New York sojourn

I was privileged to spend the weekend of 25-27 January in New York City. This was in response to an invitation I received at the beginning of the month to come and speak to an assembled evening church service on the subject of citizenship, based, of course, on my new book. On friday the 25th I flew from Toronto's Pearson Airport to LaGuardia Airport in New York's borough of Queens. I was picked up by Jay Harvey, one of my principal hosts for the occasion. I stayed at the Hilton Doubletree Hotel in midtown Manhattan, right across from Radio City Music Hall and within walking distance of St. Patrick's Cathedral and Rockefeller Center. This was the second time I had been to New York, as our family had taken a holiday there ten years ago.

YouTube channel organized

Over the past two months I have uploaded quite a large number of videos to my @ByzantineCalvinist YouTube channel, mostly guitar performances of the Genevan Psalm tunes and a very few hymns and canticles. But I have also posted videos relevant to my new book, Citizenship Without Illusions. Last week I reorganized the material in my channel, grouping them into playlists devoted to 

• Political Visions and Illusions
• Interviews and conversations
• Commentaries and lectures
• Citizenship Without Illusions
• Hymns for guitar
• The Niagara Psalter, and
  
•  The Genevan Psalter

Some of these playlists include videos from other channels relevant to my work, including reviews of my books and personal interviews. I will be adding more to these lists over time. In the meantime, take a moment to click on some of the links immediately above and see what's on offer.

Citizenship Without Illusions: review 6

Another review of my new book appears at Sensus Divinitatis, the blog of Peter Schuurman, Executive Director of Global Scholars Canada: Christian Citizenship in an Age of Trump: Participation without Illusions, by Callum MacLeod. MacLeod is a fourth-year undergraduate student in political science at McMaster University here in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. An excerpt:

As someone who has benefited from [Koyzis'] mentorship, I can attest to his love for teaching and his desire to help the body of Christ think through complex problems surrounding faith and politics. This pastoral motivation is the undoubted impetus for this book, and his passion for empowering lay people shines through in his writing style. Instead of the pithy statements that so often characterize political commentary today, Koyzis articulates complex ideas in a winsome and engaging manner. He skillfully blends personal experiences with historical rigour, making his work accessible and thought-provoking. His ability to blend these elements and bring lofty principles to bear on everyday events results in a short and practical book that appeals to laypeople and political enthusiasts alike.

Once again the full interview can be found here.

Disarming Leviathan interview: citizenship and nationalism

Late last year I was again interviewed by Caleb Campbell, pastor of Desert Springs Bible Church and author of Disarming Leviathan: Loving Your Christian Nationalist Neighbor, for his Disarming Leviathan podcast. The interview has now been posted and can be viewed here or immediately below:

Campbell, incidentally, is a native Phoenician, but not of the Sidonian or Carthaginian variety.

A more nuanced ecclesiology: responding to Wood's review

A fifth review of my new book, Citizenship Without Illusions, has appeared in World magazine: Faithfully political. It is written by James R. Wood, who teaches religion and theology at Redeemer University. Before proceeding to look at his review, I should indicate that I know Wood slightly. Some years ago, he came to our house to discuss my first book, Political Visions and Illusions, possibly after the publication of the second edition in 2019, although my memory of the exact timing is a little foggy. We subsequently crossed paths at a downtown church plant here in Hamilton.

FT's evolution: 'populism' overtakes 'highbrow'

I am a longtime reader of the journal First Things, to which I began subscribing in 1992, only two years after it published its first issue. Here is what I wrote about it over two decades ago in this space:

On friday I received in my campus mail box the latest issue of my favourite periodical, First Things, which is published by the Institute on Religion and Public Life in New York and edited by the redoubtable Fr. Richard John Neuhaus. I suppose one might describe it as a largely Catholic journal, with significant confessional protestant and observant Jewish contributions as well. Its tone is probably best described as neoconservative. While I myself cannot in good conscience call myself a neoconservative as such, I am quite happy to admit that thoughtful articles of substance appear in every issue making it well worth reading.

Fixing what's broken

So soon after The New York Times alerted us to the need for electoral reform, Christian Courier has published my own take on the issue: Fixing what's broken. A brief excerpt:

If the United States were to adopt PR [proportional representation], the party system would become less rigid and more flexible. New parties could rise and take their place in Congress, and the old parties would disappear if they no longer served their original purposes.

Read the entire article here.

NYT gets on board with PR

This is good news indeed. The New York Times has published an extended discussion of proportional representation written by Jesse Wegman and Lee Drutman: How to Fix America's Two-Party Problem. An excerpt:

In less polarized political times, winner-take-all systems can do a decent job of reflecting public opinion and maintaining democratic stability, but when a nation is deeply divided and large numbers of people fear that they will not be represented at all, the result is an erosion of trust in government and rising extremism and political violence. As the political scientist Barbara F. Walter has observed, a majority of civil wars over the last century appear to have broken out in countries with winner-take-all systems.

Recent activities for January 2025

My Global Scholars newsletter for January is now posted. Included are four positive reviews of Citizenship Without Illusions, a podcast interview, and a 30th-anniversary celebration and book launch organized by Global Scholars Canada.

Citizenship Without Illusions: review 4

Joel Wentz reviews my new book immediately below. I am, of course, grateful for such a positive assessment of my work.

Citizenship Without Illusions: review 3

This review of my new book is posted at Faithful Intellect: Citizenship Without Illusions by David T. Koyzis. The author calls himself David without listing a surname. He presents a rather full outline of the book's contents along with several takeaways from each chapter. Here is an excerpt:

Writing about politics and religion requires navigating a mine field and Koyzis does it splendidly. He does a good job of presenting both sides while maintaining a nonpartisan perspective throughout the book. I also appreciate that the book is not too US centric. Koyzis is an American who lives in Canada and had family in Europe. This global perspective adds insightful comparisons that highlight what is common across countries and what makes the US unique.

Here is another excerpt on an issue that I am pleased to see highlighted: