By Paul Krause, Crisis Magazine - “Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.” Humans are mimetic creatures: we learn by images and imitation. This is nothing new. Aristotle identified it, Saint Thomas Aquinas built from it, and René Girard pioneered his grand theory of violence and the sacred from it. As Christianity declines, the human impulse for transcendence and the yearning for unity, solidarity, and community remain, but we are now seeing a full-throated return of thyia in all its (un)holy horror and terror.