I just finished Rod Dreher's Live Not By Lies: A Manual for Christian Dissidents.
I can't recommend it enough.
Dreher interviewed a number of people who had survived Communist repression and their children. The stories were chilling - indeed, some of the stories of actual mistreatment and torture were really uncomfortable to read. They provide some guidance about how to face such repression in the future.
Dreher's point is that what those people experienced under "hard totalitarianism" may not be what we will experience here, but he warned that there is a "soft totalitarianism" that is affecting us, and will likely get worse. While people may not be arrested, tortured and killed, they may face social ostracism, loss of jobs or promotions, and possible fines/legal issues.
My one quibble is that unlike his previous book, The Benedict Option, Dreher didn't provide enough stories of how we as Christians are currently fighting this soft totalitarianism. Yes, the examples of what the Communist repression survivors did do provide guidance and role models. Still, another chapter about how people are currently fighting soft totalitarianism in West would have been good. As a result of that lack, the view of the book is a perhaps darker, more pessimistic than it could have been.
But as I said, it's a quibble. This is an important book that I think all people of faith should read.
Pax et bonum
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