anger….which breed contempt. Luke Skywalker lived in the truest definition of love when he refused to kill Darth Vader in Episode VI: Return of the Jedi.

The recipient didn’t deserve it, but it was available nevertheless. Contempt was absent.

I can’t capture the problem of contempt better than public speaker and author of Love Your Enemies, Arthur Brooks…so here is Brooks explaining how contempt rips through our lives and spills out into society writ large.

To love, you can’t be keeping score. And if you’ve turned on the news lately, or scrolled political Twitter…that is what drives our world today. Grievance and scorekeeping. We’re going to have to rise above it. The Civic Renaissance depends on this. I’m not calling on your to be a doormat or relinquish being a warrior for what is good and righteous. But a time will come in your relationships or in the public square where politics & power is litigated, to will the good of others and relinquish your sword, or hold it tightly with suspicion and fear.

If you saw Disney’s Raya & The Last Dragon, that film tackles exactly this. A world torn apart by perpetual sectarian conflict because common sense would dictate to each side that their opponents haven’t changed…so why should they ever let their guard down. Makes sense. But to the detriment of the world.

We can’t let that happen to us, our marriages, our friendships, or our country.

It’s time to love despite. Odd as it may be, Star Wars taught me that.

For more on this, check out my book: How The Force Can Fix The World, on sale wherever you get books.

Philosophy + Film—a possible new Civic Renaissance course!

The best teachers and instructors are lifelong learners themselves, which is why I LOVE creating courses. I loved learning alongside the many of you who took CRs first class, Five classic books that will change your life, this past September.

I’m considering launching a new course, perhaps as early as February and march, called “The Philosophy of Film: Explore life’s biggest questions through the ideas of great films.”

The course would be four weeks, and each week we’d watch a film and read a book that explore a foundational question in life.

Module 1

• How do we know what we know to be true? Plato’s Allegory of the Cave + The Matrix

Module 2

• What is the meaning of life? Terrence Malick’s Tree of life + Søren Kierkegaard

Module 3

• How can we be happy in life? Citizen Kane + Ecclesiastes

Module 4

• How can we make the most of our time on earth? Babette’s Feast + Seneca’s De Otium (On Leisure

What do you think? Is this a course you would enjoy taking?

Write to me directly with your thoughts at ah@alexandraohudson.com, or vote anonymously below!

Philosophy and film? Vote below!

What I’m learning right now: Intellectual omnivorism in American history

After finishing an AMAZING course exploring the great minds of the Middle Ages—and after listening to courses on global mythology, courses on the Ancient Greek and Roman worlds, a course the life and teachings of Christ, Buddha, Mohammed and Confucius, and after studying modern European history for most of my life—I feel like I’ve earned the right to listen to a course on American history.

Growing up and being educated abroad—in Canada and the UK—this is not a topic that I have ever studied systematically. To remedy this rather glaring knowledge gap, I’ve started an epic, 84 lecture Great Courses course on American history.

I’ve learned many interesting facts about America. One lecture I just finished was on how people here during the Colonial period tried to compete artistically and culturally with Europe—and never quite felt like they could.

So, early Americans turned to high education and philosophy.

For example, English Puritan and a leading figure in founding the Massachusetts Bay Colony, John Winthrop (January 12, 1587 – March 26, 1649) helped to found Harvard College just six years after Massachusetts was founded.

Harvard and other early U.S. higher ed institutions embraced protestant scholasticism. In other words, they focused on all Aristotle and the Bible all day everyday day. Other, more contemporary thinkers—including thinkers of the enlightenment—we're almost completely overlooked.

Then came alone a gentleman called Cotton Mather, the son and grandson of two famous English puritan preachers in America.

Incidentally, Cotton’s birth and death dates passed just this weekend! He was born on Feb 12 in 1663, and died Feb 13, 1728.

To put it bluntly, Cotton was one smart cookie.

It was said that Cotton Mather could listen to a lecture in English and take down notes in latin.

He was highly educated, and also very curious. Just in case you’re new to Civic Renaissance, I am of the mind that I think that being curious is far more important than any sort of formal educational attainment or credential.

Cotton thought that American schools needed to incorporate more recent thinkers and books—other than purely Aristotle and the Bible—into Harvard’s curricula.

In other words, he was more intellectually omnivorous than many of his peers.

I loved learning about Cotton because it is people like him—people who see things as they are, and also conceive of how they could be—that make our world better and help us progress.

Can you think of other people like this, in America history or elsewhere? They deserve to be championed.

Feel free to write to me with your ideas at ah@alexandraohudson.com

Invitation: Can we save Socrates?

Many people question the utility of the classics, philosophy, and Great Books curricula today. They are often accused of being elitist, oppressive, or just not relevant to modern life.

Join this conversation with Roosevelt Montás, a professor who teaches Great Books at Columbia University. Dr. Montás will share his story of being born in the Dominican Republic, coming to appreciate the Great Books, and his journey of how they changed his life for the better.

He will also share how they hold the possibility of helping people from all walks of life live better, richer lives today.

“Can we save Socrates?” will take place Tuesday, Feb 22 at 2:30 EST.

Reserve your spot now!

Members of the Civic Renaissance community also have a chance to win a copy of Dr. Montás' book, "Rescuing Socrates: How the Great Books Changed My Life and Why They Matter for a New Generation."

To enter, write to me directly with the subject line SOCRATES at ah@alexandraohudson.com

Hope you can join us!

On the power and possibility of curiosity

Last year, my friends Mónica Guzmán, April Lawson and I had a wonderful and wide ranging conversation on the power of curiosity in divided times.

Mónica has a book coming out next month, called I Never Thought of It That Way: How to Have Fearlessly Curious Conversations in Dangerously Divided Times.

Stay tuned for an event and give away we are doing next month for Mónica’s book, but in the meantime, enjoy her Ted Talk on curiosity, which you can view below!

Thank you for being part of the Civic Renaissance community!

I am grateful you are here.

Lexi