Solzhenitsyn helped me see the world in a new way, deeply shaping my political vision and desire to stand against injustice in a century where the ever growing power of the State has slaughtered and imprisoned untold millions. He gave me respect for the power of words, taking my breath away when the seemingly mighty Kremlin feared a lone man with a pen who would not back down from speaking the truth. He wrote what I still consider perhaps the single finest Christian novel of the 20th century, One Day in the Life of Ivan Denisovich. A man of deep faith, he was widely misunderstood--first by those in the West who saw the Soviet Union and the U.S. in terms of moral equivalency, then by the American elite who were offended when Solzhenitsyn pointed out that capitalism without justice in a society of laws without faith is dehumanizing, and finally by his fellow citizens who found his values outdated.

I mourn his passing, and honor his memory. The world is poorer today and heaven richer.