Age of Weimarica

On 10th September 2025, a shooter climbed onto the roof of a building at Utah State University, Utah, USA. He was positioned approximately 200 metres away from Charlie Kirk, the founder of Turning Point USA (TPUSA). Charlie sat in his iconic ‘Prove Me Wrong’ tent, seated in front of a table, where he would invite university students to debate him. It was one of the many ordinary tours that Charlie was well-known for, having done them since the age of 18.

In the debate that was ongoing, a student asked Kirk a question about transexual school shooters. ‘Do you know how many mass shooters there have been in America over the last 10 years?’ Kirk replied with a question. ‘Counting or not counting gang violence?’ The student did not have time to provide clarification. At the age of 31, Charlie’s life was extinguished as the assassin discharged his weapon, striking Charlie in the neck, opening his jugular vein. Having had the misfortune of reviewing footage of the moment of the strike, I was almost immediately aware that his death would follow moments later. I was also deeply disturbed. His wife Erika had become a widow and his two children became fatherless. His last word on this planet was ‘violence’, and violence there was.

For whatever reason, despite never having known or cared that much about Charlie’s work, I felt as though the world had become a suddenly much worse place. Much worse than it already is, that is. It was later that I learned from people all over the world – including patristic voices in Eastern Orthodox Church that I am part of – that Charlie’s entire career had been not just about pushing for MAGA and other political topics particular to the USA, but also a powerful voice in the global Christian world. Granted that he was an Evangelical, a branch of Protestantism, so not in my church, but our doctrine has never been to pretend heretics don’t exist or that they don’t deserve love. Everyone deserves love, including non-Christians. Not empathy, which is a word often abused by the godless to mean a fake form of love that is conditional in nature; selfish; not love. Charlie displayed love.

More importantly, Charlie Kirk was brave. Braver than I could ever possibly have been. Simply the prospect of going to a super-leftist university campus is enough to instil anxiety in me. Setting up a table to debate people who disagree with you on every topic, who find your belief in Christ contemptible? Not for me, I would never do it. But Charlie Kirk did that. He went there, because if he did not have belief in Christ, he had belief in one thing: reaching out those who disagree with you with a calm voice, respect, and utmost love. This is a common ground that even most hardline atheists can stand on. His entire career was built on this principle. That is what TPUSA is. He was not an undeserving lobbyist, a run-off-the-mill politician, or an extremist demagogue. Whatever money he earned, he earned it through a platform of being respectful and preaching moderate views. Whether he sincerely held these views is irrelevant. I did not care much for his political views either, they were fairly milquetoast.

But his love for youth was unmatched. Where most people saw aspiring future workers or scientists, Charlie saw warriors for Christ who could become a lot more. Warriors whose sword and shield are the good news and the Lord, with the ability to not just reshape the world, but secure their own salvation. Nobody tended to the youth in the US the way Charlie did. He was the last remaining vestige of anything approximating sanity on atheistic and mostly radical leftist university campuses.

I would go so far as to say, Charlie Kirk was probably the only person in the 21st century to truly embody the concept of freedom and democracy as it is taught to us at public school. The only person to go to people, who often hated him on a personal level, who vilified him, yet never once even raise his voice, resort to violence, or belittling those he viewed as opponents. As far as the cameras – which have been rolling for 13 years – are concerned, Charlie Kirk showed Christlike respect upon all atheists and leftists. While the careers of people who sit in front of tables are often part of a mostly uninteresting office job or questionable political mongering, Charlie’s table was possibly the most profound table in all of the western world. It was a table of democracy; of debate.

One would think, then, that such a milquetoast, kind – if maybe a bit strange – American conservative would have been assassinated, that his death would not leave any room for interpretation of whether or not he deserved getting slain like cattle, destined to bleed out and traumatise millions of people worldwide.

I was proven wrong immediately. Demonic cackles and many voices of individuals possessed by Satan started howling throughout nearly every conceivable media channel in the world. Like the bells of a church, they celebrate his death, calling it a well-deserved fate, and that everyone who prays for him or his family is a right-wing weirdo and a loser. Closer to home in Europe, Amrit Kaur, the leader of Red Party Youth Norway, sarcastically voiced how terrible it is that Charlie has been murdered. Social media, such as Reddit, is brimming with memes such as ‘debate lost’ or ‘he should not have had such a big head in PVP zone.’

It is important that we need to hate the sin, but not the sinner. These individuals are possessed by Satan, meaning that they are not in control of their actions. They are all humans, made in the image of God. Do not let resentment or bitterness over their actions develop in you.

Nevertheless, the USA is entering a period that bears a disturbing resemblance to 1920s and early 1930s Germany – better known as the Weimar Republic. The parallels are not in policy, but in spirit. The Weimar years were defined by a crippling economic depression and a deep sense of national humiliation that created a fertile ground for extremism. A weak and distrusted democratic government found itself caught between two armies of true believers: the communists who aimed to tear it all down for a workers’ revolution, and the rising nationalist right who sought to purge the nation and restore a mythical past. In this fractured landscape, political solutions became impossible, and the stage was set for war.

When debate dies, the street becomes the arbiter. The political violence of the Weimar Republic was not abstract; it was disturbing and brutal. It was a war of clubs against knives. Communists, organised in their own paramilitary wings, would descend upon the fascists and club them to death. The Brownshirts, in turn, would retaliate with daggers and assassinate communist leaders in the streets. The conflict was so ritualised that it inscribed itself onto the very bodies of the combatants. It was said that in the city hospitals, you could tell a man’s ideology by his injuries. If he was covered in bruises from blunt force trauma, he was a fascist. If he was bleeding from stab wounds, he was a communist. Sometimes the job would be finished in the hospitals, too.

The most terrifying sign of a collapsing society is not the violence itself, but the disappearance of neutral ground. The war in Weimar Germany did not respect the walls of a hospital. Political enemies would hunt each other down in the wards, finishing off the wounded men they had failed to kill on the pavement. A place of healing became just another battleground. This was the final stage of the collapse, where the institutions meant to uphold civilisation – medicine, law, order – became extensions of the political fight. Any semblance of a shared society had vanished. There was only the tribe and the weapon.

If, then, Charlie Kirk – a man whose entire career was built on non-violence and dialogue – is executed for his speech, what hope remains for the USA? His assassination is a terrifying answer to the question of what happens when debate is no longer possible. While we in Europe watch from across the Atlantic, we must ask if this is a purely American sickness or a contagion that will spread. We should hope for the best, of course, but this is not a good sign. When a society is already straining under the kind of economic misery currently gripping the US American people, the first political murder is never the last.

An assassination of a political figure in a fractured nation is never just a murder; it is a signal. It can be a catalyst. We saw this in 1994, when the assassination of the Hutu President of Rwanda, Juvénal Habyarimana, was used as the trigger for the systematic genocide of the Tutsi minority. That gave the killers permission to begin the slaughter. While the context is different, the principle is the same. Charlie’s murder sends a clear message to the most radical elements of the left: political violence is now on the table. The Rubicon has been crossed… or maybe it hasn’t. This uncertainty is specifically why Charlie’s assassination disturbs not just the Christian world, but reasonable non-Christians alike.

Unfortunately, a strong indicator for why this may be a sign of very bad times to come is the fact that the celebration of Charlie’s death is not something that appeared overnight. That is, the people celebrating did not wake up on 9th or 10th September and thought to themselves, ‘Man, these right-wing nutjobs really are subhuman. I really hate them. I hope they will be tortured and killed.’ These people, who seemed ordinary, coming from all walks of life – bureaucrats, medical workers, McDonald’s staff – had these opinions for years, or decades. It is only just now that their presence is on full display, and it is horrifying.

Nevertheless, the reign of a tyrant ends when he dies. When a martyr dies, Christ’s presence only magnifies, which is why this incident is bringing out the demons. This is why his death, while a crushing tragedy for his family, is also a severe mercy for the rest of us. It is a divine clarification. In the coming Age of Weimarica, the satanic temptation will be to fight the war on the world’s terms – with the club and the knife, with hatred and bitterness. Charlie’s martyrdom is a call to reject this temptation. It is a call to boldness, a command to abandon the lukewarm faith that is so easily surrendered when the pressure of worldly affairs mounts.

Do not cry for Charlie Kirk. He has won his crown. Weep instead for a world that murders its peacemakers. Then, pick up the weapon he wielded: a love so radical it is willing to speak truth to those who hate you, knowing it may cost you your life. We were not called to live in fear or to win political battles, but to be a faithful witness to Christ’s Resurrection unto death, and unto the ages of ages. In an age of terror, that is the only path to eternal life, and the only victory that matters.