On Friday morning, Harvard professor and New York Times best-selling author Arthur Brooks spoke to an audience of more than 5,000 at the Faith Matters Restore conference in Orem, Utah. The topic? How to bring back our country from the brink of seemingly intractable polarization and hatred.
It’s a poignant subject, made even more so by the location: Utah Valley University, the same campus where, just over two weeks earlier, Charlie Kirk was assassinated, triggering a wave of ugly celebrations and frenzied political finger-pointing.
Brooks offered a simple solution to this hostility, one deeply rooted in faith: Love your enemies. Why? It’s the only way to realize that they aren’t your enemies after all.
We’re honored to bring you an adapted version of that speech today. —The Editors
“Hatred among brothers and neighbors has now reduced sacred cities to sites of sorrow.” These are the words of the late Russell M. Nelson, president of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, speaking in October of 2002.
Today, his words are eerily prophetic. Two weeks ago, Charlie Kirk was assassinated at Utah Valley University, the very campus where I now stand. The tragedy has provoked a number of impossible questions. Among them: Why here?
Here’s a hypothesis: You have been chosen for a great and vital journey. You have been called to respond to this murder by following the most countercultural teaching in the history of humanity: to love our enemies.
