My name is Douglas Wilson. This is the podcast. This is episode 380 of the podcast, and I'm glad you decided to join us.

I want to talk a little bit about America as an idea. There are many people who want to argue that America is a propositional nation. And I want to argue that this is a propositional nation.

And I want to argue that this is a pernicious idea,

not because propositions are not involved,

because they most certainly are.

Every people, every culture, every nation is gathered around certain propositions, and our nation is no exception.

There are certain propositions that are very important to us.

But there is this disruptive thing that God put into the world called sex.

What that means is that men and women get together and they have children,

and then those children grow up, and then they have children, and those children grow up,

and then they have children. They all tell each other's stories,

and those stories have a central theme or a central point. And in order to make those central

points, you have to use propositions. And so the propositions are there. But to simply say that

America is an idea or an ideal creates the impression that anybody who agrees with that proposition,

anybody who agrees with that idea or anybody who's attracted to that idea can just simply walk in and be an American.

And this is glaringly, screamingly false. Now, let's say, just to illustrate this,

let's say there was a land out in the middle of

the Pacific that was the size of Tahiti, let's say, that was uninhabited, and for some reason,

we just now found it. Okay. And let's say that we rounded up 2,000 members of a weird cult that was dedicated to certain key presuppositions.

They were dedicated to certain propositions, excuse me.

And they all had to do with their religion, okay? Three propositions.

And someone recruited them to go settle this island, and only those who were dedicated to those

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