"The Miracle that Saves the World"

Why a philosophy of birth is a philosophy of life, book news and notes from the book tour

Gracious reader,

Civic Renaissance, and The Soul of Civility, are humanistic manifestos. Both are dedicated to reviving an appreciation of the gift of being human.

Our current divisions stem in many ways from our failure to appreciate this gift of our humanness, both in ourselves and in others.

Our insufficient appreciation of personhood manifests in ways large and small.

The large ways are obvious. Growing political violence, extremism, high-stakes rhetoric, and the emboldening of hate groups and hateful rhetoric.

But I’ve noticed it in small ways, too.

Take, for example, a news item from a few weeks ago. Sofia Richie Grainge—daughter of musician Lionel Richie, and Gen Z’s “It girl” in her own right— announced that she was pregnant… and due in three months.

Her waiting until she was two-thirds through her pregnancy reflects a growing cultural norm, among celebrities and non-celebrities alike, to delay a pregnancy or birth announcement.

In an extreme case, Paris Hilton didn’t announce her child’s birth (through surrogacy) until after he was born.

Of course, there are many reasons one might want to delay sharing publicly about one’s pregnancy. Whether to avoid public scrutiny, gossip, speculation, or simply to celebrate privately for as long as possible, pregnancy is deeply personal, and all are valid reasons to keep the news to oneself. An announcement of pregnancy delayed to the second trimester also helps one to ensure a pregnancy’s viability before sharing the news widely: after 12 weeks, the chances of miscarriage drops dramatically.

My first pregnancy ended in miscarriage, so I understand the fear that many women share of making a public announcement only to have to follow it with a public recantation—adding insult to injury to an already devastating loss.

The Miracle that Saves the World

For my current pregnancy—12 weeks along—I have chosen to tell people early and often.

I chose to break the cultural norm of delaying discussing pregnancy before 12 weeks, and did so as a defiant, definitive pro-human act, a small rebellion against these deeply dehumanizing times we find ourselves in.

War, a divisive election, a media and political ecosystem that wants us to essentialize others based on one aspect of who they are: these are but a few symptoms of a society that insufficiently appreciates the gift of being human, and the value of human life.

Hannah Arendt, the Jewish German philosopher and refugee from Hitler’s Third Reich, chose to never have children herself, but still had strong thoughts about why birth mattered to everyone, and how it supported a free and flourishing society.

She was passionate about birth, which she beautifully called “the miracle that saves the world.”

She unpacks her philosophy of “natality”—a word derived from the Latin “nat,” meaning “born,” which is also the root for our words natal, nature, native, nation and nativity—in her book called The Human Condition.

Birth, she claimed, wasn’t just something for pregnant women or couples to care about.

It was something that everyone—at all levels of society, and of all sexes, all ages, childless or not—had an interest in.

Natality matters to everyone. We were all once born. We have the power of being born again, beginning something anew in ourselves and in the lives we live.

We also all have an interest in the propagation of our species, which birth alone enables.

Arendt argued that a society that diminished and marginalized the value of birth—as I think radically delaying birth announcements can—fundamentally lacked an appreciation of human life.

A society that insufficiently appreciates human life, she thought, was a sign of a society in decline. Indifference to life, or fatalism, was both a breeding ground for, and result of, totalitarian rule.

Celebrating birth, by contrast, is an antidote to the fatalism, the indifference to life or death, that pervades a society—in Arendt’s day, and now.

This is because celebrating birth’s critical role in human life affirms democracy and human freedom.

Arendt wrote that totalitarian leaders and strongmen “do not care whether they themselves are alive or dead, if they ever lived or never were born,” and are primed to take power when their subjects stop caring about life or death, too.

We owe it to our species, past, present, and future, to celebrate birth— to reinvigorate our celebration in what Arendt dubbed “the miracle of being”—in ways great and small.

I see my early sharing of my pregnancy as a declarative rebellion against the fatalism and dehumanization of our day.

Because loss defined my first experience of pregnancy, I have a constant subliminal fear of loss once again rearing its ugly head in our lives. Seven hears ago, we grieved our child who we lost at nine weeks. A few family members and friends knew of our pregnancy and loss, but we were largely alone.

Duality in the human condition

That early experience with miscarriage gave me a profound sense of the precariousness and fragility of life. And yet, having birthed two beautiful healthy children after my loss, I now better also appreciate the resilience and tenacity of life, too.

Today, we often think of things and people through a lens of cheapened simplicity. Good or bad. Right or wrong.

But much of human life is both/and.

My experience with miscarriage taught me life is fragile. My experience birthing two children showed me life is resilient. As human beings, we are both/and.

Fragile.

Resilient.

One of the many dualities of the human condition.

It reminds me of Blaise Pascal’s insight from his Pensées:

Man is only a reed, the weakest in nature, but he is a thinking reed. There is no need for the whole universe to take up arms to crush him: a vapour, a drop of water is enough to kill him. But even if the universe were to crush him, man would still be nobler than his slayer, because he knows that he is dying and the advantage the universe has over him. The universe knows none of this.

In birth, we must be prepared for the dual possibilities of “irreparable loss and rapturous gain,” as Yale University Press editor Jennifer Banks writes in her wonderful work, Natality: Toward a Philosophy of Birth, which is informed heavily by Arendt’s thought.

This duality of gain and loss, joy and suffering, is ever-present in human life.

Birth is no exception.

Being a mother, a parent, a human being in this world demands that we be prepared for both possibilities, and that to enjoy the peaks we must endure the valleys. Callousing our hearts to shelter us from pain is a recipe for numbness, indifference to life and suffering, and can breed the fatalism that Arendt feared.

I chose to tell people as early as three weeks of my pregnancy, knowing full well it would be painful to share with them once again should he or she be lost.

Inviting people into my joy, both then and now, means also inviting others into my possible pain. We must embrace the joys with the sorrows to lead full, rich lives as human beings.

What do you think? Do you agree with Arendt that everyone has, and should have, an interest in birth?

Do you believe that people at all levels of society should be celebrating birth, and that doing so can be a powerful antidote to fatalism and dehumanization so rampant in our day?

Share your thoughts by commenting below.

“How can we embody your book in our city?”

In November, 2023—six weeks after the publication of The Soul of Civility—I received an email from Jeff Worrell of Carmel, Indiana’s City Council with an interesting question to me.

“How can we embody your book in our city?” he wrote.

He had read about the book from the promotion of one of the dozens of events along the book tour. He bought the book, and immediately had a vision for how it could help him and other local leaders begin a conversation about civility in his city.

This week, it was an honor to be hosted by Carmel, once again, and help Jeff lead a conversation about my book and how Carmel citizens can embody ideals of civility and respect across difference in our everyday practical applications.

I was honored when, at the end of the evening, Jeff surprised me with a beautiful crystal plaque from the City of Carmel thanking me for helping to launch Carmel’s civility initiative.

Next week, Fishers, Indiana—inspired Carmel’s civility initiative—is hosting a similar event hosted by a cross section of local leaders. I hope some of you might join us!

Notes from the book tour

It was great to start the West Coast Launch of the book last week! This included speaking at the 43rd Annual Conference on The First-Year Experience at the Macmillan Author Lunch.

I had book talks in Boise, at the University of Idaho, College of Law Boise Campus. It was a great pleasure to share practical tips on how to foster and encourage civility in Idaho.  

I also had a wonderful book party with family and friends in Vancouver, and was able to present about my book alongside my mother, Judi the manners lady, who is central in my book—and in my life.

It was a privilege to talk at my alma mater, Trinity Western University. My professor, Cal Townsend, had me talk to his class, and then invited me to his office after to give me his own personal, well-loved copy of many of the works I studied alongside him from thinkers such as Kierkegaard, Augustine, Nietzsche, Dostoyevsky, and many other wonderful greats.

A successful launch of the book on the West Coast!

Kian and I also enjoyed an evening with Jordan Peterson while he was in Indianapolis, one of the most surprising and interesting thinkers of our day.

Book in the news

• Column: Survey says: ‘Yes’ on need for civility, The Current.

• Fighting the uncivil war, The Washington Examiner highlighted the need for civility and my book in an election year. Read it here.

Thanks for being part of the Civic Renaissance community!