In 2021, Apple TV+ released its first season based on Isaac Asimov’s science fiction classic The Foundation. It turned out to be a poor adaptation of the classic, given how many changes were made to meet with today’s woke expectations, but there is enough of the classic’s elements there to understand the overarching story of the original. The Cleon Empire spans nearly countless star systems. Trantor has become the center of the Galactic Empire, from which the Cleon Emperors have ruled. And while on the surface it appears that the Empire is strong and well, a “doomsday” profit, a mathematician named Dr. Hari Seldon, has predicted, by the means of psychohistory, that the Empire is on the verge of total collapse. For those unfamiliar with the book, psychohistory is defined as a “branch of mathematics which deals with the reactions of human conglomerates to fixed social and economic stimuli”, or put more simply, a fictional science which combines history, sociology, and mathematical statistics to make general predictions about the future behavior of very large groups of people.[1] Of course, the Emperor (and those behind the Emperor) resents these “scientific” findings; it is considered a manifestation of defiance and disloyalty. As almost all tyrannical dictatorships do when they feel threatened, the Emperor threatens death for Dr. Seldon and all those who follow his scholarly work on the subject. But Dr. Seldon anticipates this, and has his calculations stored in the Prime Radiant, a data storage device containing all of Dr. Seldon’s psychohistorical calculations on the fall of the Galactic Empire. With the Prime Radiant, his followers would be able to keep track of the timeline, and prepare for the inevitable.
But there is more to the story. Dr. Seldon warns that with the fall of the Empire will come a long period of darkness, an intergalactic dark age, before another Empire emerges from the ashes to pick up the pieces. This dark age would be approximately 30,000 years in duration, “one-thousand generations of suffering”, as the book puts it. It is a bleak future that testifies of the inherent weakness of the Cleon Empire which can do nothing to prevent the fall. What Dr. Seldon proposes, therefore, is that he and his 98,752 followers dedicate themselves towards building an Encyclopedia Galactica, a copy of which would be housed in every library across the Galactic Empire. This encyclopedia would help to reduce the coming dark age from 30,000 to 1,000 years, allowing a head start for civilizations to rebuild. Upon hearing this, and not wanting to make Dr. Seldon a martyr, and not wanting either to give the impression that the Empire cares nothing about its people, Dr. Seldon and his followers, consisting of people of all different trades and vocations, are exiled to the planet Terminus, at the outer edge of the Empire, to work on the Encyclopedia Galactica. This project led by Dr. Seldon would be called “The Foundation.”
The “Western” Empire
I became enamoured with the beginning of Asimov’s story when I first discovered it, I think primarily because I was able to discern several parallels with our own reality. For example, while the West consists of several nation states, the West can nonetheless be seen as an “empire” of sorts with its prevailing and governing progressive ideologies, and its proliferation and imposition on the rest of the developing world (e.g., Latin America, Africa, Asia, etc.). Think of how these ideologies are presently imposed on developing, third-world countries, accompanied by the threat of sanctions when countries have outright refused the West’s ideological colonialism.[2] We see this imposition perhaps most evidently at the United Nations (UN) and at Klaus Schwab’s World Economic Forum (WEF). To help put all of this into proper perspective, regardless of whether the face of the Empire is Justin Trudeau (Canada), Joe Biden (USA), Emmanuel Macron (France), Angela Merkel (Germany), or whoever else happens to rise to power, with the West’s departure from its Christian heritage, sinful man, in all his hubris, has sat upon the throne which was not meant to be his. The god of the West is no longer the God of the Bible. Collectivized man, in the form of the state, now calls the shots as the independent sovereign, subject to, and accountable to no one. As the new god-substitute, it has sought out to redefine reality, to reinvent marriage, the family, the human person, etc., to move the goal posts of what is and what is not, extending also to what is evil and what is good, at times even switching them around altogether (Isa. 5:20). Those who do not comply with newly state-imposed norms are threatened with punitive measures, for how else can the state effectively implement obedience? The Empire of the West, while exhibiting some form of electoral “democracy”, has nonetheless been tyrannical in its general disposition. But while the West may portray an image of strength and wealth, much like the Cleon Empire of Asimov’s The Foundation, it is on the verge of collapse.
The Writing On The Wall
How so? Well, you cannot expect to remove the foundation upon which Western civilization is built and surmise that it will function all the same if not better. Remove the foundation of a house, or of a condominium, and sooner or later it will collapse into a thousand – no, into a million pieces. This is what the West has done. Questions such as “What is a person?”, “What is a man?”, “What is a woman?”, “What is a family?”, “What is good?”, etc., no longer have definitive answers. Any answer given is either offensive to someone somewhere, or totally lacking of substance that it ultimately means nothing, and the latter of the two is becoming more prominent with the growing “snowflake” mentality of our culture. Consider the implications that follow: How can we possibly engage in conversation if we do not even know the meaning of the terms we are using? How can we understand reality and communicate truth?
In the US confirmation hearing of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson, for example, Jackson was asked by Sen. Marsha Blackburn how she would define the word “woman”. A simple question that ought to have had a simple answer. The answer Jackson gave, however, was not an answer at all. To quote Jackson: “Can I provide a definition though? I can’t. Not in this context, I’m not a biologist.”[3] According to the recording provided by USA Today:
Blackburn [then] chided Jackson, claiming that “the fact that you can’t give me a straight answer about something as fundamental as what a woman is underscores the dangers of the kind of progressive education that we are hearing about.”[4]
Jackson and her views, like so many others, are byproducts of our ailing culture. Public education centers, as referenced by Blackburn, are of no help to us, because at the end of the day they only throw more fuel on the dumpster fire. They have increasingly become the state’s progressive indoctrination camps. And parents have been none the wiser to send their children off to pagan Rome.
Just what is our culture coming to? We are witnessing in our present age the blurring of social and moral distinctions, the breakdown of societal function and of the moral framework that was once knit together by the biblical truth that gave early form to our nations. We are losing all meaning, and with the loss of meaning comes the loss of boundaries. If all things are now permissible and tolerable, as it relates to sexual orientation and practice, to use such a representative example, how much longer until necrophilia and pedophilia are added to the list of accepted norms? At what point do we say, “Our culture is enroute to self-implosion?” But this is not the only societal crisis we face. Much like Trantor, the West’s economy is teetering and tottering over the edge of disaster thanks to the fiscal irresponsibility of our state officials. How much is the US national debt? $33 trillion? How about Canada? $2.1 trillion? Where are the funds supposed to come from? Taxing its citizens? Here in Ontario, residents are already being taxed to poverty, are we going to be taxed to death? Inflation is running rampant with basic commodities now costing families an arm and a leg. The cost of a turkey is one such example leading up to Canadian Thanksgiving.[5] It is only a matter of time before the West falls into total economic ruin, and the people will suffer.
We do not need something like “psychohistory” to read the signs and predict the fall of the West. The fall is coming, the great empire will soon show its weakness and will lie in shambles. In fact, the writing is already on the wall. In the coming generations, if not our own, civilization will collapse, and with it there will be much suffering and ruin. But what are we to do?
Playing The Long Game
We do not need a Foundation, like the one Dr. Seldon proposes in Asimov’s science fiction classic. We have something better. We have the church, both in terms of the individuals it consists of, which operate in every public, societal sphere, and the institution itself. And what the church needs to be ready for is to pick up the pieces of a fallen West and cultivate a Christian civilization to take its place. And how might we go about doing that? Here is the theological answer to that, followed by the practical: We have to take up our cultural mandate (Gen. 1:28), to cultivate creation into a godly, Christian civilization by fulfilling our threefold calling, that of prophet, priest, and king.[6] As prophets, we are to interpret creation according to God’s inscripturated revelation. As priests we are to dedicate everything in service to and in worship of God. And as kings, we are to govern creation according to God’s established norms and subject to the authority of God. Though the original cultural mandate (Gen. 1:28) handed down to our first parents was rendered almost an impossibility to fulfill because of man’s sin, it was renewed in the Great Commission, shortly before the ascension of our Lord (Matt. 28:18-20). Following the reasoning of the apostle Paul, who was inspired by the Spirit of God, if in Adam all died, in Christ who is the second Adam we, who are the elect, are made alive (1 Cor. 15:20-23), and as God’s living people, we have been restored in Christ to our original calling: to cultivate a godly civilization – or to use New Testament language, to advance the kingdom of God, for the glory of God, and by the power of the Spirit of God. Note that in contrast to our pagan Western culture, our objective is not self-glorification, nor are our accomplishments to be the result of our human (fallen) wisdom. Our objective is the glorification of God, and whatever we accomplish for the glory of God is by means of the Spirit of God.
This sounds wonderful, you might admit, but you might also ask, “How can we fulfill that mandate practically?” What does it look like when our boots are on the ground? Well, some believers have already been at it. Let me first say that it begins with the recognition that Christ is Lord over everything, and that, leading up to His return, all His enemies will be made subject to His reign. The gospel will triumph, in other words, just prior to His second advent (1 Cor. 15:24-28). Once we have understood this biblical truth, once we have accepted this promised future, which runs contrary to the pessimism and escapism that has dominated much of the church for the past few decades, we will then realize that everything we do, beginning first in the home, is “kingdom building”, and kingdom building that will not be in vain. Some have taken this to heart and have begun to produce Christian cultural products (music, art, commerce, editorials, platforms, enterprises, etc.), and by “Christian” I do not mean “evangelistic” though it does bear witness to the truth, I mean that which embodies the goodness, beauty, and truth of God. The stratagem of some has been to spread like yeast in the public culture, changing it from within. Perhaps similar to how Luther had initially thought to change the Roman Catholic Church from within, back in the sixteenth century. But as Western culture has become more resistant to godly change, Christians are now establishing parallel cultures, parallel societies — think of what is going on in Moscow, Idaho, for example.[7] And this is precisely what we need to develop while the West marches towards its cultural implosion. It is a monumental undertaking, there is no underselling it, but can anything less prepare us for the fall to come? And what hope we have that we will succeed, for as Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr. writes:
Through the gospel’s Spirit-empowered proclamation, Christianity will increasingly grow over time until it becomes the dominant influence in the world. The kingdom’s growth will produce increasing righteousness, peace, and prosperity, which will eventually prevail over the world for a long period of time.[8]
Are we ready? Are we already at work? It is the farmer who prepares his field for the coming rains who will be rewarded with a bountiful crop.
[1] Isaac Asimov, The Foundation (New York, NY.: Del Rey, 2018 [orig. 1951]), 16.
[2] Nicolette Manglos-Weber, “US talks sanctions against Uganda after a harsh anti-gay law – but criminalizing same-sex activities has become a political tactic globally”, The Conversation. Accessed October 7, 2023, https://theconversation.com/us-talks-sanctions-against-uganda-after-a-harsh-anti-gay-law-but-criminalizing-same-sex-activities-has-become-a-political-tactic-globally-206352.
[3] Alia E. Dastagir, “Marsha Blackburn asked Ketanji Brown Jackson to define ‘woman.’ Science says there’s no simple answer”, USA Today. Accessed October 8, 2023, https://www.usatoday.com/story/life/health-wellness/2022/03/24/marsha-blackburn-asked-ketanji-jackson-define-woman-science/7152439001/.
[4] Ibid.
[5] Brian Lilley, “Poilievre roasts Trudeau over failure to lower food prices by Thanksgiving”, Toronto Sun. Accessed October 7, 2023, https://torontosun.com/opinion/columnists/poilievre-skewers-trudeau-over-failure-to-lower-food-prices/.
[6] See Steven R. Martins, “The Threefold Office of Man”, La Fuente: Iberoamerican Journal for Christian Worldview, Vol. 2, No. 1 (2022).
[7] NBC News, “Pastor Seeks To Make Moscow, Idaho A ‘Christian Town’”, Youtube. Accessed October 8, 2023, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bDk8w-LNxHk/.
[8] Kenneth L. Gentry, Jr., Postmillennialism Made Easy (Chesnee, SC.: Victoria House Publishing, 2020 [orig. 1999]), 5-6.