You're listening to Breakpoint This Week, where we're talking about the top stories of the week from a Christian worldview. Today we're going to talk about the devastating floods in Texas and what that tells us about our God. We're also going to talk about the IRS telling churches they may endorse political candidates. We have a lot to get to you this week. We're so glad you're with us.
Stick around. Welcome to Breakpoint This Week. From the Colson Center for Christian Worldview, I'm Maria Baer, alongside John Stone Street, president of the Colson Center. John, before we get to the main program this week, I've been so excited to share this with you. And I'm really hoping you haven't heard this before because I want to be the one to break this news to you.
The Department of Homeland Security this week announced You no longer have to take your shoes off when you go through TSA. What I love so much about the announcement, besides the fact that you don't have to take your shoes off anymore. Which I'm now left wondering if I get a refund for my TSA pre-check, because that's why I got TSA pre-check. Regardless. They never explain in the announcement.
why they made the change, and why we used to have to take our shoes off. Anyway, they just said this will streamline security. Yes, I knew that when you the day after you implemented this policy, I knew that if you had revoked the policy, it would indeed streamline security. But are you so excited? Is this the first day of the rest of your life?
I'm not going to bite on this. I have so many thoughts on this. I have gone on a deep dive into the rabbit hole of the TSA. For a long time now, I will say that there is a bit of an irony after.
Someone enforces a pointless policy to celebrate an announcement saying we're no longer doing that. Is a point of referential absurdity. That's w would be humorous. If it didn't affect millions of lives. But anyway, I'm not biting.
That's all I'm saying. I'm so proud of you, but I'm also really happy for you because I feel like of everyone in America, this is really a big day. It's a policy that means nothing. Nor will it streamline security. Nor will it streamline.
I know. Wow. Yikes.
Well, okay, John, let's get to the program today.
So, I want to talk with you first about the biggest story of the week, which has been this horrific flooding in Texas. A lot of our listeners obviously will be aware of the news at this point. There was flash flooding last weekend. The hardest hit county was Kerr County, Texas, including a Christian camp for young girls called Camp Mystic. I was just looking through today some of the the survivors and the people who were lost from the camp, including several young girls, the camp's director, whose family said he was trying to save some of the girls when the flooding happened.
It sounds like it came through overnight.
So far we know around 120 people have died, but they're still searching for around 170 people. As a result of this flooding, it's just really unimaginable. And As always happens when news like this hits. You know, it causes you to Not only think about yourself and your own family and what this would be like, and your hearts just break for the people that are going through this unimaginable loss. But you wonder what the Lord is doing.
You have to believe he's doing something, but it's hard to wrap your mind around theologically.
Well, I mean, clearly not everyone is wondering what the Lord's doing. For many people, this is the question that makes a belief in the Lord or a God of any kind or at least the Christian God. irrational and untenable. And it's more understandable at times like this than when the problem of evil is thrown around as kind of an opinion. anti-apologetics sledgehammer, which it's been done.
Which has been done, you know, really throughout history. This is the perpetual challenge to the Christian worldview. And it's a really hard one. It's especially a really hard one when you get beyond. The typical categories of evil.
It feels almost kind of over sanitized and Maybe disrespectful. to do this kind of academic wrangling of These categories But Evil is often divided up into categories of moral and natural, moral evil being The kind of evil that we do to each other as human beings, acts of terrorism, acts of violence, and so on. Natural evil being those things that seem outside of our control, those things that the Insurance companies refer to as an act of God. But then there is a third category, and this one been into that. this kind of evil Kind of overlaps or potentially overlaps both moral and natural kinds of evil, and that is.
what my theology professor called maximum suffering. Almost always. Maximum suffering has the characteristic of being seemingly senseless. and involving children. And with children comes this level of innocence.
Being robbed, if you remember the musical Les Miz. There's a a song about this, uh about the empty tables. And referring to families being broken apart, particularly young men, that shouldn't be. Absent from those tables, but are. And so you have examples of.
both moral and natural evil that just seems over the top. When I heard, for example, That Timothy McVeigh targeted the Murrah building specifically in an area where it flicked. damage on the the daycare center that that then took that act of terrorism to a new level. The story of Camp Mystic and these girls has captivated the nation, and it's just brutal because. It doesn't take a whole lot to imagine the sort of helplessness and so on that That is that that those girls experienced that night.
And the this the sort of work that was uh carried out by counselors, by the camp director who lost his life, by This incredible Pilot, a swim rescuer that has been interviewed. His interview has gone viral. Trying to show up and do his job. It's just. It's almost so much to think about.
And that's. One of the characteristics of this that can teach us something. Why does it take our Breath away. Why is it that if we live in a world that's not superintended, A world that's just one darn thing after another, as Henry Ford put it. That's an episode between two oblivions, as another atheist put it.
in which uh humans themselves are are just The accidental collocation of atoms as another Evolutionists put it. Why is it, then, that this would take our breath away? Why does it come across as something that should not have happened. That is an anomaly. I mean, look, we live in a world where there are natural forces that overwhelm human beings all the time.
and has throughout history. Why is it that we're still surprised? We're still surprised because there is something about us. There is a law written on the human hearts. There is a perspective that we have that says this should not be.
And that instinct is either irrational, Or that instinct actually tells us something that's true. The fact that everyone kind of has that instinct. Even when someone commits A horrific act. and takes great. pride out of it as if they've done something remarkable.
Or Feels regret. All of those things still point to this reality, this universal human experience. that particularly in cases of maximum suffering, we just It should not be. We know it should not be. This is not the sort of thing.
that should ever be normal. to us. That's not the sort of thing that we should ever buy into and believe in. That's a very powerful. piece of evidence that has to be reckoned with.
And That is what has convinced me. That Evil and suffering is not. Just primarily. A problem that Christians have to quote unquote, be able to explain. It's something that every Worldview or philosophy or explanation of reality, whether it's sophisticated.
you know, from PhDs or whether it's just kind of The average person trying to make sense of their world like all of us do. That's another piece of evidence, by the way. That we respond to this so much differently than the animals do, that we don't just. Have a survival instinct that kicks in. There's a sacrificial element that kicks in.
There's a care for one another that kicks in. There's all these sorts of things. And then there's this, you know. Reckoning with it at the end. Why did that happen?
How did that happen? Whose fault is it? And I think we need to talk about that too, that whole conversation. that's been happening, but just the fact that we do that.
So A. That we think it's something that ought not to have happened and be We think we can make sense of the world and we try to make sense of the world. That's something that I every you know, so-called explanation of reality. Has to account for. And at that point, This is either just really bad luck.
If the world is really just you know, one darn thing after another and humans just an accidental collocation of atoms. Or there is meaning and purpose to it, or at least to the world itself. that we sense and are responding to as we see this. That's a very important consideration. What kind of world do we live in?
Is a fundamental question that emerges in the face of a tragedy like this.
So, if you were in a conversation with someone who accepted your premise here, that, okay, I'll concede that this points to a designer and this inner sense that this shouldn't have happened. What would you say to the next question being, how can you then say this designer is good or actually cares about us?
Well, that's the next question, right? In fact, it's the prayer we used to pray before meals is God is great, God is good. and we thank him for this food. And as David Hume put it, If God is great, he could have. prevented this evil.
If God is good, He would have prevented this evil. He did not prevent this evil, therefore God is either not great or not good. And there are ways that people have tried to explain this by. compromising either God's greatness or God's goodness. The Muslim explanation of this is that whatever God does is good by definition.
The Christian definition is that our understanding of goodness is the same as God's because it's based on God's character, and that's what he requires of us.
So we can have a different. Thing and say, well, this is good for humans, but it's bad for God, or vice versa. That's the Islamic explanation. There's also been those who have kind of thrown out the suggestion that God's not great. That there are things outside of his control.
This is famously. an open theist position. the Rabbi Harold Kushner. came to that conclusion as a as a Jewish writer trying to make sense of his own I believe it was a dramatic suffering and death of his own son. that he was writing about.
I think why bad things happen to good people. And that was his conclusion.
Well If you posit a God who's not really great or not really good, then you're outside of Christianity. Both of those things are fundamental premises of. Who God has revealed himself to be. And God's greatness and God's goodness. is manifested actually in the same act of God.
in which God addresses really what's underlying all this. Which is that many people do not find apologetic explanations or explications of this particular, you know, problem of evil and suffering convincing. In other words, there's the question that people ask, and I think there's the question that people are really asking. A lot of times, I had this experience years ago. Speaking to our youth group in a girl came up to me and And she said, I I I want to ask you some questions and we sat down and Sheep.
Asked me this question: why does God let bad things happen? And I went through the neatly packaged answer, which a lot of people have written. And by the way, I think it's intellectually defensible. I think it's rational. I think it's better than all the other answers on the market.
And then she looked at me and she said, I but you just weren't able to help me. And I said Where did this question come from? And that's the question, really, I should have asked at the beginning, but I was new at this at the time. And She went through uh a horrific act of personal injustice and suffering. A family breakdown, a church breakdown.
And she said to me, You know, why did God let that happen? And see, that's a different kind of question. There's the question: why would God allow evil and suffering to take place? If he is great and he's good. And then there's the question: why did God let that suffering happen to me?
Now, the questions are related to be sure, right? In other words, in a Atheistic framework and a pantheistic framework and an Islamic framework. There's not rational explanations. For the existence of evil itself in the world. Why we sense them as evil, and then what God is actually doing.
to deal with it or what can be done to deal with it.
Okay, so all three of those uh phil philosophies fail on those fronts. Christianity offers not a God who explains, but a god who acts As both an answer to the question, where did evil come from in the beginning? It's the kind of God we have, the kind of world he created, the kind of people that we are. But that God is Actively doing something. Because at the end of the day, one form of this question is: why doesn't God just do something?
Why doesn't God just do something? The Christian answer is: God did. He became one of us. He himself Became a victim of the evil and the suffering that he allowed to take place in the world. In fact, He was a victim of maximum evil.
He was an innocent sufferer. But his actions also defeated that. took away the sting of that. And brings us a level, not just of kind of existential feeling better, because oftentimes we don't. but solid ground to stand on for a long-term hope.
That is that isn't always existentially satisfying in the suffering of the moment. But at the end of the day, people need to find meaning. There's no meaning to be found if there's no meaning in the whole story. There's really no meaning to be found if this meaning is merely just some sort of human imposition. Like, well, I'll make my meaning out of this, I'll make this worth something.
That's just not going to be. feasible if the entire world has no meaning. But if the entire story has meaning, if our lives are infused with meaning, if history is headed in a purposeful direction, And evil will one day. be uh flipped upside down. Then you have a strategy of a God who actually uses evil to bring good.
That doesn't mean we can point to this and say, here's the good and the reason for the evil. That's where I think the danger is. Remember, Job's friends were great until they started talking. And that's the danger here. The danger at one level is not to say anything.
As if nothing can be said, as if Christians are as hopeless as everyone else in the face of evil and suffering. We're not. The other dangerous sank too much. which often happens out of this, which is this is the exact reason this happened. People did that after Katrina.
People have done that. To suffering mothers in horrific sort of ways. I call them the Romans 828 moms, you know. where people love those All things work together for good brother over the wall. While not actually entering the The suffering of the other.
But of course, that's actually the strategy of God: to enter the suffering. of others. It doesn't take away the pain. But It is I think handles That some one Can hold on to. The older I get, the more it means to me the part of the Lord's Prayer about daily bread.
Because I think in a moment You know, when you can't, you don't want to say too much. You want to be with somebody. one of the most comforting things. I think we can offer is that Whatever this is, it's temporary. and whatever you need right now you will receive.
you know, and and God is good. And I think people who Hearing testimonies of people who've experienced tremendous grief. This is a theme that comes up. is that it's kind of one day at a time, one breath at a time. And there's such a great mercy of God in that and such wisdom in.
Not looking at all of this as forever. That's the other gift of the cross, right? Is that This is an episode, not between two. Oblivions, but it's life is an episode that includes suffering, but it is temporary. John, you mentioned that you might want to hit on this question of who's at fault for this kind of thing and maybe our tendency to grasp for blame.
Do you want to hit that real quick before we move on here? Yeah, I I do. I and it's just because It's been horrific. to see people jump in. with a political explanation or a p political blame for this almost immediately.
Early on. I mean, and that's something, I mean, frankly, the inconsistency here. is absolutely infuriating. you know as a Commentator put it. Today, if And again, I usually don't speak in these kind of stark political terms, but I think.
This is actually right. That if A Republican is in charge. And something like this happens, the Democrats blame the Republicans. If a Democrat's in charge and something like this happens, the Democrats blame the Republicans. If the Republicans speak out.
And when they do, it's just as bad. By blaming somebody else unfairly for Mm-hmm. then everyone says you're not allowed to do that. The inconsistency here on the media coverage. Is absolutely remarkable, but it does tell us something, right?
We talked about this before. when you're talking about candidates running for office, one thing to really pay attention to is when someone says, This is the problem. And I will fix it, right? As if all problems are political, legitimately, and all solutions are political.
Well, bring it to a situation like this. You remember when the storm went through, the hurricane and landed in outside of Asheville last year, and the horrific suffering that took place there and. An unprecedented.
Well, what do we mean by unprecedented? You know, I told the story about. Fishing in West Virginia and seeing the floodline, you know, 30 feet up in the air above a river. It's just, it's, this sort of thing happens. Praise God.
God holds that back. That's what we know of scripture-wise. More of it would happen. Both acts of moral evil and natural evil, if God were not working to actively hold it back. But we do live in a fallen world.
Where that stuff does happen.
So, to immediately say, well, the best explanation of this is political and the best.
solution for this is political is is is foolishness. This is not the lens. We added added this as we were talking about the election. Chuck used to say salvation. does not come in Air Force One, neither does the Apocalypse come in Air Force One.
If there is a breakdown civilizationally, it is upstream. From all of this.
So that's the part of the blame. that I think has been just It's been really hard, honestly, to take in. I want to point to just Just quickly, two sources. that can help us wrestle with this. And one last observation.
The final observation is this. It is the human tendency, and it is especially the human tendency in a cultural moment like ours. That's so dominated by a sense of safety and control that the world's never had before, right? We talked about living on the tail end of the modern period, and our technological prowess has given us an ability. To control so much that previously was not.
So it's very, very tempting to think: well, we ought to be able to control everything. That's a mistake in the worldview. It's also very, very tempting to say that, well, what it means to get past this is to feel better. And I think your observation about the comfort. Which is what But God promises comfort.
Doesn't mean you feel better. It means you you're not walking alone. You're not suffering alone. Ultimately, there's a God who's entered your suffering, Himself having suffered in Christ. and now victorious over sin and death.
And that's A comforter. in the Godhead. There's something really powerful about the Trinity. Theologically, but this is diving deep into some theological categories where if somebody just wants to feel better. It doesn't always seem like, well, why would I do that?
I would encourage you to do that. I would encourage you to go deeper, not wider, at this point. There's a book called by a guy named Henry Blocher, B-L-O-C-H-E-R. called Evil and the Cross. I think which is it's it's a little dense it's it's It's an academic treatment of the problem of evil that ends up in a very profound theological place, and I think it's one of the best.
The other one I would recommend is way more personal. It has to do with that idea of feeling better. Nicholas Woltestorff, the great Christian philosopher. lost a son and he wrote on this. And He said people said it would feel better in time.
And he said, I don't want it to. Is what does that say about the loss? The loss never stops. And the book is called Lament for a Son. And I think it's kind of a journey like.
Joke and wrestling with that.
So those are two.
sources that I I would I would point to that I think are are helpful. while at the same time not pretending like that our conversation you know, dots every I and crosses every T. My theology prof used to say, you know, there's always going to be socks hanging outside of your theological suitcase. Especially at times like this. And I think he's right.
Well, John, let's take a quick break and we'll be right back with more breakpoints this week. Hi, breakpoint listeners. If you've been considering applying for the Colson Fellows Program, there's good news. We've extended the deadline two weeks until July 31st. The Colson Fellows Program is a 10-month worldview formation program for busy men and women in all stages of life.
The program takes a deep dive into Christian worldview to equip you to live like a Christian right where God has called you. But don't wait to submit your application. If you've been on the fence about the program, now is the time to jump in. Don't miss this opportunity to deepen your faith and sharpen your mind with like-minded Christians around you. If you have questions, we've added two more live informational webinars on July 17th and July 23rd, hosted by Michael Craven, Vice President and Dean of the Colson Fellows Program.
Find out more at colsonfellows.org. That's colsonfellows.org. Uh We're back on breakpoint this week. John, I want to turn now to some of the other headlines from this week. The first one, which has kind of made big ripples in our world and will have a big impact in the country.
Is the IRS announcing that it will change the way it has enforced the Johnson Amendment? This is the famous amendment that basically has told pastors, or at least has been interpreted by the IRS up to this point, that Christian pastors and religious leaders cannot endorse political candidates from the pulpit. This has to do with. The tax exempt status of churches and nonprofits, the idea until now has really been you can't engage in direct politicking if you have this tax exempt status.
Well, this week, the IRS announced It's going to look at this a little bit differently: that pastors have the right to say what they want. This is a free speech right. And there had been some preemptive lawsuits. Against the IRS because of this interpretation of the Johnson Amendment before now, which has. You know, I think you could make a really strong argument that it's been somewhat selectively, if not enforced, at least selectively threatened.
I would say usually on the progressive left, especially in progressive left churches, there's been a deep connection between churches and candidates, and that line has been very blurry. Whereas on the right, pastors have tended to be a little bit more careful. I mean, I remember Lois Lerner at the IRS under Obama basically telling the administration to pay closer attention to these conservative Christian groups and how they might violate this amendment. Anyway, this is an interesting development, but what do you think about it? I'm a little bit mixed.
Well, no, it's the right move because it's never been enforced. It's never been enforced either way. And it has been threatened, but selectively threatened. There's never a threat heading the one direction.
So it's a bad law if it's not enforced. It's a bad law that needed to be changed. That's something that President Trump. talked about before his very first campaign. This was or in his very first presidential campaign.
He did it in somewhat rudimentary ways, talking about we're going to say Merry Christmas again, we're going to get rid of the Johnson amendment. You can have Red Cups at Starbucks again.
Well, but see, this is the point. It goes to the heart of so many of the stories that we've actually experienced, right? Whereas the real threats to religious liberty in America We're not from the Johnson Amendment.
Now, again, I think it's great that basically it's gone. That's what this move is: basically, the IRS moving further away, whether it'll be. Reinstated in later administrations in some form or another remains to be seen. But the question wasn't whether the IRS was going to invade the pulpit and force a pastor to do something against his will. And we talked about that a couple weeks ago with the Obergefeld decision.
All the pastors saying, I will never perform a same-sex wedding here.
Well, no one was ever asking a pastor to perform a same-sex wedding. They were asking the baker to bake a same-sex wedding cake. And that's where the compromise to religious freedom really came. And honestly, there was a. A gathering prior to the 2016 election about religious freedom.
within candidate Trump, where this conversation came up and There were real concerns expressed that these are the real challenges.
Now, again, I'm not saying this is a bad step. I'm just saying that in the long, Overall scheme of things, it probably won't change anything because. It's not ever been enforced. Because it's a bad law, it should be taken off the books or it should be essentially neutered completely, which is what was happening. But but overall, I don't I d I don't think this is all that consequential.
Maybe as a foothold for the next step which needs to be taken. And by the way, in many ways, Through executive orders, certainly through lawsuits, certainly because ADF keeps beating the state of Colorado. There's a lot of examples where, you know, true progress has been made for religious freedom, you know, First Liberty protecting Coach Kennedy, you know, the rights of conscience being protected. All of this is great stuff.
So we've seen some real benefits and some real steps being taken. Would you counsel a pastor against Directly endorsing a candidate?
Well, that's an interesting question because that's the coverage that I saw on this. That, yeah, I mean, it's almost universal agreement that the Johnson Amendment needs to go. It was never, you know, rightly enforced or ever enforced, certainly selectively threatened. I think your phrasing of that is exactly. Right.
You know, no one went after Rafael. Yeah, right. I mean, who who did that? But then, you know, it was quickly followed. I saw a couple.
Political commentators, including Christian ones, say, well, and no church should ever do this. I don't think that's the case at all. I think that the church should absolutely. At times, at least if not, say, you should absolutely vote for this and bind someone's conscience. Uh I that that's probably a step too far.
But to say you should never vote? For this person, because they're platform i mean i go back to the framing That you and I talked about leading up to the election, you know, which I owe to a former colleague at some administrative We should think about what it means in a particular civilizational cultural moment like ours. Of voting being the vote to lessen evil, not between the lesser of two evils, because we're sometimes voting on policy, we're voting on people with policies. We have to, you know. You know, talk about kind of character comparisons, you know, between perhaps candidates that are mean and candidates that have beliefs.
and endorse policies that are absolutely immoral.
So how do you you know, you know, measure all that out.
Well, you do the best you can. And say, this is the vote to lessen evil. And if a pastor says that, or at least says, you know, listen. This should never happen. You know, this guy should not hold office.
I think that's a legitimate. You know, you might call that an anti-endorsement. I don't, I don't see, I guess that line seems really arbitrary to me. If we don't have the Johnson Amendment in place, we don't have the threats of the IRS.
So, you know, why wouldn't we? at some level. You know, personnel is policy, policy is policy, and you got to look at all that stuff.
So, yeah, I think at times you absolutely should say between these two, this is an easy one. Yeah. I mean, you can look looking at the mayoral race in New York, it's hard to imagine, hard to imagine a pastor trying to thread a needle like.
Well, just choose the best you can. Choose the non-communist. Maybe on offer thing. Yeah, that's some extreme examples.
Well, John, there's another story I wanted to talk with you about. Justice Katanji Brown Jackson, the most junior member of the Supreme Court, has. Been giving some interviews. Their term is over for the year, and she's talked to a couple, I think, law schools and news outlets. And made some really fascinating comments.
And so I wanna read one to you and get your take on this, because I think a lot of people were. Reasonably surprised by this. She was talking to the Global Black Economic Forum. And she said that. Her role on the Supreme Court.
She views it as an opportunity, quote, to explain my views about the way our government does and should work. and to tell people in my opinions how I feel about the issues. That was surprising to me on a lot of friends. First and foremost, being that she is saying out loud that. She views her role as a way of sharing her personal beliefs about the issues.
Maybe she. Misspoke, but if you view that quote in the line of her opinions and some of the things she has said in her opinions, I think she might have meant it. That is not precisely my view of the Supreme Court. which is more or less to interpret the law as it was passed. Uh what do you think about this comment?
It was a fascinating comment because it revealed an awful lot. I mean, I At one level, there's a a fundamental difference. There's a divide in the United States between those who think That there is neutrality possible by the court, and that's what the institution is set up to do. an adjudicating branch of government amongst particularly the other two. To check power and check decisions for their constitutionality, and that requires kind of a belief.
That they are at some degree neutral. Not that people are neutral, but that collectively, given the task that they're given, the training that they're given, the recognition of their track record. Putting them all together in the way that they're both nominated for the court. put on the court and so on. that there is a neutrality that's possible.
But there is a framing of life in the world. a far more cynical one, which says there is no neutrality. There's no way for the court to actually do what it was tasked to do. And You know, probably there are those who hit that just from complete political cynicism. Right.
They see the court as being merely a political branch. Where whoever has the majority is going to always support their party, is always going to support their view. And that party is not actually attached to right and wrong. It's just attached to their platform and their platform. And this whole thing is a balance of power.
Now, if that sounds. Like a postmodern interpretation of the world, it actually is. I think some people get there from more of a political cynicism. than they get there from postmodern philosophy. But I'll tell you what, the whole scene.
Took me back to the confirmation process of Justice Sotomayor. Who famously was challenged because of a speech that she had given called, um, Where she had the wise Latina woman line, where she said, as a wise Latina woman, I would come. to a better decision than a white man who hasn't lived my life. And the question was: that sounds an awful lot like, you know, bias. And is this reverse racism?
And President Obama got on television and said, Don't worry, you know, just go read this speech in context. And it'll make more sense.
So I did. I went and read the speech in context, and I thought, oh, This is Michelle Foucault, top to bottom. In fact, she literally says a few lines before that, to judge is an exercise of power. Not to judge as an exercise of interpretation, but to judge as an exercise of power. There is a deeply ingrained view.
of life in the world. underlying that statement. that then becomes a view of law that she buys into. And now you're talking about narratives of oppressed and oppressor. You're talking about narratives of power.
You're talking about someone. who sees all law as being an imposition of power.
So that if it's them. That power has been oppressive. The only way to move forward is to get a voice. and then use your own voice as a lever of power. It's a very cynical view of the law.
It it basically says that there's nothing underneath it. There's no right and wrong in ultimate categories of justice that are either underneath it or or can be accessed. And that's really what underlies this. This was kind of the next stage of that, I think. You know, we know that.
For example, on a popular level. There's a a uh You know, something about, you know, Get your voice, you be you, say your own. It's very populist, and Kataji Brown. Jackson's comment sounded a lot more like the expressive individualism. that Carl Truman talks about, which is very much married to to critical theory and You know, I need to, you know, give my view.
I mean, think about on a popular level. We say things like every opinion counts, and it doesn't matter if that opinion is educated or not educated. I'm not saying a lot of people have been saying, but I'm not saying Justice Jackson's. views aren't educated. I think they've been educated in a very particular way.
And it's in this kind of cynical view of whether or not A, the court does anything more than impose power, and B, Whether there is something about judging. Like, you know, if I were to say what Soda Mayor said, I would say to judge is a matter of interpretation, right? There is a law, your job is to interpret the law. It's interesting, by the way, Justice Soda Mayor this week actually. kind of criticize Justice Jackson.
for going kind of the political route instead of first doing your job to adjudicate. The Constitution But that's What a judge is. That's what the branch is. And you either believe that that task. Is A possible and B legitimate, or B A legitimate, B possible?
I don't know which one would come first in that whole thing, but. Or not. And that philosophy, that postmodern vision, whether you go to the critical theory version of it or the populist version of it. or the Michelle Foucault version of it that Sotomayor relies on. Two things.
The answer, no. It's not legitimate, not possible. Unsettling in a way to just to hear that she views her job that way as a as a sort of a vehicle for or a lever for her to share her views of things. A, as if that's what we asked her to do when we approved her to be a justice. But it's kinda, it reminded me of, you know, when you have like a prayer meeting and you say it's time for everybody to share their prayer requests and then.
People use that time to like tell you a 20-minute story about something that they just wanted to share. And I'm absolutely acceptable gossip in the South that begins with bless their hearts and goes to the story. We were asking for a prayer request, but you've chosen to use this as a vehicle to do like there's it is unsettling when one of the justices, you know, says that she views her role that way. And I think that's a great analogy, by the way. But this is the problem with that populist way of looking at things is that it leads you to do what I think.
I don't know if she does this personally. I don't think it's a coincidence that she, of all the justices, says the most words every year. You know, there are people who are. No, it is. I just saw that.
I actually saw that confirmed. There is a, that, that, it's been since she's been in, which is unusual for a new justice. I'm willing to chalk some of that up to style, but when you hear this kind of. Philosophical explanation. 100%.
And I think every justice should ask every question that they think to ask. Like, I don't think you shouldn't speak necessarily, but. I will say, she of all the justices, too, it is kind of a hobby of mine to listen to oral arguments. And more than anybody, she uses the phrase, it seems to me. And I've noticed that before any of this came up, or I heard this comment from her.
It seems to me that, like, she does more opining, I think, than other justices. And What I wanted to say is, I think, I don't know if she's doing this personally. But one of the most dangerous things you can do Is to start to trust your own view of things more than anything else. And the populist view, and even the critical theory view of the world, depending on your identity, she is a black woman. Runs you the risk of doing that.
I think one of the wisest things you can do is to mistrust your own first interpretations and intuitions and to ask questions. But when you view things through the lens of because I'm, because I have these identity markers or whatever, my view is more correct or legitimate or just than people who don't share these characteristics, that's a recipe for some strange thinking. It's just unsettling as a citizen.
Well, you and I were talking offline yesterday about this a little bit. And given so do Mayor's comments, then that should, you know, her vision of the law should ground. Justice Jackson's ability to see the law the same way. I mean, one's a little bit more academically sophisticated than the other, but it's really the same way.
So it is a little inconsistent for Justice Sotomayor to then critique Her approach to this decision, and you'd have to look at the specifics there. It was a decision that was rendered eight to one with. Justice Jackson being the one. In even the liberal justices joining the conservative justices and saying, well, it's a matter of the law. And by the way, in that same speech, she says, There's not a universal definition of whys.
So, this is to the question that you're asking: is that whether you think there's a there, you think there's a moral law, you think that there's. Justice and truth that is actually accessible, even that there's a constitution that is. accessible. and that there's something to the Constitution beyond perspective. Or not.
And that's really the debate on the law. And that's why, by the way, you can become a lawyer. in the United States and never read the Constitution. Because why? You're going to read case law.
You're going to read interpretation, interpretation, interpretation. and try to figure out new interpretations or way to lever. Uh leverage old interpretations. You know, it's not like what's the whole idea of authorial original intent, it becomes irrelevant.
So, yeah, it's it's it's super interesting. It's just the problem is that it's super consequential, right? To me, it's like the nerdy part of me is like, oh, the ideas do have consequences. And then, of course, in real life, you're like, oh, this is how this plays out. And I'm a little concerned.
Do you think AI is going to replace lawyers? If you're a lawyer and you're a Colson Fellow, please reach out to us because I'm so fascinated by what you see coming. Down the pike. That's just such a fascinating question to me.
Okay, John, last item I want to hit before we get to some questions and feedback. is the Great Lakes Symposium is coming up. Can you share a little bit with us about that? Yeah, I think it's a fascinating topic this year, and I want to invite everyone to join us for the Great Lakes Symposium, which is taking place on Thursday. July 24th.
My guests this year are Jim Daly, a focus on the family, and Seth Dillon, the CEO. Of the Babylon B, and the topic is truth, love, and humor, faith without fear. Is it possible to hold those three things together? We often talk about holding truth and love together. But can we also hold truth, love, and humor together?
the role of humor and satire, and of course The Babylon Bee is everyone's favorite fake news site as they describe themselves. And they explore using humor to tell the truth. I think it's a really important thing. To talk not just about the existence of truth, a lot of the Apologetics approaches, rightfully so, have wrestled with the notion of truth, whether truth is absolute or truth is subjective. Once we Determine, I think, as Christians have to, that truth is absolute.
There is truth that's knowable. that's outside of ourselves. Then what does it mean then to obey God? And be someone who's willing to stand on the truth, speak the truth. live the truth and even love the truth.
And that puts us in an awkward place across the board. You know, it's great to have a good sense of humor. It's great to have a perspective which says, Truth and love are never in conflict. And that's the whole conversation. That we're going to have.
You might remember. The Babylon Bee was banned from Twitter. For a long time, for a particularly, well, what's the word? A tweet that ran afoul of the cultural moment. And Well, so interesting about that story is that there's a decision that had to be made, and Seth Dellon made that decision.
That even though there was a shortcut to get an enormous audience that they had on Twitter back. he decided that the truth was more important than the outcome. And the entire conversation in the modern period is that truth is the outcome. You know, if it's true for you or true for me, it depends on whether it's good for you or good for me. It's a very utilitarian view.
And to stand athwart history that way, in a very real way, and say we're just going to trust the Lord. And the Lord moved in a very crazy, crazy way, as some people know. I don't want to give it away because I want you to come and hear the story. and be a part of the conversation. The Great Lakes Symposium is going to be at the Great Lakes Center for the Arts, a beautiful venue there in Bay Harbor, Michigan.
Now, if you live in the Bay Harbor area, please join us at the Great Lakes Center for the Arts. But the event will also be live streamed, and we have an incredible live stream audience and also an ability to For you, as part of the live stream audience, to join the conversation by submitting questions and being a part of the conversation.
So, we hope you'll do that. You can sign up by going to colsoncenter.org/slash truth. That's colsoncenter.org/slash truth. Hi, John Stone Street here from the Colson Center. If you've ever taken a close look at a really old church building, most of the time you can find a cornerstone.
A lot of times, the cornerstone will bear the names of the founders who built the church, not just to last during their time, but for generations to come. If the ministry of the Colson Center is making a lasting impact in your life, and if it's going to continue to make a lasting impact for the kingdom of God, we have to have that same kind of strong foundation. That's why I'm going to invite you to become a cornerstone monthly partner with us at the Coulson Center. Your monthly support provides a steady foundation so that we can do the work that God has called us to do. It's a way to ensure that resources like Breakpoint, the Strong Women podcast, the What Would You Say video series, and the Identity Project can remain free so that believers, families, individuals, pastors, teachers can continue to use them and benefit from them.
Your monthly support also helps to fund Colson Fellow Scholarships for those who have financial need. More than anything else, that sort of financial stability allows us to seize the strategic opportunities as God brings them to us.
So please join us, laying a strong foundation for the future by becoming a cornerstone monthly partner of the Colson Center. Visit us at colsoncenter.org slash monthly. That's colsoncenter.org slash monthly. We're back on Breakpoint this week. John, I want to hit real quick a question that we got from a listener a couple of weeks ago, and we haven't had time to get to it before now, but I think it's a really interesting one.
He sent in a question saying, you know, you and I have talked a lot before about. Transgenderism. Really appearing to be a social contagion, particularly among young girls. And that's a relatively new development. Abigail Schreier has, of course, covered that.
In really great depth with her book, Irreversible Damage. Other journalists have kind of uncovered the truth of this as well, but it's getting harder and harder to deny. The stats are out there. I mean, the vast majority of people showing up to so-called gender clinics at all these children's hospitals across the country are either prepubescent or teenage girls.
However, this listener asked whether the same might be true of men, that transgenderism could also be. a social contagion among young males. I want to read you just a little bit of his question. As I observe men to be claiming they're transgender and feel like a woman, it seems like a social contagion as well. Men with a lack of self-worth and self-esteem.
Maybe they were very much not a part of a crowd. They didn't have friends in school. They have low-income jobs or no good education. Maybe they're not as attractive as others. And this listener is asking whether that might contribute as well.
Because I think the storyline, at least as I've understood it, is that, you know.
so-called gender dysphoria. traditionally in history has usually been diagnosed in boys. And it's usually diagnosed fairly young. And so, the sense you're left with when you learn that information is that this is actually a real problem in a very, very small subset, but it's a real psychological phenomenon. Among young boys, which has kind of led us away from the idea that this could have been culturally nurtured at all.
But do you think it's possible that it has been in the male population as well? Listen, I think the entire issue changes within a cultural setting, right? In other words, Solomon said there's nothing new under the sun, and he's absolutely right. But in certain cultural moments, there are external factors that bring certain existential questions. Or certain sins, or whatever, up to the top.
And that's been one of the things that's been so frustrating in this whole trans conversation. I've said this before, Oliver O'Donovan, the wonderful Anglican ethicist. Has written on these issues of sexuality, artificial reproduction, technologies, and so on. And 25 years ago, he wrote on. Transsexualism.
That's back then when that was the proper term for it. And he notes that by and large, I mean, when we're talking about this issue, we're talking about men in their middle age with some kind of sexual brokenness, some kind of sexual perversion in their life.
Well, then when we hear these whistleblowers that come out of Tavistock or the university. Of Washington, St. Louis. They're all saying these are all. You know, young girls.
You read Abigail Schreier, and she's like, this is happening to entire classrooms, right? Where you have school groups, and there are, you know, 10 or 12 girls within a particular classroom. class or a particular school. That are coming out and saying, I was born into the wrong body at the wrong time. You're also talking about a particular timeframe, not just a particular geographic location.
And guess what it has to do with?
Social media. And then it gets worse. Guess when that happened? When everyone was sent home from school, not looking at each other in the eye and are on screens all day. And then, despite all of these factors, that it has gone from male to female, that it's gone from middle-aged to young, that it's gone into particular places and particular times, we're like, I don't know.
I mean, I think it. We were born this way. I mean, it was a absurd conclusion. From all the obvious data points.
So, what we're saying is it's clearly been a social contagion for young women. That's what's happened. Uh is it also for young men? I think the answer to that is yes. I think it if you look in particular settings, Again, you'll see Kind of bunches.
uh emerging. But it's been by and large young women. And I think that has a lot to do also. with something that would be less obvious and more philosophical, which is the struggle that we've had figuring out what it means to be a woman. Practically.
So now we've reached the point where even you know Supreme Court Nominees are unwilling to answer that on record. But think about that's come out of 20 or 30 years going, well, a woman is this, a woman is that, a woman is this, a woman is that. And as a wonderful group of Female Catholic theologians have pointed out. The only thing we agree on is that a woman isn't her fertility, that we have to fight her fertility and eliminate her fertility and so on. I will say one other thing on this, particularly on the question as it could it also be a social contagion for young men.
The transgender confusion itself is a social contagion. It's especially, you know, affected. Young women. But there is one community that's interesting. if it weren't so serious.
Where there does seem to be higher numbers. and that is African American young men. Anthony Bradley has talked about this a little bit. And tweeted on this, and so on, that it is middle class. African American, suburban.
Kind of an epidemic or higher numbers than in the past that identify you know, with one of the letters in the spectrum, L G B T Q. or in the acronym LGBTQIA, I think some of us started to notice there seems to be more from that population. Whereas that wasn't the case 10 or 15 years ago. I don't know all the details to that, but that's my suspicion. that it's particularly i in infecting middle class America.
and specific ethnic groups. I mean, why could that possibly be the case?
Well Maybe. A lot of it has to do with The message that is both explicitly preached and implicitly preached. That what you want to be is as many minority statuses as possible. That's the idea of intersectionality. You had this one and this one and this one and this one and this one, and now you're a morally preferred person.
And in an age of identity crisis, embracing multiple identities. Also, in an age of pornography, where there's sexual brokenness that gets introduced into it. I mean, one can clearly see the social factors that are nudging. young men, particularly young men from particular communities in this direction. I think there is also a real and pressing need for somebody to study.
The connection between Not just transgenderism, but just sexual deviance and struggle. and having been sexually abused. We're just not allowed to talk about that connection, but it just seems incredibly obvious to me and incredibly consequential. I don't know what the numbers are, but even studying it is so, you know, you're just like, it's a third rail, which is just adds cruelty to cruelty. And I hope that somebody will do that.
The most recent numbers are like one out of six young men and one out of. three to four young women, which sounds insane. Who identified? That's not taking yet that have been sexually abused. That's not taking into account.
That pornography has become sexually abusive. Yeah. Right? In other words, the things that we would have considered to be abusive. You know, forced exposure at an early age, hypersexualizing an experience, and so on.
All that's happened on the internet, all that's happened on social media. No one considers that. I think when you are talking about another embodied person, it is another category. But you know, you're exactly right. That has been off limits.
Since Obergefell, we talked about all the things that Obergefell did, and I mean the debate leading up to Obergefell, that we were never supposed to say. that sexual orientation has anything to do. with sexual abuse. because of the Born in This Way narrative. We were never supposed to say that.
And so that question, look, I'm old enough to remember. When that was a part of this conversation, and then when you were never supposed to bring that up again. And, you know, we should absolutely bring that up on both the gender identity issue. as well as sexual orientation. both of which are categories that we made up.
To downplay any of the social it's another example of what you always say that when it comes to sex, the rules are different, because there's a lot of things we are willing to attribute. I mean, we'll talk about the very real connections between like teenage obesity. especially among young women and sexual abuse. And we will not make this connection. And it's again, it's adding cruelty to cruelty, I think.
So I hope that we can move that direction.
Okay, John, do you have a recommendation you could share with us quickly?
Well, I think I cheated. I gave mine. I'm going to play by the rules. And yeah, I mentioned the two resources on evil and suffering, and there are some other. Powerful conversations.
You know, look, I've often said we live in the golden age of apologetics. If there's a tough question, it's been pretty thoroughly answered.
Sometimes those answers don't always get to the average everyday person. At the same time, These answers aren't always. Existentially satisfying.
So we have to, I think, think really hard about what it is that we're after. Are we after truth? And are we going to allow that truth to at some level inform and shape and ground our feelings? Or are we going to get that backwards? And it gets really, really hard at a time of great suffering.
like this. I recommend so fundamentally If you want to learn more, go to those places. But let's all pray. Believing that prayer is actually doing something for these victims. It's heartbreaking.
And yes, the Great Lakes Symposium.
So go to Colsoncenter.org slash truth to join that conversation.
Well, I'll just recommend I've I know I've recommended him before, but my soundtrack for the summer is once again John Mark Macmillan. He has so many great albums. My favorite two are The Medicine and Economy. But you really can't go wrong. It's such a great, like, summer sound.
There's some great worship songs in there. He has such a unique voice. He reminds me of a Christian version of Bruce Springsteen sometimes.
So if you like that kind of thing. John Mark McMillan. Also, just for nostalgia's sake, next time you're at the airport, take off your shoes. You know what? Don't let a good thing go to waste.
Give them to the TSA agent. Just tell them you're sorry that things have changed and you know that they probably miss looking at your shoes. You know, just go with it. Nostalgia is good. Take off those shoes.
Don't let the man get you down. If you can't tell from my tone, I'm being sarcastic and I'm kidding. And I'm sorry. That's just a character flaw. I am a sarcastic person.
Okay, John, that's going to do it for the show this week. Thank you so much for listening to Breakpoint This Week from the Colson Center for Christian Worldview. I'm Maria Baer alongside John Stone Street. Please have a wonderful and safe week, and we'll see you all back here soon. God bless.
