The 306-page book takes the reader on an adventure that includes Moyle’s time in Central Europe, when communism crushed the will of the people and freedom was non-existent. Moyle looks back on this era in recent history with an eye toward the present, not from a political but a moral point of view.
“The communist period in Central Europe showed that too much importance given to the community could crush the personal. But in the Western world, growing individualism has led to a crisis of loneliness and identity,” notes Moyle. “Neither provides an adequate framework for describing or meeting human needs. »
Moyle writes from experience. During the Cold War, he and his wife Tuula organized the translation and distribution of books behind the Iron Curtain. In the post-communist years, the couple helped people establish publishing houses and engaged in research on various social issues.
Where do we go from here? Moyle writes that “a moral framework” is necessary.
“How can we maintain the community and the personal in a healthy tension that benefits both, while respecting the uniqueness of each person and the common good? This question is essential to the search for a better country,” he writes.
In fact, this book addresses the human desire for justice and a better way of life by attempting to awaken our moral imagination to the potential of a trusting community. Ultimately, it comes from God and the Ten Commandments.
“The Decalogue,” Moyle writes, “is as much an expression of his character as a call to our behavior. This denotes the goodness that makes absolute power safe because it is not self-centered, but focused on the goodness and benefit of the other.
Moyle, knowing that secularism and not religious faith is the norm in the West, makes the following astute observation with which readers must confront: “Believing in a morally good, personal, infinite God is a step too far for some readers . I understand this and would not expect it to be any different in a society steeped in a century of naturalism. I hope I have given enough reasons to at least consider the possibility that God, freedom, and goodness are not necessarily opposed but might even be related.
Another book that seeks to make sense of the world is “The Surprising Rebirth of Belief in God.” Not only does it attempt to do so, but it offers a hopeful Christian message in its 251 pages.
