Debating Illiberalism in DC

As one of my last trips before hitting the don’t-travel-while-pregnant cutoff, I went to Washington D.C. As part of the Georgetown Initiative on Catholic Thought and Social Life, I was part of a panel with Ross Douthat, Matthew Sitman, and Austen Ivereigh. We were asked to tackle “Nationalism, Post-liberalism, and Pope Francis.”

It got a bit more heated than I’d like, but the contribution I made that I’m proudest of is at 27:30 in the video below. I lay out my definition of illiberalism, and (since, being pregnant, I’m two women on the panel), I talk a little about why liberalism’s ideal of the autonomous individual will always exclude women.

And near the end (at 1h27:30) I talk about how hard it is to talk about the magnitude of sin and of mercy at the same time.