Why “The Late Show” matters to our culture and our souls

The Late Show with Stephen Colbert will air its last show tonight. Why should you care?

The ending could be nostalgic if you’re old enough to remember when David Letterman started the show in 1993 after being passed over as Johnny Carson’s successor on The Tonight Show. You might care about the controversy over the show’s ending: some claim that CBS acted for political reasons, while others point to reports that the show had been losing $40 million a year.

I think the show’s ending is relevant for a different reason.

As Elahe Izadi reports in the Washington Post, “We no longer choose from a handful of late-night hosts to get our fix of breezy celebrity interviews; there’s a seemingly endless supply of video podcasts for that.” She quotes Robert Thompson, a Syracuse University professor of television and popular culture:

Like all broadcast television, it was cultural glue. We all fed from the same cultural trough at the same time. That is gone and only remains in a few pockets, and those pockets are falling one by one. When Colbert leaves, another one of those important pockets will have fallen.

As we focus this week on finding hope in surprising places, I’d like to suggest that losing such “cultural glue” is good for our culture. And for our souls.

Why America is not a democracy

America is commonly called a democracy, but this is not the whole story. A true democracy would rule by a simple majority: take a vote and do whatever 50 percent plus one want to do.

Our Founders were wiser than that. Many knew what it was like to be in the minority, whether it was their religious affiliation, the smaller size of their particular colony, or their years of oppression by Great Britain, the superpower of the day.

James Madison believed, in fact, that pure democracy leads to “mob rule” by which the majority can oppress the minority. Accordingly, he and the other Founders constructed what political scientists call a “constitutional republic.”

In our system, citizens vote for fellow citizens to represent them in their government. The highest executive, be it a mayor or governor or president, leads within the checks and balances of the legislative and judicial branches. The framers of the Constitution also included a Bill of Rights specifically to protect individual and minority rights, with provisions for freedom of religion, speech, and so on.

However, while this system still prevails in our government, the same has been less true with our media and popular culture.

As journalists have become more partisan, news sources have come to reflect the views of their reporters and consumers. Late-night television is especially illustrative here: Stephen Colbert and the hosts of other legacy network talk shows are clearly negative toward President Trump, for example, while hosts on “right-leaning” platforms are the opposite.

The Late Show may have been “cultural glue,” but only for those who agreed with its political opinions. Those on the other “side” have their own “glue” as well. And both are so adhered to their side that they have no real idea what the other side thinks or wants.

“We must live through all time, or die by suicide”

If our republic becomes a democracy, the minority loses until it becomes the new majority, then the current majority loses. In this world, every vote becomes a battle and the other “side” is the enemy.

This zero-sum mentality poisons consensual culture and governance, illustrating Abraham Lincoln’s plea in his First Inaugural Address as he sought to avoid a civil war: “We are not enemies, but friends. We must not be enemies. Though passion may have strained it must not break our bonds of affection.” He understood that “as a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.” A culture in which half the population is the enemy of the other half is the best path I can imagine to such a cultural demise.

Here is where the hope of the gospel becomes urgently relevant once more.

When we live each day in intimate fellowship with the living Lord Jesus, his Spirit strengthens our biblical beliefs while fostering true compassion for those who disagree. We understand that we live in a secular constitutional system, so we do not trust politics or the government to do the work of evangelism for us. We know that eternal souls matter most and thus engage our culture not as warriors but as missionaries.

We “feed” from the “cultural trough” that is the “living water” of Jesus (John 7:38). As we “grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ” (2 Peter 3:18), we love as we are loved (John 15:12).

Here’s a way to test yourself: The next time you disagree with a politician, celebrity, neighbor, or family member, gauge your spirit. Do you feel superior to them? Do you sense antagonism and bitterness toward them? Or do you find yourself loving them “as yourself” (Matthew 22:39) and praying for them (Matthew 5:44)?

St. Augustine observed that you do not love your neighbor as yourself “unless you try to draw him to that good which you are yourself pursuing.” He added:

“This is the one good which has room for all to pursue it along with thee. From this precept proceed the duties of human society.”

How fully will you pursue this “one good” today?

Quote for the day:

“No amount of scholastic attainment, of able and profound exposition of brilliant and stirring eloquence can atone for the absence of a deep impassioned sympathetic love for human souls” —David Brainerd, missionary (1718–47)

Our latest website resources:

• Is there a biblical case for America as a chosen nation?
• Why are Americans turning against AI?
• How to disagree better on the role of women in ministry
• Three purposes behind America’s founding
• Why did Jesus return to heaven on Ascension Day?