You're listening to Breakpoint This Week, where we're talking about the top stories of the week from a Christian perspective. Today we're going to talk about the legacy of William Wilberforce. An attack on Christians in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and some new developments in assisted reproductive technology. We have a lot to get to this week. As always, we're so glad you're with us.
Please 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. I am recording this week. Our producer just said it looks like you're up in the mountains somewhere.
I don't think there are mountains in Iowa, but there are lots of hills. I don't know exactly how to characterize this terrain I'm in. But I'm once again at Village Creek Bible Camp. Outside of Lansing, Iowa, right along the Mississippi River. And it is gorgeous here.
John, you are at an undisclosed location this week, too, right? You and me are both summering pretty hard this week. We are summering. We're summering. That's right.
But we would never, never leave the broadcast without, you know, filling it with something meaningful.
So here we are. You got to keep first things first. That's right. Also, I wanted to wish you and all who might celebrate a happy feast day of William Wilberforce. That actually took place of Wednesday of this week.
You and I are recording this on Thursday. And this is a recognition of William Wilberforce instituted by the Anglican Church, which is. Your home turf.
So do you want to tell us a little bit about the origination of this?
Well ish. I mean it depends on what you mean. But you know there's various Days that are set up to honor certain folks within church history. And William Wilberforce's day was Wednesday. And several people posted about it, which was great.
But more than that, Wilberforce certainly is a life. We're celebrating.
So I'll telegraph my recommendation early from the end of the program to today, which is if you haven't watched the Amazing Grace film for a while, it just really is stunning. Not only for the great portrayal of Willi Wilberforce, but also for the wonderful portrayal of John Newton, who, of course, the slave trader, author of Amazing Grace, became a local pastor and deeply influenced Wilberforce. And you can also kind of get up to speed on this remarkable life that, as he put it, was about two great aims, the abolition of slavery and the reformation of manners. Again, defending human dignity. in a particular area.
And advancing public morality.
So these are the reasons that. His life meant so much to Chuck Coulson. It means so life to so many. His life means so much to so many Christians today. Is because that's really kind of what it always is to live a life of public courage.
is to defend human dignity and to advance what is true and good and right in society. And that's a, I think, a role that the church always has. Those two things do not seem to belong together. Like they don't seem equally serious.
So, could you like the abolition of slavery and then manners? When I hear manners, and probably a lot of people, I'm thinking about like, Don't put your feet on the table and chew with your mouth closed. Yeah, that wasn't what he was talking about. Can you yeah, give us a little bit more about that?
Well, we you know, we've changed the language has changed.
So we tend to punt today towards values, family values, Christian values. What he was talking about is virtue, something that most thinkers of the time. who were influenced by faith. believed was an essential ingredient for any flourishing society and any free society. You don't have freedom without virtue.
You don't have virtue without freedom.
So if you don't have the ability to make a choice, then you're not really being virtuous. And if you want to be free, you have to be virtuous. Otherwise, that freedom is unsustainable. That freedom becomes license. That license becomes addiction.
Addiction, of course, becomes slavery.
So, this is an essential ingredient.
So, that's what he really understood: that really what was plaguing society, in fact, they very much fit together and. One of the reasons is you know The slavery issue was down. Upstream for Wilbur Forrest and upstream was an ability to think about the world in virtuous terms, which, of course, involves seeing people for what they're truly worth, all people, including those that it's normal to discount. And we're dealing with the same things today. You know, let's take abortion as the slavery issue of our day.
If we don't return sexual virtue. in the areas of relationship and commitment and particularly of of of men sticking around. and not trying to have quote unquote freedom without any consequences. You're never going to be able to rid. The demand side.
Of abortion. You know, we can do legal stuff to limit the supply, but you got to also limit the demand. Where does that come from? That comes from virtue.
So that's what he means. And that is very, very clear. Both in the causes that Wilberforce championed, how we think about women, how we think about children, how we think about. Immigrants, how we think about even animals, and the care for the world, seeing the world as a place to be cared for, not just exploited, all that was. was front and center for Wilberforce.
And His view, which is basically goes under the highly reduced title, it's got a super long title. But the title Practical Christianity puts those two things together, I think, in pretty profound ways. There's another news headline I want to hit with you in this segment that I do wonder what his response would have been. I don't know a lot about the state of the Islamic world in Wilberforce's era, but. We had just the most horrific news this week, and I just saw that the Pope commented on it and just what a tragedy this was.
But in the Democratic Republic of Congo, there was an attack. By a force made up of militant Islamists who are part of a chapter of the Islamic State. who call themselves the Allied Democratic Forces. which is fascinating to me, but maybe that's a rabbit trail. They attacked a Christian church that was holding an overnight vigil.
and using machetes they killed at least forty people, including nine children. There's some politics here. This group originated in Uganda, but has been pushing into the Democratic Republic of Congo because the Congolese military tried to help push back on them in Uganda.
So there's conflict there. But I would love to hear William Wilberforce's response. You know, this feels like one of the global evils of our time. Certainly. It does recently, doesn't it?
I mean, we talk about these things on occasion here. On the program, and it seems like we've been talking about it more and more. We talk a lot about Nigeria, mainly because it's a common occurrence in Nigeria. Both for an attack by Muslim radicals against Christians to take place and for it to be downplayed. Both by the government and by other voices, particularly other Western voices that want to.
turn this into a land dispute or something like that. What we're seeing now, though, is this headline in Another nation in Africa, and we've also seen others as well. And The thing that I'm trying to figure out right now is: okay, where are we in this stage? I mean, the conflict between Islam and the West. Has been well predicted in Samuel Huntington's Clash of Civilizations Coming Out of the Cold War.
And we had many attacks in various European cities and other Western places, certainly in the United States. Prior to that, though, as this was building up, These attacks were quite normal in Africa. And what we, it seems to me, like we're kind of back to that is the new normal, where African nations and our brothers and sisters in Christ and other countries. Are now facing the wrath of these radical Islamic groups as they seek to grow. and become better at this kind of thing.
It just reminds you of the clash of civilizations that was predicted by Huntington. Um that also that that those fault lines between those civilizations, as he said, would not just be between nation states or between even Islamic nations and Western nations, but even within nations. And Africa's been a home for that for a really long time. And unfortunately, it seems to be ramping up in other parts of the world. Maybe part of that is the pushback on immigration and that's happened in so many European countries, obviously.
There's a new level of militancy. In many nations. I don't think we're done seeing attacks like this in Western War, but. But it also goes to this narrative where people want to talk about Islam being a religion of peace, religion of peace, religion of peace. And the question is, where and when has it been a religion of peace?
Yes, there are many Muslims who would never commit these sorts of atrocities. There are many Muslims that have been Westernized that would never commit these sorts of atrocities. But whenever Islam has a foothold in any place in the world, The thing you don't get is peace. The thing you get is conflict. And if peace comes, it comes because of conquest.
That's the way this math goes and it's always gone this way. And, you know, this is just another story and another week. And it feels like every single week we could talk about this. I've been reading Eric Hoffer's book that you recommended, True Believer, about the kind of science and the pattern of mass movements. He's very particular about how he defines a mass movement.
And I came away from it thinking, really, the only thing in the world in operation today that I think you could. that would fit his definition is Islam. Why do you think it is so Attractive to people? Yeah, I mean, that's a great question. I mean, I think that we underestimate just.
kind of how powerful cultural norms are.
So you've got these societies where Uh these things are uh You know, have created these norms. Yeah. The other, I think, reason is, as Hoffer puts it, is there has to be a sense of disenfranchisement. And that there is actually a place you can go, a cause you can belong to that's going to correct something. And I think that is certainly something that Islamic leaders have mastered is that ability to call people to something bigger than themselves, which is something else that Hoffer you know, talks a lot about in True Believer.
And you know, I think there's also the spiritual element, which Hoffer doesn't talk about, but which is very real: which humans are incurably religious. We don't want the one true God, so we make up others. And there's a you know a sense of power and idolatry and attractiveness to that. I think it's especially attractive to young men that are disenfranchised. looking for something to live for.
So yeah, I think there's a lot of reasons. And also it reminds us that a small amount of people can do an awful lot of damage too. And that's another part of this. It is interesting that he says there has to be a the people that end up joining movements like these are in a sort of sweet spot. Where they've not, they're at the disenfranchisement, but they're not all the way into despair.
They have to have some shred of hope that things, that things could change. But what's. What gets me about this and where I the only answer I have for this is evil, is the demonic forces that are at work in groups like this group in the Congo. is that if your project was to create a better world and you have a vision for it, And one of the ways that you go about doing that is by cutting to death children with swords. And then you're still, I don't understand how you hope that on the other side of that.
The world that you're in, where you just committed that, could be improved. Does that make sense? Because whatever world comes after that is still a world where that happened in it. And that the only explanation I have for that is evil. I don't see how anyone can rationalize around that.
I have no doubt that I, as much as anybody else, is psychologically susceptible to. To a mass movement, let's say. And so I pray that the Lord will keep me from temptation and protect me from the evil one and all those things that. He taught us to pray, but that part I can't understand. You join a mass movement and they say, okay, step two is.
doing this to children and women and defenseless people praying. What kind of world am I making? Yeah. I mean, there is a sociological explanation. That can accompany the spiritual one.
But I don't think they're different. Like, in other words, I think that's one of the things that Lewis teaches us in the screw tape letters is that. The mechanisms of society and the norms of culture can be used in really powerful ways to smuggle in. all kinds of abuse but You are yourself, I think, and I would as well, when we recoil from that sort of barbarity. It's because of norms that we've embraced, right?
I mean, you know, it's not. Throughout history the assumption of human dignity And that if someone is the other, there's there's still a level of value. to them. I think that those are truths that are written on the human heart by God, but I also think they're suppressible. That's what Romans 1 talks about: the humans have an incredible capacity.
To deny moral reality, all reality really, but moral reality in particular. And there are entire cultures that have been able to suppress that for generations. And the norm around the world is not that you value children. The norm around the world throughout human history is not that you value.
someone who doesn't belong to your your tribe or your group of people.
So, you know, we're probably looking at that going, I can't imagine that. But if you don't begin with that assumption, I guess it does look like a better world. If they're the problem, remember Soltzenitsen said something along those lines where he's like, if only. It was that simple. If only there was just this other group of people that was the source of all the bad stuff in the world, and all you had to do was eliminate.
those people from the world. I mean In a sense. True believers of all kinds of stripes, including Islamic ones, believe that. They believe that. The problem with the world is that group of people over there.
And when those groups get eliminated, then the world is a better place.
So I think that's the assumption that we're bringing to the table. It's the right assumption, by the way, because of what we know to be true about creation. But it is a different assumption than others have.
Well, John, let's take a quick break, and we'll be right back with more stories on this episode of Breakpoint this week. I was not quite old enough yet to drive a car. but I could get my perfectly healthy breast removed. I decided to go all in and to transition. And they really drilled it hard into my mom and dad's head that, like, you're gonna have to choose basically between Having a Live son or a dead daughter.
And it's the only choice that they give parents. They say it's transition or die. That was Chloe Cole. Her incredible story is told in the upcoming documentary film Truth Rising from the Colson Center and Focus on the Family. Chloe has gone from being confused about gender ideology to being a courageous voice of reason and truth, helping other victims of it.
And despite all the public backlash, Chloe continues to speak the truth with compassion. Hear Chloe's courageous story in Truth Rising, don't miss the global premiere on September the 5th. We're back on breakpoint this week. John, we had a listener reach out to us with a fascinating story. You and I have been tracking the world of assisted reproduction for quite a while now, and it seems to just get more and more science fiction-ish.
And the story in the free press was about a new technology where genetic material basically from three adults are combined to make a child, and some of the genetic material from all three adults survives in that child.
So they're referencing in particular when there is some kind of condition when an egg and a sperm are combined. that creates problems within that embryo. And so what they're doing with, they can do in a lab with people who want to have a child is they'll take a donor egg and combine it with that the mother's egg and sperm. And an embryo will develop and a child will result. And that child will have like 49% of the DNA from the donor egg and the father's sperm.
but it will also maintain about 1% of that other egg. And so they're messing with this in a way to remove the corrupted DNA from the original egg. Basically, this is in pursuit of a healthier embryo, I guess, than would have originally resulted. If you can't tell, I don't fully understand the science of all this, but the ethical point is clear, which is that this results. in a child that has DNA or has genetic material from three parents.
What are some of the major ethical implications you see here? What are some of the ethical? I mean, that's really asking a lot. I mean, listen, any time we... Come up with a technology that allows us to do something new, even if it's given to us.
for therapeutic uses or medical uses. pretty quickly devolves or Becomes a kind of a normal tool in the toolkit to solve whatever problem we think needs to be solved. In other words, if we have the ability to do it, then there is the moral permission given the industry to do it. And that has driven artificial reproductive technology for a long time. You know, in this particular story of quote-unquote three parents, as you were kind of.
getting at. It's not necessarily Accurate, depending on how you reduce down the definition of parent to say there's three parents. But you are then creating a technology that, as polyamory, for example, becomes more and more acceptable as an adult living arrangement. Then you're going to have the capacity and the ability for couples then to. Basically, if they're All in love and we're not limiting married couples to two, then why limit parents to two?
And we say things like love makes a family. And if that's true, well, if two people's love makes a family, how much better will three people's love be? I hear this argument actually frequently if you're following kind of the case for. That's being made for polyamorous couples, including polyamorous couples with children. It's like, oh, we've got now a whole bunch.
I mean, we have, you know, we have movies that kind of make the same argument. Oftentimes not dealing with his you know, serious of ethical issues, but just kind of You know, arrangements of life with stepfathers and all that. And the kids are happier because they've got more parents and that sort of stuff. And really, I think it points to. What is the fundamental ethical crisis right now?
And there was a couple other stories this week that I think point to this also. When you're talking about medical technologies, the question is: what is it that we're trying to solve? Right? What's the problem? What's the medical problem that we're actually confronting?
The contraception mentality. The birth control mindset. Has basically turned the problem into Conception That's uncontrollable. In other words, everyone should get what they want all the time. including when it comes to this relationship between sex and babies.
So if I don't want children, I should be able to have the thing. That gives me children as much as I want, however I want, with whomever I want, but not have the kids. If I want kids, it doesn't matter if I'm having sex, quote unquote, that doesn't actually. procreate, I still should be able to have kids. Which is why you have polyamorous and same-sex couples and all that.
The entire industry is hijacked by this mindset. This is, it's, it's the birth control mindset. And we think of birth control as limiting, but it's basically control. It's controlling birth. Getting in on my terms.
So if I have decided to enter a relation with three people. And I decide, well, you know what? I want a kid with all three because I don't want to leave anyone out.
Well, then I should be able to have.
Now, the technology is being driven by adult desire. Not by any sort of Creation norm? much less moral norm. And I think that's really at the heart of it. And that explains the other.
Crazy story this week, horrific story. this week where we uh found out that a pedophile. A convicted pedophile, was able to arrange a a surrogate and acquire a child. A guy in a same-sex relationship, what state was it in? Pennsylvania.
And I mean, I don't know if there's any other details here you want to bring out about this story, but this was this made the rounds on social media. You kind of think: could this possibly be true? Turns out it is. The guy's convicted of a crime with children. He's in a same sex relationship, and somehow That doesn't keep him from being able to acquire a child.
In other words, a same-sex couple. Going through the IVF surrogacy. process. can acquire a child way easier Then a loving couple who's infertile and wants to adopt. Like there's so many more roadblocks for the second relationship than there is For the first one.
And so, what do you get? Another story.
Now, why? Why why would that possibly be the case? Because what somebody wants sexually is who they really are. And this is the way that our culture has moved, but also the law has then reflected that culture. I mean, it makes no sense on its face.
It makes no sense because what we would be told is that this would never happen, this would never happen, this would never happen. You know what? It just happened. Why did it happen? Because somehow the problem we're trying to solve when it comes to reproductive medicine is giving every single person exactly what they want all the time.
And that's unsustainable. Right. That was highlighted in another piece that you had recommended to me earlier this week and I read. It was an essay by Maddie Kearns at the Free Press about her experience with struggling with infertility. And finally, receiving a diagnosis, she had severe endometriosis and.
Praise the Lord. I mean, I think a couple of weeks ago, she had her first daughter, and just, it's a beautiful and kind of heart-wrenching essay. But one of the things she pointed out was that. IVF and this mentality, or I completely agree with you around controlling our own reproduction. And that the really important part of any conversation about.
Fertility or infertility is what do you want at the end of it? And she, every doctor, she went to so many doctors and she interviewed lots of other women who'd gone through similar situations. Every doctor basically said to her, It looks like IVF is your option. Let's look at IVF, let's look at IVF, let's look at IVF. And she was really surprised that she kept having to say, I would also like to find out what's going on with me.
Like the reason I'm here to see you is to diagnose the problem that I'm having, not to just grab this what you call an easy option, which we know is not easy. I mean, it's an incredibly painful and physically demanding process. It's incredibly expensive. More children die in the process of IVF than will ever be born from that process. We know that as well.
One of the most interesting parts of this piece by Maddie Kearns was she said, She had finally spoken with a Catholic doctor and an organization in St. Louis that helps women diagnose and treat their infertility naturally. And he had recommended this type of surgery to remove the endometriosis. And she went to speak to another doctor, I think to get a second opinion about this, another fertility doctor who was really pushing IVF again. And this other doctor made a comment: like, well, if you do go ahead with that surgery, man, your surgeon is going to have to be really careful.
And she's like, and I was just as opposed to the other surgeons who aren't. As opposed to the juggler on the corner of the street. But it's just if the end result, and you can hear it in some of these doctors that she quoted or interviewed or other patients that had interacted with them. The end goal is for you to get a baby, right?
So what does it really matter what's in between here and there? Do it the easiest way. Do it the most common way. Do it the way that is most billable to insurance or whatever it is. And that, but then what that robs us of is not just.
the moral virtue that's obviously involved in creating children and the responsibility on parents for that. But it also robs us of the incentives and motivation to solve these problems another way. Because infertility is a real pain. Like it is pain for couples and families because the desire for children is natural and good. But what have we neglected to study or look for once we've got this very lucrative?
A very widespread practice of IVF. And if that's just in our back pocket all the time, why bother looking anywhere else? Yeah. I mean, like you said, I mean, and we've covered this so many times. Uh and many people um Get offended when we do talk about the number, for example, of embryos that are destroyed.
Every single year, because of the way IVF is typically done. When we talk about the selective reduction. uh which is another word for abortion. When we talk about the million and a half Embryos that remain in a frozen state in America because they were quote unquote extra humans. That did not have a place.
When we talk about the screening, even before the selective reduction, that oftentimes leads. To aborted embryos. And we talk about. That how this fits is a little bit different. I mean, all those things remain true, and in and of itself, would be enough to really bring.
And it does. Makes IVF, as it's done, an unethical process. There are ways to do it more ethically than the normal way. But it just ethically is a wild, wild west. And when you add the surrogacy and what we talked about, about this same-sex couple and this pedophile, then it just adds to the complications.
But Maddie's story Is really something. And I don't know her well. We've met, we were at an event together. Over the last couple years, and she's a fantastic writer. I mean, she used to work for National Review and.
Her faith came out, her moral clarity came out. And when I saw this piece, I just couldn't help but. you know, smile and high five, you know, virtually because that really is a wonderful, wonderful thing. But she's pointing out something that a group of women, particularly Catholic theologians, have been talking about when it comes to reproduction. And that is that when it comes to the way we do reproductive ethics.
The the woman's fertility is treated as a problem that needs to be overcome. And so, therefore, when a woman does want a child and is not able to get one. The IVF, again, this goes to the whole control model. Right? The whole idea of birth control.
that children are to be given to those who want them, and they're not to ever be given to those who don't want them. And in that way of doing medicine. IVF does not treat a problem. It's not a way of treating. The woman.
There's a problem. There's a problem in fertility, either with the man or with the woman or with both. IVF is a workaround to that. It often results in a child being born. What it doesn't do is treat whatever problem is causing the infertility to begin with.
what she does in that article at the Free Press, and I don't know if I can get one recommendation per segment, but this would be my recommendation for this segment is to read this piece.
Well, she just goes to so many really important things in this piece. First of all, that control mindset. Right. And that IVF purports to be a medical treatment when it actually doesn't treat anything. It's a technological workaround.
which is unlike other reproductive treatments. And she talks about the commitment that she had. This is not on the table, and how hard that was for every single doctor she went to to understand. right who did not treat the condition that she'd been suffering with for years, really since puberty, as something that needed to be treated. The problem was she didn't get the childs that she wanted.
Right. So then you do, see it just, it just aims the medicine in a different direction. And so she tells the story of finding someone who actually is interested in this sort of treatment. and the Ethics and Public Policy Center. Has done some work on this.
There's a piece on their website called Treating Infertility: The New Frontier of Reproductive Medicine. This is actually a wonderful new area of medicine. And there's a lot of work being done. There's even some policy work being done in Arkansas and some else. Uh other places.
To try to help free up research dollars and insurance dollars and so on for what's called restorative reproductive medicine. And this is a way of doing this sort of work. That doesn't just result. Or resort to hitting these workarounds, but actually does try to treat the infertility for what it is. And in the process, Like for example, and and Madeline Kearns's process, that the thing that she'd been suffering with for so long was helped.
Like that's what medicine's supposed to do, isn't it?
So anyway, it's a fun thing to celebrate, but I just couldn't help but see. how different her mindset was. from the mindset that enabled these other great evils. you know, three parent children and a pedophile acquiring a child through surrogacy. There is a mentality problem underlying the law and underlying medicine.
Yeah. And it's exactly what you said: it's control and it's adults before children, because the other piece of this that I felt so convicted about and really angry about, I mean, when I. gone through having my children and walked through infertility with friends of mine. Is how little kids learn.
Okay, for a culture that is as obsessed with sex as ours, especially the way that we talk about sex with children and how forceful we are about getting it into schools and getting it into libraries, and they're fully autonomous sexual beings at four years old and can tell you what gender they are and all of that. You cannot find a sex ed curriculum. Let's talk about, you know, the majority of public schools who have a sex ed curriculum, it was designed by Planned Parenthood. You can look that up, it's easily findable. It does not include teaching on a woman's reproductive cycle and how that works.
It is unbelievably alarming to me how, when we teach kids about sex, the idea in our minds of sex ed. is how to avoid some of the natural consequences of sex, Usually, how to avoid the consequences of sex with multiple people because that's always assumed that that's the pattern and that's what you're going to do.
So let's talk to you about sexually transmitted diseases. Let's talk to you about consent. And then let's talk to you about gender identity or whatever else. And then women, young women grow up. I mean, hopefully they have parents who can teach this to them and that this should obviously primarily be the role of a parent.
But to consider something sexual education and never include Any teaching to young women about how their cycle works and how you can tell how your cycle works, and how, like, the modicum of control that we were given by God to have, just an awareness and a concept of what's happening in our bodies that He gave us. is not taught. And it kind of betrays the end game, which is really the most important thing about sex is A, that you do what you want and B, that you either get what you want out of it or you don't get what you don't want out of it. And that's why all of our teaching centers on that. It's a real shame.
Yeah. I mean, I just want to let people know, because we all know someone who has struggled with infertility in one way or the other. Many people are dealing themselves with this, or maybe a friend, neighbor, child. Who's wrestling with this? And I would really encourage you, there's been some incredible work done in this area.
And what's called restorative reproductive medicine. If you go to the EPPC, Ethics and Public Policy Center, eppc.org. They've got a wonderful. Archive of resources around restorative reproductive medicine that's, I think, worth looking at. Yeah.
Absolutely, thanks. Gosh, you are full of recommendations this week. I love it. Three of them. I'm up to three already.
Three. Let's take another quick break. We'll be right back with more breakpoints this week. What is a human being worth? In a culture that devalues life, getting this question right couldn't be more important.
That's why we want to invite you to sign up for Why Life, Courageous Faith in a Culture of Death. This is a series of four short video excerpts from some of the best Colson Center national conference sessions on life and human dignity. Featured speakers include Ryan Baumberger, Daniel Ritchie, Dr. Margaret Cottle, and Dr. Kristen Collier.
Each video comes with questions to help you think deeply and prompt discussions with your family, church members, and friends. Sign up for Why Life Today at colsoncenter.org/slash why life. That's colsoncenter.org slash why life. We're back on breakpoint this week. John, as most of our listeners will know, last week you hosted the Great Lakes Symposium.
Up in Michigan with Seth Dillon of the Babylon Bee and Jim Daly of Focus on the Family. And man, I'm so excited to talk to you about this because you guys were talking about humor and truth telling as Christians. But you were also talking about Snark. And if there's one adjective that our Breakpoint This Week listeners use often, To describe me, it is snarky. And I take that as the highest possible compliment, and I love it.
I was born in the middle of the morning. They don't always mean it as a compliment when they write in, by the way, just for the record. Which is yet another piece of evidence that I am in fact quite snarky. Can Christians be snarky? Tell us about the event and where do you come down on that question?
Yeah, it was. You know, it's interesting. You know, you kind of think about these events, and this is, I think, year six up here. It's. Really, a wonderful event.
It was great to see so many people pack in. We were sold out. Both live and had a wonderful group online that registered. We called it truth, love, and humor. And anyone who's heard Jim Daly Talk about truth and love together.
It's something that he's really convinced of, and he's really found ways to work even across the aisle with people. Who don't agree with him and to do it just because that's what the Bible says, you know, be kind to people. Be nice to people, be loving to people. and don't compromise and you know is that something that we can actually do People also know the Babylon B. People know it as being a very Uh intentionally Well, it is snarky.
Their mission statement is, you know, which he Seth Dillon shared with the group is. Essentially, it boils down to ridiculing bad ideas, and that some ideas need to be, and ideas do need to be taken down. We talk about that all the time. I love the quote from. Father Sirico years ago, that we've got to be ruthless with ideas and gentle with people.
We got to be ruthless with ideas because ideas have consequences, bad ideas have victims. Ideas walk into the real world. They don't stay in books and universities and lecture halls. uh create uh context and cultures and they influence families and And lives. And there are Christian ideas that are good ideas, and they're also true ideas, and they bring good to the world.
But there are ideas that have been really, really, really bad.
So, you know, we've been talking about here at the Colson Center for a long time. You know what it means to speak the truth and love, and but also this idea that we're called to this moment. And that all Christians are called to a moment. If you're in a moment, you're called there as a Christian. You're not in any time, in any place by accident.
God wants you in this time and place. And we all have a calling to be, as Paul says, a A agent of reconciliation or a minister of reconciliation in 2 Corinthians 5.
So what does that look for? for us. I think in our particular moment, what I've become really convinced of. Both in our work with Truth Rising, the new film documentary that's coming out, in partnership with Focus on the Family and the Coulson Center, and Oz Guinness, and a couple. Weeks.
Is this idea that all of us are called to be truth-tellers? that we have to be able Confront lies. Not participate in them. We've talked about Alexander Soltzenitz and 'Live Not by Lies'. His idea that it doesn't mean you have to be at every protest or every march or make a big deal out of everything.
But you can't let the lie come through you. You can't let the lie. be retold through you. And I think all that's true. And so now we're kind of getting into the nitty-gritty.
Is it okay? To be really hard on ideas. The Babylon Bees known as that.
Now, of course, they're just as hard on. Silly things within the church as outside of the church, and they have been for a long time. But but but here we are. The one that for example, got them banned. from Twitter.
Uh which ended up being one of the most consequential things In the last 15 years in American society, when they decided to post. Admiral Levine as man of the year after A major news outlet had named him Woman of the Year. And they were accused of being cruel with that. Was that cruel? What's the line between snark and cruelty?
And can you be direct and funny? and still be loving. I came out of the two presentations fascinated because I thought, not that Jim and Seth, I don't think they saw any.
Sort of tension between themselves or between their present presentations. But I thought there was a little bit of like, how do you hold these two things together? And I asked them about that. And it was a fascinating. conversation.
I'm still kind of wrestling with it. I think about was it loving for the Babylon Bee to post Man of the Year About a man. They were accused of being cruel because of the picture. But the picture wasn't doctored. The picture was the official picture.
Of this man. who was identified as what an Assistant Secretary of Health and Human Services.
So, in an incredibly powerful role in the United States, a role that actually could be leveraged and was being leveraged to to hate children or to help children hate themselves.
So were they being loving to him? I I think some people would really struggle with that. I don't know necessarily they were being loving to him, but I think they were absolutely being loving to the A whole lot of kids and a whole lot of parents who needed to have that. Terrible, terrible idea. That's caused so much harm.
undermined and ridic even ridiculed. And what's that tension between ridiculing a person and ridiculing their ideas? It gets really tight. And it gets really tight, especially on the LGBTQ stuff, because those ideas are their identity, right? There's not a separation.
So I thought it was a fascinating conversation. I'm not sure that we resolved everything. But I think We have to participate in that conversation. We have to know that not everything we are going to say is going to be well liked. That doesn't mean that gives us a carte blanche get out of jail free card to say whatever we want.
Super, super snarky, especially when that snarkiness becomes cruelty. And that's really the tension there.
So, in human communication theory, there are several different components of a message, right? There's the. The giver of the message, the sender, there's the content, there's the medium. And there's the receiver. Whenever we have these conversations about snark or humor, And Christianity?
And can you tell the truth and still be loving? And can you tell a lie and still be loving? And can you be loving if you don't tell the truth? Whenever we have these conversations, I sense. that we are almost singularly focused on the messenger.
Sometimes the message as well, but we almost never talk about being the receiver of these messages and what kind of responsibilities are on that person.
So, I think if we're going to talk about being charitable in the messages we send and the mediums we use and how we send them and all of that. We equally should be concerned about being charitable receivers of messages. And that's always my question when someone says, You know, I didn't like it, I think the Babylon Bee is horrible because they did this, this, and this. What do you think that they meant? Like, could you steal man their argument?
Why do you think they said it? Why do you think they said it like that? And, you know, I do get feedback sometimes on this show, even from people who. Either will just tell me they don't share my sense of humor, which I don't take any offense at all to that. I mean, I am objectively hilarious, but if you don't share my sense of humor, totally fine.
But sometimes people will I think Overstep a little bit in suggesting that I was cruel or I was wrong or I was hurtful. And then sometimes they'll say, like, or maybe you were joking and I didn't get it. And I appreciate that self-awareness, but I do think we also have a responsibility when we're receiving messages. To be charitable just as we do. To be charitable as messengers, if that makes sense.
Yeah, I mean, and of course, the response is going to be that can be used as a get out of jail free card, right? And it is. You know, I was thinking the same thing. Like, you know, one of the things that has corrupted this whole conversation is just the. absolute confusion.
That niceness is what loving is. And I think the equivocation of those two things has been damnable. I mean, you know, the the the ideas the idea that was called uh Uh that that that people called unloving. From the Babylon B, or at least one of them. I mean, you know.
But this Admiral Levine. Quote. Was a damnable idea. It was causing havoc in millions of lives. Absolutely.
It was hurting parents' relationship with their children. It was hurting their children's relationship with themselves. And he was a victim of the idea. That's right. And And and so, but Is it possible to be cruel to someone who is that deceived?
Of course, it is.
So we have to then, I think, listen to the criticism. And listen to it well, and then go, okay, am I in the right or am I not in the right? And So we, you know, that, you know, even when we're falsely accused, that happened even in the last couple of weeks. With me, and you just listen and go, Yeah, I don't agree with half of what was just said.
Okay. But is there any of it that I need to listen and be charitable and listen to? And I think that's something that we can do. And a lot of times I do end up with, look, I. You know, I can do everything right, and it's still going to offend people.
But Because that's the reality and that problem really lies with them. Doesn't give me an excuse to not do everything I can. To still be loving, right? And that's what I walked away from. We need to tell the truth because to tell the truth is a loving act.
But it is possible to tell the truth and cruelty, and we can't do that. And by the way, this video of this event is live, and everyone should watch it.
So here's my. New recommendation for the new segment, right?
So now we're four recommendations. I've already nailed this week. It really was a fun conversation. And I do think it's a, let me just reiterate, it's a necessary conversation. We are in a time where to follow Christ is to be a truth teller.
We can't be truth tellers. We're not going to be able to get off, get this job description out of what it means to be a Christian today. All of us have to tell the truth. Doesn't mean all of us have to be fighters. It doesn't have to mean all of us have to be funny.
It doesn't mean all of us have to be squishy. It just means all of us are going to have to tell the truth. And we have to do it well. But I did ask Seth. Because people often ask him what his favorite headline is.
And I've got a few favorite headlines. I think my all-time favorite Babylon B headline is. How police disperse the rioters by handing out participation trophies. That was funny, right? That said a lot of really important stuff.
But I also asked them Are there any you regret? Was there any headline you put out that you're like, ah, man, maybe we should have rephrased that one or pulled back? And he really didn't have one. And I think, man, come on, you've got to have at least one. I mean, I've got headlines.
We don't do that. And I've got things that I wish we hadn't, you know. spoken on or written on. Right. Because it just wasn't our lane, or because we said the wrong thing, or didn't have all the information, or whatever.
But but yeah, that's an interesting one too, is like There's no way I've done this right 100%. But just because I haven't done it right 100% doesn't mean that I don't continue to tell the truth in the best way that I can. Or that it's not possible to do. Yeah. I thought there was real tension.
Not again, not between the two men, because they're both great and they're both really courageous truth tellers. I just thought that there's a tension in our experience. Like, what is it going to be like? to live in a you know really kind of fragile moment like this In a tedious moment like this, and be courageous enough to tell the truth, but also treat people, including people who don't reciprocate, who don't, you know. At times even think of us as human in the same way.
Uh, to do it the right way, so I think we all have to wrestle with that. And it might also come down to, unfortunately, which this often sounds like a cop-out, but it isn't, just an individual experience and context, right? Yeah, it's a cop-out. We well, but listen, I so I'm here at this camp this week with my pastor from our church in Phoenix, who's still just such a dear friend and mentor to Erin and I, Frank Switzer. I highly recommend, here's one of my recommendations, look up Frank Switzer's sermons at Redemption Arcadia Church.
He's one of the most brilliant teaching pastors I've ever had the privilege of hearing. He was talking to me once about how he was talking with someone in his church who was. Just spent a lot of time on social media and was always seemed kind of angry and was always posting. And he said, This person told him, I feel that I've been given the gift of a ministry of awareness, that my calling is to just make everybody aware of things. And appreciate the point.
You know, that's certainly possible. There are vocations that will involve that. But this is another maybe landmine in this area of truth telling where we discount. the time we should be spending thinking about What the truth is that we're telling, and who it is our obligation to tell it to. I you know, I think a good rule of thumb is like t you should be telling yourself the truth.
You should be telling your children the truth. You should be very concerned with Speaking truth into your brothers and sisters who are physically in your vicinity and in your church. And I don't think that the fact that Christians are called to speak truth and love means that we're all called to be posting on Facebook for 20 years. Almost none of us are called to do that. Let's just be clear.
That's what I'm getting at. I'm not sure anybody is. That's what I'm getting at. Yeah. Yeah.
So that's got to be part of the equation, too. Just because you're telling the truth doesn't mean it's loving or it's your calling in any given moment. Tell the truth to your kids. Start there. Good voice.
Start with your kids. All right. John, let's talk about some questions that we've gotten from some of our listeners recently, which we love. Please continue to do this. Again, you can go to breakpoint.org and click on contact us, and all of those will come our way.
Last week, you and I talked about libraries, public libraries, and some of the changes there, kind of shifting over from like centers of. Promoting literacy and free books for all to kind of more of a social service, especially for. Homeless folks or people needing social services. It's really an interesting shift culturally that we've seen. We got a lot of feedback from people.
A lot of whom are seeing the same things in their local libraries.
Some from librarians, which I loved and so appreciated. One woman, it just, oh man, it just made me want to smack my head against the wall who said, Like, yes, I see what you're talking about, just people seeking social services. There's a homeless shelter across the street from my library. But she said, I'm more concerned that, like, I spend most of my time as a librarian. Not helping people find literature or research, but printing off like Amazon.
Return labels. Like it's just it's a place for printing. And she's kind of wrestling with what have we become on that end as well. And I share the concern there. But one of the pieces of feedback on this that I wanted to talk about a little bit was someone wrote back and said, That she had she had several kids and they're now grown, it sounds like.
But she said, My first kind of the first time I became aware of this problem, she was at the library with her kids and noticed a man. on a public computer looking at pornography. At the library, and completely understandably, she did not feel. um capable of You know, saying something, I mean, which that is such an aggressive situation to be in, right? It would be hard to know what to do.
I like to think I would go say something to the librarian, but again, it's like so deeply uncomfortable. And then when you're with your children, so I completely understand that. But then she said, You know, she just got more diligent about overseeing the materials that her kids were getting at the library and also checking them first and looking elsewhere for materials and that kind of thing. All of that I appreciate and agree that the job of diligence on the part of parents will always be a job, regardless of how quote unquote, good or how much better things get in the library or schools or wherever else. But the other thing I think is true is that just like when we talk about public schools, We pay for these libraries.
I don't know if you've ever looked at your like property tax bill or the breakdown. And I'm sure it depends on where you live in the country as well. But every voting cycle, there's a new levy up for my public library, and it goes up and up and up. And we're paying for them. This is another area where, because of that, but also because these are our communities, I think Christians.
should absolutely feel not only the right, but in a lot of cases the obligation to speak into what these libraries are doing. not just the content they have and the books they have, but the way they're operating.
So, if you let me just share a really brief story, last week. It was funny, John. It was like right after we recorded this segment. I sent my girls over to the library to take back a couple of books. And my they came home quicker than they normally do.
And my daughter, my older daughter said, Mom, there's a bunch of men at the library. And I said, What do you mean? There's always men at the library. She said, no, there's a bunch of men in the children's section of the library, and they're sitting on all the chairs, and they're in the aisles. And one of she said one of the librarians is reading to them.
And, you know, when your nine-year-old tells you a story, you're like, how much of this is real? Like, what's really happening?
So. I went over there. And sure enough, there were, I would say, 25 adults in the very small children's section of our library branch sitting in all the chairs and at all the tables, sitting on the floor and the aisles of children's books. And I asked the librarian, what's happening here? Is there an event?
Well, this is a group of people from an assisted living community, so people with mental disabilities. And they have come to visit the library. And I said, that's wonderful. Why are they in the children's section? And she said, well, their level of reading is mostly this level.
But I said, okay, well, they're not browsing for books. They're not choosing books. They're sitting, and I see librarians bringing them books, but is there a reason that you don't have them sitting in the adult section? or anywhere else. And she said what I fully expected.
She said, We are open to everybody at this library. Everyone is welcome. And I said, ma'am, I'm gonna point you right behind me to your teen section, which is so dogmatically policed that if I get within four feet of that teen section where I can see tons of couches right now and one teenager playing a video game. You will make me leave immediately because this is a safe space for teens who can't fully be themselves at home. That's what all the signs say, right?
This is why grown-ups can't go over there. But we will allow this group of people who should absolutely have access to the library to completely take over the children's section. And to me, this was another example of the fact that whenever we design our policies and our public spaces anymore, the people who are considered the least and the last are the children. Because this really scared my daughter, and with good reason. And the best argument that my librarian had was that.
We are open and welcoming to all. Said also, in addition to the teen section, you're not though, right? You're not open to people with weapons, as you shouldn't be. You're not open to people who are in the middle of a mental health crisis and are acting violently. You're not open to people who are in the throes of an overdose.
Okay. So there are restrictions. I'm just trying to understand why this wouldn't be one of them, which is a large group of adults. Many of whom struggle to conduct themselves in healthy ways or safe ways, even. in the children's section of a library.
I think this is an increasing problem. Our libraries aren't thinking about kids anymore. And I think Christians have a duty and should feel completely welcome speaking into how the spaces are run. There was another question that was fascinating. Sent in, this was several months ago.
I want to read just a little bit of the question to you from a very sweet listener. I love these kinds of questions because you can just tell she's really thinking about this and trying to figure out the best way to do this. She says, I started taking Tai Chi. Eight months ago, because it was described as a moving meditation. I joined an online class.
It's been truly helpful in my life, both mentally and physically. After taking classes for the six mon for six months, my friend compared it to yoga, which caught me off guard. Because my conscience was not troubled during class, there's no spiritual talk in my Tai Chi class. They instruct you how to breathe and to move your body. Does give me energy, so something real is happening.
So then I talked to my instructors. They do have erroneous beliefs related to Taoism, but I don't see that as a problem. The Eastern world has studied the body in this manner for thousands of years. It makes sense that they would know things about it that maybe we don't. I think it's okay to take the good and leave the bad, but wanted to see what you all think.
Can Christians practice things like yoga and Tai Chi? What do you think, John? Yeah, I think it's a really good question. I think most people don't do it with the level of discernment that's required. And there's clearly a good bit of discernment that's being reflected here in the question.
I think that also When we don't have the discernment, then any red flags we come across, it's a very human thing. To dismiss those concerns because it's something we want to do. And at the end of the day, They were Americans. Americans end up able to do what they want to do. And we can justify an awful lot of things spiritually.
But the real reason is why I really want to do this. And that temptation doesn't go away. It's a temptation that starts when you're a kid and it keeps going for the rest of your life, honestly.
So I think that knowing that those are our human limitations. That's the limitations that all humans have. First of all, the tendency to be deceived and the tendency not to take something seriously that we really. Want to be true, or really want not to be true because of something else. I think the more specific thing to know here is that And James talks about how, and he uses a fishing analogy in His warning about how certain temptations lure certain believers or certain people.
And it's almost like he's using a fishing term, right? Where you fish with a particular kind of bait. for a particular kind of fish. And we're the same way. The enemy does that to us.
I remember once having a conversation with a guy I really respect, and he goes, You know, I just don't struggle with lust. And I'm like, I have no idea who you are because that just doesn't seem to be a normal thing for most men. But you know, obviously, there are things that are more compelling towards men. Sins and there are sins that are more compelling for women, and then even beyond that. It gets more specific from there.
If we have a particular susceptibility to being emotionally driven or being spiritually influenced or You know, whatever, I think then those should be really red flags, and I can see that there's going to be plenty of believers that say. I can't step into those waters, you know, whether it's anything having to do with Eastern or whatever, because it. It actually draws my heart away from who God really is, and it makes me think different thoughts about him. And that's a really important sin, is not just having the wrong God, but having the wrong idea of God. A.W.
Tozer says that that's the essence of idolatry: entertaining thoughts about God that are not worthy of him. And there are ideas about God and truth and reality that come through these Eastern Uh forms. Uh that need to be I think considered. I know it sounds like I'm just leveling out warning after warning after warning here. That's because I am.
These things come from particular places. But you know what? The American shopping experience comes from a worldview perspective, too. And there are a lot of American Christians that have been completely made susceptible to a materialism. because of their susceptibility and their lack of discernment.
In fact, Their churches are even driven by this.
So just like there are churches driven by Ideas about God that have more to do with Eastern mysticism than have to do with the God of the Bible. There's more, there's just as many.
So in other words, the temptations who are all around. And knowing yourself is in your own temptations, knowing your own level of discernment. Is really important. Knowing that your actions affect other believers, the Bible puts that as a category to be considered. and that we should keep all of those things kind of front and center.
No, no, no, look. Doing Tai Chi at a Buddhist temple? would seem to be two or three or four steps further in that direction. And then you know doing the movements and the stretches of a yoga pose. You know, on a Wii or on some sort of kind of YouTube workout video.
But you're, you know, all of that sort of stuff needs to be considered.
Now that said, All truth is God's truth.
So any truth about stretching, any truth about Calmness that has been embraced by other religions ultimately belongs to God. and we should never attribute it to anyone else. All truth that comes out of medicine and science belongs to God.
So You know, that's an awful lot of things to keep in mind just to do Tai Chi. But I think we have to keep all those things in mind whether we're doing you know, Tai Chi or or you know anything else. But keep in mind too, there are real things. in the world and real forces and So to just dismiss it as innocent. I think it is unwise as well.
So, so I do think that there is a a freedom that Christians have to spoil the Egyptians, as Saint Augustine said. to take what's really good. And use it for God's purposes. But There's a lot of things. that can be fraught.
with danger along the way. And just, I mean, Chuck Colson used to say this over and over. There's no. limit to the human capacity for self rationalization.
So, we will find ways to rationalize our behavior. And I think we just need to be aware of that. Yeah. Sounds like this listener is being very careful and discerning, which is. Always the way to go.
Okay, well John, you've shared about 400,000 recommendations this episode.
So um I'll just recommend briefly. Take your kids to Village Creek Bible Camp if you're in the area. I love this place, and it's been a very special week, as always, with my kiddos. But I'll also recommend today, this Thursday, I had a story on the world and everything in it about investigative genealogy. Which is this fascinating new technology that has all kinds of ethical questions, which is my bread and butter.
So that was on the world and everything in it today. You can find that wherever you get your podcasts as well. And we are obviously big friends of World. John is there most Fridays for Culture Friday.
So check out today's episode, this Thursday's episode, for that story.
Well, thank you as always for listening to Breakpoint This Week from the Coulson Center for Christian Worldview. I'm Maria Baer with John Stone Street, wishing you a lovely week. We'll see you all back here soon. God bless.
