The intensity of modern political conflict feels different from ordinary disagreement. Neighbors who once discussed policy now avoid each other entirely. Family dinners end in silence or shouting. Online spaces become tribal battlegrounds where nuance disappears and every issue becomes existential. This is not simply a matter of differing opinions about governance or economics. Something deeper is at work, something that transforms ordinary people into soldiers in a war they cannot name.

To understand this phenomenon, one must look to an ancient concept that explains how groups develop a life of their own. An egregore is a collective consciousness born from shared focus and emotion. When enough people direct their attention toward the same symbols, repeat the same phrases, and feel the same emotions together, something emerges that is greater than the sum of its parts. The group begins to behave like a single organism with its own drives, its own survival instinct, and its own personality. Anyone who has felt the electric energy of a crowd at a concert or the solemn weight of a religious ceremony has encountered this force. It is real, it is powerful, and it operates largely outside individual awareness.

For nearly two millennia, Western civilization existed within a single massive egregore called Christianity. This structure was not merely a set of beliefs or institutions. It was a living force that held two fundamentally opposed drives in productive tension. On one side was the drive toward universal love and equality, the conviction that every human being possesses inherent worth and deserves compassion. On the other side was the drive toward hierarchical order and particular identity, the recognition that boundaries, traditions, and inherited structures serve essential functions. These two drives are natural opposites. One pushes outward toward inclusion and change. The other pulls inward toward preservation and stability. Christianity managed to contain both, creating a dynamic balance that shaped Western culture for centuries.

That container eventually fractured. As religious participation declined throughout the twentieth century, the unifying structure weakened. But the energy it contained did not simply vanish. Energy never disappears. It transforms. The Christian egregore underwent a kind of fission, splitting into two distinct and hostile fragments. Each fragment inherited one of the original drives but lost the balancing force of the other. These two fragments now animate the political Left and Right, turning contemporary politics into a spiritual conflict that most participants do not recognize as such.

The first fragment is the Progressivist egregore, which dominates the political Left. It inherited the Christian impulse toward universal compassion and the elimination of suffering. This drive seeks to create heaven on earth by identifying and removing all forms of injustice, inequality, and harm. In its original form, this impulse was balanced by tradition, hierarchy, and the acceptance of human limitation. Without that balance, it becomes an all-consuming fire of moral purity. The hunt for sin transforms into the hunt for privilege and systemic oppression. Excommunication becomes cancellation. The demand for confession and repentance remains, but the framework of grace and forgiveness weakens. What remains is Christianity without Christ, a religion of salvation through social reconstruction, driven by an intense and unbounded empathy that tolerates no compromise with imperfection.

The second fragment is the Traditionalist egregore, which dominates the political Right. It inherited the Christian emphasis on order, boundaries, and the defense of sacred inheritance. This drive seeks to preserve the structures, identities, and hierarchies that built Western civilization. In its original form, this impulse was balanced by universal love, mercy, and the recognition of common humanity. Without that balance, it becomes a fortress mentality of defensive rigidity. The protection of faith transforms into the protection of blood, soil, and cultural identity. The concept of divine order remains, but the grace that tempers judgment weakens. What remains is Christendom without Christ, a religion of preservation through boundary enforcement, driven by a deep defensive instinct that views change as existential threat.

This is why contemporary political conflict feels like a holy war. The combatants are not merely political parties or ideological movements. They are the separated halves of a once-unified spiritual force, now locked in combat. Each side possesses a piece of the original truth but lacks the complementary piece that would make it whole. The Progressivists see a world that must be purified of its historical sins and restructured according to principles of equality and inclusion. The Traditionalists see a world that must be defended against chaos and the loss of everything that makes civilization possible. Both visions contain genuine insight. Both also contain dangerous incompleteness. Neither side can understand why the other refuses to see what is so obviously true, because each is operating from a fundamentally different fragment of the same broken whole.

The practical consequence of this split is that ordinary people become possessed by forces they do not recognize. The intense emotions triggered by political news, the compulsive need to consume more information, the inability to tolerate dissenting views, the sense that everything is at stake in every election are all symptoms of egregoric influence. These are not merely personal reactions. They are the hunger pangs of a living entity that feeds on attention and emotion. The egregore needs believers, defenders, and soldiers. It recruits by offering meaning, community, and the intoxicating certainty that comes from knowing which side is righteous. Once recruited, individuals find it nearly impossible to step away, because leaving feels like betrayal, abandonment, and the loss of identity itself.

Recognition is the first step toward freedom. When a person understands that the overwhelming emotions they feel about political issues are often not entirely their own, but rather the influence of a collective force seeking to perpetuate itself, something shifts. The spell begins to weaken. This does not mean abandoning all political engagement or pretending that real issues do not exist. It means reclaiming the ability to think, feel, and choose independently rather than as a cell in a larger organism. It means recognizing that both egregores contain partial truths and dangerous excesses, and that neither deserves total allegiance.

The war between these two forces will likely continue for some time. They are powerful, they are deeply embedded in institutions and media systems, and they have millions of people who identify with them completely. But individual human beings who see these forces for what they are can choose to step off the battlefield. They can hold both compassion and order, both change and tradition, both universal principles and particular loyalties, without needing to join an army. The West is currently haunted by the fragments of its own spiritual history. True autonomy lies in recognizing the ghosts and refusing to be conscripted into their war.