Christian Humanism: A Path Not Taken

Alan Jacobs' title—The Year of Our Lord 1943—is deliberately old-fashioned and evocative. It is Christian, of course—the phrase articulates history along a Christological axis—but of a rather formal sort, found, for example, in the Book of Common Prayer. It also names a year in that history, one that bears its meaning on its face: we are well into World War II. We are thus called back to a time when Christianity was more formal and (perhaps consequently?) had more social purchase. It was also a time of reckoning, both for Christians and for the countries and civilization to which they belonged. What did the war mean? What did it reveal? In the event of victory for the Allies, what should things look like afterwards?