David Theroux, In Memoriam

Today we honor the life and legacy of our dear friend David Theroux, who left this mortal coil to be with our Lord Jesus on April 23, 2022. He passed after a brief illness in the company of his wife Mary and loving family.

David served as one of the first Advisory Board members to LCI, and for his guidance and insights I am truly grateful. Moreover, his far greater contribution to the cause of liberty and of Christ was his founding of the Independent Institute and the C.S. Lewis Society of California.

Of course, David has influenced many more facets of modern libertarianism, but I think it would be most appropriate to point you to his extended biography at the Independent Institute, rather than recite those same things here.

What now follows is only intended to honor my friend David through a brief recounting of some of my significant memories with him.

When I started LibertarianChristians.com in late 2008, David was an early supporter of the project. I was already familiar with the Independent Institute, but less familiar with David’s particular work on the thought of C.S. Lewis. His encouragement, contributions, and sharing of ideas were always welcome and refreshing. I have emails from him dating back to before 2010.

David was one of the first people I consulted about putting on the first Christians for Liberty Conference in Austin, Texas back in the summer of 2014. I persuaded him to jump on board as the first keynote speaker that year. He spoke on C.S. Lewis on Mere Liberty and the Evils of Statism.

He joined us on Episode 22 of the Libertarian Christian Podcast to talk about C.S. Lewis and natural law.

Funny story: in summer 2015 I had an interview at Lawrence-Livermore National Laboratory. I flew into San Francisco and the day after my interview dropped by the Independent Institute headquarters completely unannounced. I waltzed in and said I was there to see David, who was delightfully surprised and welcomed me warmly. We had a lovely time talking about their latest projects and meeting the staff. I only had a couple hours but it was well worth surprising their office and hanging out with David and the II crew.

He was, once again, among the first people I recruited to the Advisory Board of LCI. And through the difficult times of COVID, he still made time to commit to our meetings and be an active voice.

The last time I spoke to David, we continued our discussion of a series of articles we had been compiling together for a project we were calling “Against Secular Materialism”, which we will eventually use to show how being against the naturalism worldview also means being against the State.

Even last week, he was publishing articles. His latest essay was on Reason, Morality and the Delusion of Naturalism, which I shared in my last Weekend Insights post. I was not aware of his passing at that time.

David’s work will continue to have an effect long into the future, that much is certain.

“David Theroux’s passion for freedom, peace and liberty, and for improving human life, will live on with all of those he inspired,” said Graham Walker, Executive Director of the Independent Institute. (This is on their frontpage right now.)

David… I’m going to miss you, my friend.