Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during an event at Utah Valley University on September 10, 2025.
I may not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it. – Voltaire
Even if you bristled at his tone or challenged his views, Charlie Kirk’s death marks a sobering moment for our democracy.
But you can do more than react.
You can do something that matters.
You can look past the headlines and into the crowd—
see who was listening to him,
ask why they came,
and consider what their presence says about us all.
A creeping chaos
When I was a kid, our backyard football games went sideways when someone ignored or changed the rules mid-drive. To play a game you need order. We all knew that. But sometimes you just want your way. For many people, America feels like that backyard right now—testing the limits of order to let everyone have their way.
Every culture rests on a sacred order. In the West, a biblical story shaped everything from the calendar to human rights. That same story is bringing order across China and the global South, even as Western culture considers it morally constricting. Prosperity only wants permission. Aldous Huxley was blunt about that fact:
“For myself… the philosophy of meaninglessness was essentially an instrument of liberation.”
Huxley names our moment. We’ve erased boundaries and tradition without any suggestion about what new order will replace them. Except for one value I’ll just call “permission.” Permission seems to make life feel fair, so we default to it. But permission invites chaos. Up front, it feels kind; downstream, our indifference—our “yes”— has been causing harm.
Yes to kids with unlimited internet.
Yes to addictive algorithms.
Yes to high-potency intoxicants on Main Street.
Yes to grade inflation.
Yes to “medical exits” for the lonely and the tired.
Yes to illegal border crossing from a distance, but no plan up-close.
Permission isn’t neutral; it invites chaos.
Chaos and a yearning for order
The first to feel the chaos are the people who keep public life running—teachers, small-business owners, faith communities, parent volunteers. These aren’t people with a power agenda. They’re simply the people we expect to keep the peace when boundaries collapse. Imagine teaching in a public school today with so much ambiguity about everything, especially identity. Imagine the risk of naming any of it.
Kirk named it for them. He emboldened some and polarized others. But most supporters just felt seen for the first time in a long time.
When anxiety spikes, blunt talk feels steady. When chaos is on the rise, people with change fatigue reach for a strongman. Can we think about them for a minute? Or are we consigned to one more ride on the merry-go-round of reactions— for and against?
Let’s name the central loss that makes people hunger for a spokesman to push back. A loss of common ground.
From “Question Authority” to “Cancel Authority”
The “Question authority” bumper sticker in the 1960’s led to needed reforms. Over time, “question” hardened into “cancel.” In the vacuum of common values, two reflexes became dominant:
- Self-rule: I decide what’s true for me.
- Bureaucratic rescue: Someone else should fix it when I’m wrong.
Permission became the only doctrine of public life. “You do you” seems fair, neutral.
But it isn’t neutral. Beliefs drive every point of view. No one knows everything so we must assume and put faith in something. David Foster Wallace was brilliant but agnostic. Yet he said, “Everybody worships.” Everyone brings a creed into the public square—even those who check the “none” box. There’s no neutral.
Pluralism is a courtesy but not a creed
Courteous pluralism says, “You have a right to your own opinions.” It’s a posture, a way of disagreeing agreeably. But lately, that posture has been promoted into a belief system. Now it’s not just how we disagree—it’s what you must believe. That shift kills conviction and breeds chaos.
It was that shift—an institutionalized despair, a creed of chaos imposed in the name of tolerance—that Kirk challenged on campuses across the nation.
If you bristled at Charlie Kirk’s tone, fair enough. He played the provocateur, framing conversations as win-lose, hardly the spirit of Isaiah’s “Come now, let us reason together.” But don’t miss the upstream turbulence: people feel the boat rocking. They’re not demanding domination; they’re begging for ballast.
“The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, open to reason, full of mercy and good fruits, impartial and sincere. James 3:17-18
You have correctly named the problem with society – tolerance for tolerance’s sake. In the U.S. we have lived by the self and it’s “truth” for far too long. Charlie Kirk courageously called this out by inviting those who wanted to engage him in debate to do so in an open public forum. He was willing to take the slings and arrows from those who disagreed with him and the name calling and false labeling when they couldn’t win a reasoned discourse. Was he a perfect Christian man? No, but he was never mean or accusatory to his adversaries when debating them as they were to him. He declared his love for Jesus and wanted others to know his Savior and to experience life as a forgiven sinner living in and for God and for His truth. Even now in the aftermath of his murder, the evil one is calling him names like racist, fascist, white supremacist, bigot, etc. The evil one is putting fake pictures on social media of his killer in a Trump T-shirt trying to twist the killer’s motive for this heinous act. Charlie spoke the Truth in love and lost his life for it. His wife lost a husband and his young children a loving father. You call him a provocateur. Yet I am reminded of a man with similar courage who openly declared his love for Jesus and the good news of the Gospel to anyone and everyone who would listen. He did so in synagogues and public forums all over Europe and Asia. He spoke God’s Truth. The Romans executed him for it. We call this man an apostle.