While the church of the Enlightenment wrestled with reconciling faith and reason, woke postmodernism struggled to reconcile its rejection of objective truth with its moral absolutism.
Bridging Worlds Through Grace, Truth, and Dialogue
By Dr. Tim Orr
The cultural elites of our day—those driving the ideologies of academia, media, and corporate culture—are experiencing what can only be described as an epistemological crisis. Much like the Christian church in the 18th and 19th centuries, which grappled with the challenges of Enlightenment thought, today’s “woke” movement faces a reckoning over the contradictions at the heart of its worldview. While the church of the Enlightenment wrestled with reconciling faith and reason, woke postmodernism struggled to reconcile its rejection of objective truth with its moral absolutism. This crisis signals the unraveling of an ideology and the potential for a profound cultural shift.
During the Enlightenment, the church was confronted by thinkers who elevated reason and empirical evidence above divine revelation. Philosophers like Immanuel Kant and David Hume questioned the basis of religious knowledge, challenging centuries of ecclesiastical authority and dogma. The church, long accustomed to defining truth through scripture and tradition, was defensive. It had to ask hard questions: Could faith coexist with reason? Was it possible to maintain moral authority without sacrificing intellectual credibility?
This crisis led to significant reformations within Christianity. Some traditions embraced the challenge, finding ways to integrate scientific discovery and biblical faith, while others retreated into defensive postures. The lesson was clear—ignoring the epistemological challenges of the day would only lead to irrelevance. Much like the church of the Enlightenment, today’s cultural elites are forced to grapple with the limits and contradictions of their epistemology.
The woke movement, deeply rooted in postmodernism, has long rejected the existence of universal truths. Instead, it posits that knowledge is socially constructed and shaped by power dynamics. While this framework initially served as a useful critique of oppressive systems, it has now morphed into a dogma of its own. Ironically, the same movement that decries absolute truth as a tool of oppression now insists on moral absolutes in its crusade against systemic injustices like racism, sexism, and inequality. This contradiction—asserting moral certainty while denying objective truth—has created a significant epistemological crisis.
Consider academia, where many woke ideas have been incubated. Universities proclaim their commitment to intellectual diversity and the free exchange of ideas but frequently silence dissenting voices in the name of inclusivity. The result is not inclusivity but ideological conformity, leaving institutions unable to meaningfully engage with alternative perspectives. The same is true in media and corporate culture, where performative virtue-signaling often precedes genuine action. This incoherence is not sustainable, and cracks are already beginning to show.
Trump's first administration played a catalytic role in bringing the epistemological contradictions of woke postmodernism into the public spotlight. While the administration's unconventional approach drew criticism, it successfully disrupted entrenched cultural and ideological strongholds in provocative and transformative ways. This disruption exposed the fragility of woke ideology’s dominance and laid the groundwork for a broader cultural re-evaluation.
One of the administration's most significant achievements was reshaping the judiciary. The Trump administration fundamentally altered the legal landscape by appointing a record number of federal judges, and three Supreme Court justices committed to constitutional originalism. This emphasis on interpreting the Constitution according to its original meaning challenged the progressive practice of reinterpreting law to fit modern ideological frameworks. In doing so, the administration highlighted a critical tension within woke ideology: its reliance on mutable, subjective interpretations of justice that are disconnected from objective legal principles (Smith, 2020).
Education was another battleground where the Trump administration’s policies exposed woke ideology’s contradictions. Efforts to promote school choice and challenge the prevalence of critical theory in public education gave parents and communities greater agency in determining what values are taught to their children. For years, public education has been a stronghold for woke ideology, embedding concepts like systemic racism and gender fluidity into curricula with little oversight. By advocating for decentralization and local control, the administration empowered a growing grassroots movement to push back against these narratives (Williams, 2021).
The administration also tackled the ideological capture of Big Tech and mainstream media. Its critiques of censorship and bias within these industries brought long-standing issues of ideological monopolization to the forefront of public discourse. Platforms like Twitter and Facebook, which have become gatekeepers of information, were exposed for their role in suppressing dissenting views under the guise of combating "misinformation." These actions prompted the rise of alternative platforms and renewed debates about free speech in the digital age, further weakening the stronghold of woke ideology (Taylor, 2022).
Though polarizing, the Trump administration’s actions forced the cultural elite to confront its vulnerabilities. Like the Protestant Reformation challenged the Catholic Church’s monopoly on spiritual authority, the administration disrupted the woke establishment’s grip on cultural institutions. This disruption did not eliminate these ideological strongholds but created a space for alternative voices and frameworks to emerge.
When Trump returns to office as president, his administration will intensify its focus on dismantling the cultural and ideological strongholds of wake postmodernism. Building on the foundation laid during his first term, the second administration would aim to expose further and challenge the dominance of woke ideology in key institutions like education, government, and media.
The parallels between the church’s struggles during the Enlightenment and the current crisis in woke postmodernism are striking. Both represent moments when dominant institutions were forced to confront their inconsistencies and adapt or risk irrelevance. Just as the church had to refine its theology and engage more meaningfully with culture, today’s woke elites must reckon with their contradictions, too.
However, there is also a key difference. While the church ultimately found a way to integrate reason and revelation, woke ideology, with its foundation in relativism, lacks the grounding necessary for such a synthesis. Without a commitment to objective truth, its ability to adapt is limited. This opens the door for alternative frameworks—grounded in reason and moral clarity—to shape the cultural narrative.
We find ourselves in a moment of profound opportunity. The epistemological crisis of woke postmodernism has created a vacuum, and the question is, what will fill it? Just as Enlightenment thinkers reshaped the intellectual landscape by offering compelling alternatives to church dogma, those who believe in objective truth, human dignity, and the importance of free inquiry can shape the cultural ethos of the future.
Having learned its lessons from history, the church is uniquely positioned to lead in this moment. Offering a vision of intellectually robust and morally compelling truth can provide a much-needed antidote to the relativism of woke ideology. This requires courage—not just to critique the contradictions of the current moment but to embody an alternative rooted in grace, truth, and love.
The epistemological crisis of woke postmodernism is not merely an academic issue but a cultural turning point. Just as the church of the Enlightenment was forced to grapple with the challenges of reason and modernity, today’s cultural elites must confront the contradictions at the heart of their ideology. Whether this leads to renewal or decline remains to be seen. But for those who care about truth, justice, and human flourishing, this moment represents a profound opportunity to shape the future.
By learning from history and seizing this moment, we can contribute to a culture that values coherence over contradiction, freedom over conformity, and truth over relativism. The time for action is now.
Smith, J. (2020). Cultural battles: The rise of populism and the decline of elitism. New York: HarperCollins.
Taylor, C. (2007). A secular age. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
White, H. (2018). Postmodernism and its discontents: Power, privilege, and identity. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Tim Orr is a scholar of Islam, Evangelical minister, conference speaker, and interfaith consultant with over 30 years of experience in cross-cultural ministry. He holds six degrees, including a master’s in Islamic studies from the Islamic College in London. Tim taught Religious Studies for 15 years at Indiana University Columbus and is now a Congregations and Polarization Project research associate at the Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture at Indiana University Indianapolis. He has spoken at universities, including Oxford University, Imperial College London, the University of Tehran, Islamic College London, and mosques throughout the U.K. His research focuses on American Evangelicalism, Islamic antisemitism, and Islamic feminism, and he has published widely, including articles in Islamic peer-reviewed journals and three books.