What is the relationship of elections to culture? Many Christians argue that elections are downstream from where real change is taking place. Often politicians and judges are making decisions to “catch-up” with the culture. Mark Steyn understands this.

He writes about this in his book, The Undocumented Mark Steyn. He explains this in his New York Post article, The real battle for America is over culture, not elections. His argument is simple. Culture trumps politics. In many ways politics is merely the reflection of cultural change.

He acknowledges: “You can’t have conservative government in a liberal culture, and that’s the position the Republican Party is in.” He goes on to explain: “Liberals expend tremendous effort changing the culture. Conservatives expend tremendous effort changing elected officials every other November — and then are surprised that it doesn’t make much difference.”

Try this as a thought experiment. Imagine that some of the candidates you supported who lost their elections actually won. How much difference do you think their election would make as the culture has become more secular and anti-Christian? There might have been a few less assaults on religious freedom, but the impact of a single candidate on many of these cases might be negligible. What would be the impact on a culture that has accepted same-sex marriage? Again, there might be a small impact, but the culture trend continues.

Mark Steyn concludes that: “If the culture’s liberal, if the schools are liberal, if the churches are liberal, if the hip, groovy business elite is liberal, if the guys who make the movies and the pop songs are liberal” electing a particular candidate “isn’t going to make a lot of difference.”

This isn’t to say that elections aren’t important. Elections do have consequences. But the lesson here is that culture trumps politics.