Musings & Links for July 3, 2026
Ambition, blue laws, and bad rescue plans
Hi friends,
Greetings from Waco, where I’m prepping a D&D session (using 1st edition Basic/Expert rules) before celebrating America’s 250th tomorrow swimming and grilling with friends at Jenoa’s parents’ home.
I’m grateful to live in this country. Looking at the span of history, I strongly still believe this is a uniquely great place and time to live with a heritage and culture worth celebrating. I used to think blasting Lee Greenwood and waving an American flag was cringe, but at this stage of life, cynicism, ingratitude, and ironic posturing make me cringe even more.
Here’s some things I’ve read. One is more explicitly theological, the other two sit where theology and economics intersect, an area that I’ve been pondering and where I think a lot of people are perplexed. I started a longer piece about the topic that I intend to post soon. In the meantime, I hope you enjoy these pieces.
Sophia Holcomb wrote about a poem that she hated, and how the lie it tells is so paltry in comparison to the gospel. Self-salvation has never been more popular, and is just as devastating as its ever been.
I really appreciated this piece by Nathan Crankfield about how poverty is not inherently virtuous. Ambition, undertaken as a means of provision and generosity, is actually good. There are extremes in how we talk about wealth and poverty, and I think that does everyone a disservice, especially in the church. More specifically, I think the fact that the New Testament was written prior to the dominance of a money economy has led to widespread confusion. You see this both in prosperity preaching on the one hand, and the increasing romanticizing of Marxist ideology (or “democratic socialism”, or whatever euphemism you want to use) on the other. One does not need to subscribe to the toxicity of hustle-and-grind culture or the toxicity of anti-work resentment. Rightly-ordered love, a sense of vocation, and constant discernment provide a better way.
Benjamin Studebaker wrote in praise of blue laws over at Cracks In Postmodernity. I’m deliberately juxtaposing this one with the previous piece because, superficially, they seem in conflict — one praises ambition and private wealth, the other lauds labor laws. But, they are both written by Catholic writers, and, I would argue, have the same thread of rightly ordered love running through them. What I think is interesting is that the repeal of blue laws have a clear correlation, if not causation, with declining church attendance, and increased substance abuse(!). Where things really, get interesting, IMO, is in the top comment on the essay, shared by a Reform Jew and self-identified “labor lefty”, who points out that the relaxing of blue laws was actually beneficial for Jews who strictly observed the Sabbath, because it freed up a day for leisure and consumption.
During my time of under-employment, a lot of thoughts swirled in my head about the nature and purpose of work, how it’s changing, and what the right attitude toward it is. DHH, a successful entrepreneur in his own right, recently went on a brief rant against “grinding” on the My First Million podcast. He’s historically been critical of overwork, so this wasn’t surprising, but he’s also admitted, elsewhere, that in the past he also reinforced attitudes that encouraged the resentment of work and ambition that was popular among tech workers. To hear him reaffirm his convictions was encouraging, but I think it’s because he has an understanding of work that places it in a life ordered toward objective goods.
Again, this is something I intend to write about more, so I’ll stop.
In the meantime, stop working this weekend, and rest with gratitude. Eat a hot dog.
Robbie