Bari’s Picks of the Week: Charlie Kirk’s Final Message

It’s been another fantastic week here at The Free Press. Let’s get right to it.

Charlie Kirk’s Final Message to America

“I pray it changes the world. But even if it changes just one person’s life, then I know that I did my job.”

That’s what Charlie Kirk told his wife, Erika, last August when he told her he had finished what would become his final book. And this week, we published an excerpt from it with an introduction from Erika. As she recounts, the book began when Charlie—at the urging of the writer Dennis Prager—began observing the Sabbath.

“Initially, he managed only an hour,” Erika writes. “But as he discovered that it unlocked a completely elevated version of himself, he began to expand the time, until he was offline from sundown Friday to mid-morning Saturday—and later, until as late as Sunday morning. My phone would be on in case of an emergency, but people knew not to contact me unless there was a catastrophe that couldn’t wait for 24 hours.”

The book that came out of that experience, Stop, in the Name of God: Why Honoring the Sabbath Will Transform Your Life, is out this week. We excerpted it here:

This week I also sat down for a town hall with Erika. It will air Saturday at 8 p.m. ET/PT on CBS. It’s a conversation about grief, forgiveness, political violence, and more. Please tune in.

The America at 250 Newsletter Arrives

What better way to launch our America at 250 newsletter than with an essay on George Mason, who was born 300 years ago this week? (faustasyan/Getty Images)

I’m thrilled that the great historian Jonathan Horn will now be writing a weekly newsletter as part of our America at 250 project, which celebrates everything awesome about this country. And what better way to launch it than with a short essay on George Mason, who was born 300 years ago this week?

Mason isn’t nearly as well-remembered as his revolutionary brethren, such as George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Alexander Hamilton, and James Madison. But his draft of Virginia’s Declaration of Rights in 1776 greatly influenced the Declaration of Independence, notably by voicing the belief that “all men are born equally free and independent, and have certain inherent natural rights . . .among which are the enjoyment of life and liberty, with the means of acquiring and possessing property, and pursuing and obtaining happiness and safety.”

The language got an upgrade from Jefferson and company that summer. But the sentiment was originally Mason’s. And while his famous refusal to sign on to the Constitution effectively ended Mason’s close friendship with Washington, his intransigence eventually brought forth what he was after: the Bill of Rights.

“Without those first 10 amendments, it’s all too easy to imagine an America today without a free press and the religious liberty that we at this Free Press look forward to celebrating this month,” Jonathan writes. “So raise a glass to the other Founding Father George.” Indeed. And while you’re at it, check out Jonathan’s most recent book: The Fate of the Generals, about General Jonathan Wainwright’s doomed last stand against the Japanese invasion of the Philippines, and his heroic example as America’s highest-ranking POW during World War II.

But first, sign up for the America at 250 newsletter here.

This Land Is Not Your Land

This week, Rupa zeroes in on the must-read story of Bal Batth, an Indian immigrant who has lived in the same British Columbia home since 1974. (Kyrani Kanavaros for The Free Press)

Each week, Rupa Subramanya covers Canada like nobody else, and while you’re signing up for newsletters, you should certainly make sure her This Week in Canada arrives in your inbox every week.

This week, however, Rupa zeroes in on the must-read story of Bal Batth, an Indian immigrant who has lived in the same British Columbia home since 1974, when he was just 8 years old. He raised a family of his own in the house and planned on passing it down to his children.

In August, however, a Canadian judge ruled that the indigenous Cowichan Nation holds “Aboriginal title” over 800 acres of land that happens to include Batth’s home. Now Batth and his neighbors are in a bizarre legal limbo where they cannot say for certain who owns the land beneath their feet.

“Nothing like this has ever happened in Canada,” Rupa writes. “Because of the judge’s ruling, all those land acknowledgments that are only half-listened-to at school assemblies and hockey games actually have extremely complicated consequences, at least in British Columbia—and perhaps all across the country someday.”

It turns out words have consequences. Read Rupa’s full dispatch on this extraordinary story.

Should We Legalize Assisted Suicide?

Does a medical doctor’s obligation to “do no harm” extend to ending the lives of people who want to die? And is assisted suicide—or MAID, for Medical Aid in Dying—compassionate or barbaric?

It’s a contentious question, one being debated all across the West. Canada’s MAID program, for example, now accounts for roughly one in 20 deaths in the country each year. The policy has already made major inroads in the U.S., with a MAID program having just become legal in Illinois.

This week, Rafaela Siewert dove right into this incredibly sensitive topic with two experts—healthcare attorney David Hoffman and Dr. Lydia Dugdale—who disagree on this incredibly sensitive topic.

Regardless of where you stand on the issue—or if you’re still making your mind up—this is an Honestly conversation you do not want to miss, because this debate isn’t going away.

That’s it for me this week. Check out tomorrow’s Weekend Press for Abigail Shrier’s Tough Love for a man thinking about leaving his wife, Elliot Ackerman’s marriage proposal advice, River Page’s wild Two Drinks with former congressman George Santos, our list of recommendations for the books you should buy your kids for the holidays this year, and much, much more!

See you next week.

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