I have always cherished “The Parable of the Talents” (Matthew 25:14–30). It is a timeless bugle call, urging us to action across the millennia. The story emphasises our moral and Christian duty to embrace risk, to invest our gifts boldly rather than bury them in fear. In an era of chronic risk aversion, the Western world must rediscover this appetite for daring. From government bureaucracies to corporate boardrooms, a quarter-century of escalating caution has yielded stagnant economic growth and sluggish innovation. These afflictions breed strategic vulnerability. More profoundly, they manifest in plummeting birth rates, the erosion of institutional marriage, delayed family formation, and the fraying of traditional family structures. I won’t belabour the statistics; they are undeniable and readily available, but they paint a portrait of a civilisation in retreat.
Taking risks demands three essential elements. The first is hope: a goal that may border on the impossible yet remains worthy of pursuit through determination and a willingness to court failure. The second is trust, not in human frailty, but in God, who illuminates the path step by step amid imperfect knowledge. The third is commitment: the resolve to do whatever it takes, within moral bounds, to achieve the objective. This often entails more toil, sacrifice, frustration, betrayal, and disappointment than anticipated, demanding unyielding resilience. Yet it is precisely here that true pride is earned, where medals are won, plaudits deserved, profits realised, and the soul sanctified.
The parable’s core message is clear: we have a duty to risk to the fullest extent of our God-given talents. For a single man open to marriage, this means braving rejection, proposing, making a compelling case, and if rebuffed, learning and pressing on to another prospect. Failure lies not in rejection but in never asking, in shunning the risk altogether. As the adage goes, if you have stopped failing, you are not trying hard enough.
If safety and security are your paramount pursuits in relationships, careers, charitable endeavours, or personal missions, a recalibration may be overdue. In a team vocation, are you giving your all or opting for the path of least resistance? If called to found a business, does fear of failure and embarrassment paralyse you? Where is your faith? These spheres, spiritual and temporal, duty and action, are not silos; they interweave through every life. Risk aversion undermines them all.
This malaise has gripped the West with particular ferocity since the dawn of the 21st century. The spectre of climate change has fuelled an anti-growth “safetyism” embodied in Net Zero policies, accelerating the deindustrialisation of Europe and America. Communist China now dominates global steel production, a sobering fact, as no modern peer conflict has been won by the side with inferior industrial capacity. Mountains of “protective” regulations have stifled innovation in critical sectors like high technology and communications. Essentials such as energy, food, transport, and healthcare have grown costlier and less varied. Once innovative corporate giants have become masters of regulatory capture, mere minnows in invention. Our defences are weaker, our preparedness diminished, and our civilisational confidence hollowed out. The pep in our collective step has faded. We must snap out of this stupor, and I believe we can.
For added motivation, recall the parable’s stern conclusion for the servant who buried his talent out of fear: “Throw that worthless servant outside, into the darkness, where there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.” It is a stark warning against those who refuse to step onto the pitch of life and get stuck in.
It is time to shatter the chronic risk aversion suffocating the West. The first hammer blow can start with you. Onward, in hoc signo vinces.
