How Nations Flourish: Five Books, Five Questions

That was one cool fireworks show last night! Wow!

As we celebrate the 250th anniversary of the birth of our nation, I've found myself asking a much older question:

How do nations flourish?

Not simply economically or politically, but as places where people, families, communities, and ideas can thrive over generations.

Oddly enough, I didn't arrive at this question through politics. I arrived at it through literature.

This all came together for me while reading A Gentleman in Moscow by Amor Towles- a very unusual but delightful read! But when I looked back through my notes from this 1st half of 2026, I realized this conversation had been building for months. I've been reading C. S. Lewis, Tolkien, Jung, Solzhenitsyn, an anthology of classical poetry, and had just finished a deep study of Nietzsche. At first glance, those authors have very little in common. Yet they all seemed to be wrestling with the same fundamental questions about humanity, freedom, virtue, and civilization.

So I started drafting questions- thinking through books like A Gentleman in Moscow and how they stir the mind in subtle ways.

Reading books like this do a profound service, you became less interested in winning arguments and more interested in understanding the ideas and people beneath them.

So, for the rest of July, I'd like to explore one big question through five books. Along the way, we'll ask:

The big question- How Does a Nation Flourish?

and I think there are 5 sub-questions that help guide us in this discussion:

• Do people have hope for a better future? (Hope)

• Can they endure hardship without losing their humanity? (Character)

• Do they care for the weak and vulnerable? (Compassion/ Empathy)

• Can truth challenge the assumptions of a culture? (Freedom of thought)

• Are people free to worship God and live according to their faith? (Freedom of conscience)

And then I spent some time grabbing 5 books I have read that help explore these questions....

The five books may surprise you. They don't seem to belong together, but I think they're all part of the same conversation. Perhaps that's the literature teacher in me—I can't resist putting unlikely books into dialogue with one another.

I don't expect everyone to agree with my conclusions, and that's perfectly fine. My hope isn't to win an argument. It's to think more deeply about the ideas that shape nations, cultures, and ultimately, ourselves.

I hope you'll read along and join the conversation.

The first book study will be tomorrow, but I don't think I will get to all of them before the end of the month.

Happy July!