Episodes

  • Music & Joy / Daniel Chua

    Music & Joy / Daniel Chua
    Sep 11 2024
    Can music teach us how to live? In this interview Evan Rosa invites Daniel Chua—a musicologist, composer at heart, and Professor of Music at the University of Hong Kong—to discuss his latest book, Music & Joy: Lessons on the Good Life.Together they discuss the vastly different ancient and modern approaches to music; the problem with seeing music for consumption and entertainment; the ways different cultures conceive of music and wisdom: from Jewish to Greek to Christian; seeing the disciplined spontaneity of jazz improvisation fitting with both a Confucian perspective on virtue, and Christian newness of incarnation; and finally St. Augustine, the worshipful jubilance of singing in the midst of one’s work to find rhythm and joy that is beyond suffering; and a final benediction and blessing for every music lover.Throughout the interview, we’ll offer a few segments of the music Daniel discusses, including Beethoven’s Opus 132 and the Ode to Joy from Beethoven’s 9th symphony, and John Cage’s controversial 4’33”—which Daniel recommends we listen to every single day, and which we’re going to play during this episode toward the end.Show NotesMusic and Joy: Lessons on the Good Life by Daniel Chua (https://yalebooks.yale.edu/book/9780300264210/music-and-joy/)Can music teach us how to live?The emotional relationship we have with musicEveryone identifies with musicHow did you come to love music and write on it?MusicologistThe Sound of Music soundtrack (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLeSQLYs2U8X0nTi15MHjMAWim3PxIyEqI)Listening to music at a young ageLove of Beethoven as a childWhat about Beethoven in particular spoke to you? Do you have memories of what feeling or challenges or thoughts or kind of ambitions were there?Beethoven as harder to listen to and sit through as it is quite disruptive and intellectual in styleBeethoven and Freedom by Daniel Chua (https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/beethoven-freedom-daniel-k-l-chua/1126575597)What pieces in particular, or what about Beethoven’s composition was particularly moving to you?Beethoven’s final string quartets (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7qaq881bwRI)“It’s very strange. It’s like the most complex and the most simple music. And somehow they speak very deeply to my soul and my heart. And you just want to listen to them all the time.”A Minor String Quartet, Opus 132 (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUob2dcQTWA)A piece of thanksgiving to GodMessages sent by music as a young person about how things come togetherMusic interacts with usPlaying to understand how it is that a piece worksHow do we replicate what music communicates in our daily lives?Beethoven’s Ode to Joy (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q0EjVVjJraA)Stephen Pinker - music is auditory cheesecake“If music is joy, then what is it? What kind of joy is it?”Consuming music is not the same as joy; music is not simply entertainmentThe fanfare of terror in Ode to Joy“Humans are strange. We are very sinful creatures so we tend to weaponize whatever we have to weaponize and we weaponize music too.”“Whatever we do with music as humans, there is something more in music that speaks beyond out puny human point of view of music.”Our view of music and joy today are too human; music is cosmicWe tune ourselves, our virtues, our wisdom to the rhythm of the universe.Joy as something we obey, we listen to.“Music isn’t human. Music is actually creation.”Music, the Logos, and WisdomMusic as something that teaches us how to live.Wisdom taking delight, joy, in the universe.Music is deeply beautiful; there is profound goodness to itA lesson in flourishing found in music, in the tuning of ourselvesMusic is truthful; Christ as an instrument and salvation as being in tuneSheet music v performance as an analogy for incarnationMusic as an event that is happeningHarmony and coming together - finding one’s place within the turn; Taoist and Confucian traditions“Jazz offers this fantastic expression of a different kind of wisdom born through suffering and grief.”Improvisation in jazz; an exuberance - the weird and the spontaneous alongside the orderedMusic as an opportunity for emotion and a way to communicate and understand; spirituals and slave hymns“The order of the cosmos is basically tragic. It’s a bad, bad world. And music is a kind of consolation in that.”“Music can’t help but be meaningful.”4'33" by John Cage (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AWVUp12XPpU)Whatever we are, music is there.Using music to make sense of things; really attend to the world and its music.Augustine’s Book of Music “De Musica” (https://archive.org/details/augustine-on-music-de-musica/page/159/mode/2up)The spontaneous music of the worldDefiant joy in the music of slave hymns; a joy that will not be crushedA robust understanding of joyMusic tells us something about the world, the cosmos, of creation - Music reflects the heart of God.About Daniel ChuaDaniel K. L. Chua is the Chair...
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    57 mins
  • How to Read Genesis / Marilynne Robinson & Miroslav Volf

    How to Read Genesis / Marilynne Robinson & Miroslav Volf
    Aug 28 2024
    “The whole of human existence is like some sweet parable told in the most improbable place and circumstances. … God values our humanity. … One of the things that's fascinating about the Hebrew Bible is that it declared and was loyal to the fact that God is good and creation is good.”Novelist and essayist Marilynne Robinson joins Miroslav Volf to discuss her latest book, Reading Genesis. Together they discuss why she took up this project of biblical commentary and what scripture and theological reflection means to her; how she thinks of Genesis as a theodicy (or a defense against the problem of evil and suffering); the grace of God; the question of humanity’s goodness; how to understand the flood; the relationship between divine providence and working for moral progress; and much more.About Marilynne RobinsonMarilynne Robinson is an award-winning American novelist and essayist. Her fictional and non-fictional work includes recurring themes of Christian spirituality and American political life. In a 2008 interview with the Paris Review, Robinson said, "Religion is a framing mechanism. It is a language of orientation that presents itself as a series of questions. It talks about the arc of life and the quality of experience in ways that I've found fruitful to think about."Her novels include: Housekeeping (1980, Hemingway Foundation/Pen Award, Pulitzer Prize finalist), Gilead (2004, Pulitzer Prize), Home (2008, National Book Award Finalist), Lila (2014, National Book Award Finalist), and most recently, Jack (2020). Robinson's non-fiction works include Mother Country: Britain, the Welfare State, and Nuclear Pollution (1989), The Death of Adam: Essays on Modern Thought (1998), Absence of Mind: The Dispelling of Inwardness from the Modern Myth of the Self (2010), When I was a Child I Read Books: Essays (2012), The Givenness of Things: Essays (2015), and What Are We Doing Here?: Essays (2018). Her latest book is Reading Genesis (2024).Marilynne Robinson received a B.A., magna cum laude, from Brown University in 1966 and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Washington in 1977. She has served as a writer-in-residence or visiting professor at a variety universities, included Yale Divinity School in Spring 2020. She currently teaches at the Iowa Writers' Workshop at the University of Iowa. She has served as a deacon for the Congregational United Church of Christ. Robinson was born and raised in Sandpoint, Idaho and now lives in Iowa City.Show NotesGet your copy of Reading Genesis by Marilynne RobinsonMarilynne Robinson’s New York Times article, “What Literature Owes the Bible” (2011)Reading Genesis as the singular ancient literature that it isThe Bible (and Genesis) as theodicyHow Calvin and Luther influenced Robinson’s approach to GenesisThe benefit of reading Genesis as a wholeThe story of JosephThe fractal nature of the bibleUnsparing, honest descriptions of the characters“I think that the fact that they are recognizably flawed creatures is, what that reflects is the grace of God. He is enthralled by these people that must have been a fairly continuous disappointment, you know? We have to understand humankind better, I think, in order to understand what overplus there is in a human being that God loves them despite their being so human.”“An amazing little theater of domestic dysfunction.”Abraham and Isaac: “Poor Isaac … or he could just be a plain old disappointing child.”“The Bible is a theodicy.”God’s goodness, and a defense of GodGod’s value of humanity and the conservation of the human self“God stands by creation.”Humanism in Genesis“Humanity sinks so deep into evil. that they become near incarnations of evil.”Genesis 6: “Every inclination of the thoughts of their hearts was Only evil and continually.”Total depravity and the bleak view of humanityNoah and the Flood“… there's a kind of a strange lawlessness of Genesis.”“When God remakes the world after Noah, after the flood, he does not change human beings. He gives them exactly the same blessings and instructions that he did originally, which is simply another statement of his very deeply tested loyalty to us as we are.”“Finding a humane way to deal with the inhumanity of human beings.”Genesis 8: “Because human beings are evil, I will never destroy them.”Grace as a condition of possibility for all lifeThe similarities between Hebrew Bible as a philosophic text, drawing influences from cultures around them“what is a greater question of theodicy than the fact that populations are wiped off the face of the earth every so often—it must have been so common in the ancient world with plagues and wars and all the rest of it.”“Every human, every thought, all the time: evil.”“Genesis is a preparation for Exodus because the solution to human wickedness, which nevertheless does not violate human nature, is law.”What is the moral purpose of humanity?The roaring ...
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    54 mins
  • Poverty / Rev. William Barber & Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

    Poverty / Rev. William Barber & Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove
    Aug 21 2024

    Rev. William Barber and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove discuss the political, moral, and spiritual dimensions of poverty. Together, they co-authored White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy, and they’re collaborators at the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School.

    About Rev. William Barber

    Bishop William J. Barber II, DMin, is a Professor in the Practice of Public Theology and Public Policy and Founding Director of the Center for Public Theology and Public Policy at Yale Divinity School. He serves as President and Senior Lecturer of Repairers of the Breach, Co-Chair of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call For Moral Revival, Bishop with The Fellowship of Affirming Ministries, and has been Pastor of Greenleaf Christian Church (Disciples of Christ), Goldsboro, NC, for the past 29 years.

    He is the author of four books: We Are Called To Be A Movement; Revive Us Again: Vision and Action in Moral Organizing; The Third Reconstruction: Moral Mondays, Fusion Politics, and The Rise of a New Justice Movement; and Forward Together: A Moral Message For The Nation.

    Bishop Barber served as president of the North Carolina NAACP from 2006-2017 and on the National NAACP Board of Directors from 2008-2020. He is the architect of the Forward Together Moral Movement that gained national acclaim in 2013 with its Moral Monday protests at the North Carolina General Assembly. In 2015, he established Repairers of the Breach to train communities in moral movement building through the Moral Political Organizing Leadership Institute and Summit Trainings (MPOLIS). In 2018, he co-anchored the relaunch of the Poor People’s Campaign: A National Call for Moral Revival— reviving the SCLC’s Poor People’s Campaign, which was originally organized by the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., welfare rights leaders, workers’ rights advocates, religious leaders, and people of all races to fight poverty in the U.S.

    A highly sought-after speaker, Bishop Barber has given keynote addresses at hundreds of national and state conferences, including the 2016 Democratic National Convention, the 59th Inaugural Prayer Service for President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris, and the Vatican’s conference on Pope Francis’s encyclical “Laudato Si’: On Care for Our Common Home.

    He is a 2018 MacArthur Foundation Genius Award recipient and a 2015 recipient of the Franklin D. Roosevelt Four Freedoms Award and the Puffin Award.

    Bishop Barber earned a Bachelor’s Degree from North Carolina Central University, a Master of Divinity from Duke University, and a Doctor of Ministry from Drew University with a concentration in Public Policy and Pastoral Care. He has had ten honorary doctorates conferred upon him.

    About Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

    Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove is an author, preacher, and community-builder who has worked with faith-rooted movements for social change for more than two decades. He is the founder of School for Conversion, a popular education center in Durham, North Carolina, and co-founder of the Rutba House, a house of hospitality in Durham’s Walltown neighborhood.

    Mr. Wilson-Hartgrove is the author of more than a dozen books, including the daily prayer guide, Common Prayer: A Liturgy for Ordinary Radicals, New Monasticism, The Wisdom of Stability, Reconstructing the Gospel, and Revolution of Values. He is a regular preacher and teacher in churches across the US and Canada and a member of the Red Letter Christian Communicators network.

    Show Notes

    • Center for Public Theology and Public Policy’s ten-session online course: https://www.theologyandpolicy.yale.edu/inaugural-conference
    • Get your copy of White Poverty: How Exposing Myths About Race and Class Can Reconstruct American Democracy: https://wwnorton.com/books/9781324094876

    Production Notes

    • This podcast featured Rev. William Barber and Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove, with Ryan McAnnally-Linz
    • Edited and Produced by Evan Rosa
    • Hosted by Evan Rosa
    • Production Assistance by Kacie Barrett
    • A Production of the Yale Center for Faith & Culture at Yale Divinity School https://faith.yale.edu/about
    • Support For the Life of the World podcast by giving to the Yale Center for Faith & Culture: https://faith.yale.edu/give
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    41 mins
  • How to Read Julian of Norwich / Ryan McAnnally-Linz

    How to Read Julian of Norwich / Ryan McAnnally-Linz
    Aug 14 2024
    Julian of Norwich is known and loved for the lines revealed to her by God, “All shall be well and all shall be well, and all manner of thing shall be well.” But beyond the comfort of this understandably uplifting phrase, what are theological and philosophical insights we might learn from this anonymous medieval Christian mystic and anchoress?Ryan McAnnally-Linz joins Evan Rosa to discuss the historical context of Julian of Norwich, her life and vocation as an anchoress, and the story of near-death experience and subsequent mystical visions that led her to write such theologically rich and uplifting words—which comprise the earliest known writing by a woman in English. Together they have an extended discussion of a rather marvelous segment from the Long Text of the Revelation of Divine Love, sections 46-58, and in particular we look at the revelation Julian herself was most puzzled and mystified by during her own life, discovering understanding only decades after having received the vision: Section 51, the Parable of the Lord and the Servant.Image Credit: adapted from The Lives of the Saints Gallus, Magnus, Otmar and Wiboradain German, 1451–60. St. Gallen, Stiftsbibliothek, Cod. Sang. 602, p. 303.Show Notes“All shall be well” as an introduction to Julian for manyRowan Williams on Julian as one of the greatest English language theologiansWho was Julian? How she thinks and what we can draw from her for the purposes of theological insight and spiritual maturity?Found Julian in a medieval survey course and she has remained with himWhat caught you in Julian? Why did it stick with you?She synthesizes a visionary experience with deep theological reflection: subtle and sophisticated theologian; simplicity, earnestness, and virtuositySo give us a little bit of her biography. I know that we know precious little, but what do we know? And maybe give us some of the historical context of her?Couple of manuscripts of her writing; the short and the long textMargery Kempe visits Julian to make a request in The Book of Margery Kempe (https://d.lib.rochester.edu/teams/publication/staley-the-book-of-margery-kempe)Anchoress and is attached to a church in Norwich; 1340s first and second waves of the Black Death; mass loss and traumaThe text is less focused on herself outside of the visions that happen on what she believes is her death bed.What is the spiritual occupation of an anchoress or anchorite?Anchorite as isolated spiritual calling different from monks and hermits; life is in this one cellDo you know what motivations are there for that spiritual vocation in the church? Why would anyone do this?Anchorite ceremonies are like funeral rites; a death to the world, living only for prayerThe showings - 16 visions; prays for mind of the passion, bodily sickness, and three wounds (contrition, compassion, and willful longing for God)The suffering of Christ and his wounds and their popularity in medieval devotional practice16 showings that are intertwined and vary in form (visual, auditory, bodily, mental)The last showing, which she ponders for the rest of her life.What are some of the core philosophical, theological, or other concepts that are most salient for understanding Julian?Julian understands herself as beholden to the church, its teachings, and its tradition - wrestling with these and her visions.A Vision Shown to a Devout Woman by Julian (https://www.psupress.org/books/titles/0-271-02547-6.html)A Revelation of Love by Julian (https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/261039/revelations-of-divine-love-by-julian-of-norwich-translated-by-elizabeth-spearing-introduction-and-notes-by-a-c-spearing/)Augustinian tradition is appealed to—his teachings on evil and sin, Christian PlatonismJulian as a Trinitarian thinkerWhat would you say about her understanding of love?Later visions in life and praying for many years for understanding —Love is THE thing for Julian, it’s the whole thing.Love as joyful communion but also a passionate willingness to sacrifice for one’s belovedA Short Play: The Lord and the Servant (from the long text)Chapter 51 of the Long TextRed herrings in Julian; the medieval trope of enumeratingThe perplexing vision of the servant in the hole ?Reconciling the goodness of the world with sin; dealing with what she is seeing from God and what the church teaches about sin—wresting with the detailsThe Fall, the “Felix Culpa” or the “Happy Fault,” and the servant in the holeGod looks without blame and that complicates church teaching on sin; layers in the narrative, God, humanity, ChristBeing drawn into the puzzling and the pondering experienced by Julian inspired by her writing; finding comfort in a loving God that we cannot see clearlyHow God sees“Our life and our being are in God.”Chapter 49 of Julian’s Showings“She’s saying, sorry sin, good creatures are good creatures and their goodness qua creatures of God is kept safe and whole in God, regardless of what their concrete ...
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    54 mins
  • How to Read Dallas Willard / Steve Porter

    How to Read Dallas Willard / Steve Porter
    Aug 7 2024
    Dallas Willard (1935-2013) was an influential philosopher and beloved author and speaker on Christian spiritual formation. He had the unique gift of being able to speak eloquently to academic and popular audiences, and it’s fascinating to observe the ways his philosophical thought pervades and influences his spiritual writings—and vice versa.In this episode, Steve Porter (Senior Research Fellow and Executive Director of the Martin Institute, Westmont College / Affiliate Professor of Spiritual Formation at Biola University) joins Evan Rosa to explore the key concepts and ideas that appear throughout Dallas Willard’s philosophical and spiritual writings, including: epistemological realism; a relational view of knowledge; how knowledge makes love possible; phenomenology and how the mind experiences, represents, and comes into contact with reality; how the human mind can approach the reality of God with a love for the truth; moral psychology; and Dallas’s concerns about the recent resistance, loss, and disappearance of moral knowledge.About Dallas WillardDallas Willard (1935-2013) was a philosopher, minister and beloved author and speaker on Christian philosophy and spiritual formation. For a full biography, visit Dallas Willard Ministries online.About Steve PorterDr. Steve Porter is Senior Research Fellow and Executive Director of the Martin Institute for Christianity & Culture at Westmont College, and an affiliate Professor of Theology and Spiritual Formation at the Institute for Spiritual Formation and Rosemead School of Psychology (Biola University). Steve received his Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of Southern California and M.Phil. in philosophical theology at the University of Oxford.Steve teaches and writes in Christian spiritual formation, the doctrine of sanctification, the integration of psychology and theology, and philosophical theology. He co-edited Until Christ is Formed in You: Dallas Willard and Spiritual Formation, Psychology and Spiritual Formation in Dialogue, and Dallas’s final academic book: The Disappearance of Moral Knowledge. He is the author of Restoring the Foundations of Epistemic Justification: A Direct Realist and Conceptualist Theory of Foundationalism, and co-editor of Christian Scholarship in the 21st Century: Prospects and Perils. In addition to various book chapters, he has contributed articles to the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society, Journal of Spiritual Formation and Soul Care, Philosophia Christi, Faith and Philosophy, Journal of Psychology and Theology, Themelios, Christian Scholar’s Review, etc. Steve and his wife Alicia live with their son Luke and daughter Siena in Long Beach, CA.Show NotesThe Martin Institute for Christianity & Culture at Westmont CollegeDallas Willard Ministries (Free Online Resources)Dallas Willard, The Spirit of DisciplinesWillard as both spiritual formation teacher/pastor and intellectual/philosopherGary Moon, Becoming Dallas WillardDallas Willard MinistriesConversatio DivinaPhenomenology—“One of the principles of phenomenology is you want to kind of help others come to see what you've seen.”Willard “presenting himself to God” while teaching“The kingdom of God was in the room.”The importance of finding your own way into your spiritual practicesAn ontology of knowing and epistemological realism: “We can come to know things the way they are.”What does it mean to say that being precedes knowledge or that metaphysics precedes epistemology? What does that imply for spiritutal formation?What is real?Operating on accurate information about realityDallas Willard on Husserl: “What is most intriguing in Husserl's thought to me, the always hopeful realist, is the way he works out a theory of the substance and nature of consciousness and knowledge, which allows that knowledge to grasp a world that it does not make.”The Cambridge Companion to HusserlThe philosophical tradition of “saving the appearances”Mind-world relationshipThe affinity between concepts and their objectsDallas Willard on concepts and objects: “On my view, thoughts and their concepts do not modify the objects which make up reality. They merely match up or fail to match up with them in a certain way. Thus, there would be a way things are, and the realism there would be vindicated along with the possibility at least of a God's eye view.”Lying as a disconnection from the truth and therefore from the worldAgency in our choice to know God and pursue knowing GodThe role of sincerity and honesty in shared realityRichard Rorty, “Solidarity or Objectivity”: “breaking free of the shackles of objectivity”Dallas Willard in “Where Is Moral Knowledge?”: “One way of characterizing the condition of North American society at present is to say that moral knowledge, knowledge of good and evil, of what is morally admirable and despicable, right and wrong, is no longer available in our world to people generally. It has ...
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    1 hr and 9 mins
  • Fully Alive: Modern Monasticism & the Topography of the Soul / Elizabeth Oldfield

    Fully Alive: Modern Monasticism & the Topography of the Soul / Elizabeth Oldfield
    Jul 31 2024
    What does it mean to be fully alive and at peace with ourselves and our neighbors in the anxiety and fear of contemporary life?Joining Evan Rosa in this episode is Elizabeth Oldfield—a journalist, communicator, and podcast host of The Sacred. She’s author of Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times.Together they discuss life in her micro-monastery in south London; the meaning of liturgical and sacramental life embedded in a fast-paced, technological, capitalistic, obsessively popular society; the concept of personal encounter and Martin Buber’s idea that “all living is meeting”; the fundamentally disconnecting power of sin that works against the fully aliveness of truly meeting the other; including discussions of wrath or contempt that drives us toward violence; greed or avarice and the incessant insatiable accumulation of wealth; the attention-training benefits of gratitude and the identify forming power of our attention; throughout it all, working through the spiritual psychology of sin and topography of the soul—and the fact that we are, all of us, in Elizabeth’s words, “unutterably beloved.”About Elizabeth OldfieldElizabeth Oldfield is a journalist, communicator, and author. She hosts a beautiful podcast called The Sacred. And she’s author of Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times. Follow her @esoldfield, and visit her website elizabetholdfield.comShow NotesIntentional living community; pulling on monastic lifestyle and framework; read more about Elizabeth Oldfield’s micro-monastery here.People passing through the micro-monastery and the sharing of a meal and sitting in silence with othersCeltic prayer book - The Aidan Compline (https://www.northumbriacommunity.org/offices/monday-the-aidan-compline/)Fully Alive: Tending to the Soul in Turbulent Times by Elizabeth Oldfield (http://bakerpublishinggroup.com/books/fully-alive/421701)How you see your liturgical life, the rhythms of your life however else you might describe you spirituality as providing the soil of this book?A personal writing experience - communicating something of her tradition with the outside worldWhat it means to be fully alive to you?Everything is about relationships and connection; to be fully alive is to be fully connected with the soulBetween Man and Man (https://www.routledge.com/Between-Man-and-Man/Buber/p/book/9780415278270) and I and Thou by Martin Buber - “all living is meeting” (https://www.maximusveritas.com/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/iandthou.pdf)If all living is meeting, how are we failing in that regard?Unapologetic: Why, Despite Everything, Christianity Can Still Make Surprising Emotional Sense by Francis Spufford (https://www.harpercollins.com/products/unapologetic-francis-spufford?variant=32207439626274)Sin is disconnection; a turning inward“Elegy on the Lady Markham” by John Donne (https://www.poetrynook.com/poem/elegy-lady-markham-0)“As I Walked Out One Evening” by W.H. Auden (https://poets.org/poem/i-walked-out-one-evening)The Sacred podcast (https://www.theosthinktank.co.uk/comment/2017/12/06/introducing-the-sacred-podcast)Polarization, division, and the splitting of people - homophily and fight or flight responseJesus going to the margins, ignoring tribal boundaries and turning the other cheekSin and ReconciliationThe Givenness of Things: Essays by Marilynne Robinson, “I find the soul a valuable concept, a statement of the dignity of human life” (https://www.brethrenpress.com/product_p/9781250097316.htm)The soul is interesting and difficult to name but is so valuableRoom for uncertainty and poetry—we beat up our souls, keep ourselves distractedContemporary life is angry and greedyContempt is a poison for our souls and relationships and humanityStress and anxiety as a constantChristian non-violence traditionWe must feel our emotions - process them through the shared rituals of our communitiesDesire by Micheal O’Siadhail (https://www.baylorpress.com/9781481320061/desire/)Would you like to introduce your take on greed?Phyllis Tickle, dogged commitment of the scripture - the love of money is the root of all evilThe Parable of the Sower - Mark 4:19 (https://www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Mark 4%3A19&version=NIV)Made gods of wealth, greed, comfort, and connivenceGratitude is a medicine for greedOf Gratitude by Thomas Traherne? (https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/abs/works-of-thomas-traherne-vii/of-gratitude/161CCCE8293EE4034F65AB436AB4D3F9)“These are the Days We Prayed For” by Guvna B (https://genius.com/Guvna-b-these-are-the-days-lyrics)Notice and give thanks; misplaced desireAcadia, spiritual apathy, and heavy distractionAttention and discipline are formationThe Anxious Generation: How the Great Rewiring of Childhood is Causing an Epidemic of Mental Illness by Jonathan Haidt (https://www.anxiousgeneration.com/book)Community as accountability and rituals and set rhythms of lifeDivine Love, ultimate loveBaptism as a reminder of our death - ...
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    51 mins
  • Political Rage & America's Threat from Within / Elizabeth Neumann

    Political Rage & America's Threat from Within / Elizabeth Neumann
    Jul 11 2024
    Elizabeth Neumann served as the Assistant Secretary for Counterterrorism and Threat Prevention at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during the Bush Administration, and came back to the White House again in 2017 to serve in the Trump Administration.Her job was to counter emerging right-wing extremism, fueled by long-standing anger, resentment, white supremacism, and Christian nationalism. By April 2020, she had resigned from the Trump Administration. Citing a failure of leadership and his imperiling of American security, she signed an August 2020 statement with 130 other Republican national security officials, boldly stating in no uncertain terms that Trump was unfit for office.In this episode, Elizabeth opens up about this experience, told in her recent book Kingdom of Rage: The Rise of Christian Extremism and the Path Back to Peace. As a person of Christian faith with over two decades of experience in public service and national security, she offers a fascinating inside take on the inattention to domestic terrorism; she elucidates the emergence of a new and Christian extremism, grounded in rage and willing to take violent action; she explains the Jan 6 attack through the perspective of homeland security; and she reflects on Christian resources for responding to the chaotic, politicized anger characterized in right-wing extremism and how we might act as instruments of peace.About Elizabeth NeumannElizabeth Neumann served as the Assistant Secretary for Counterterrorism and Threat Prevention at the U.S. Department of Homeland Security during the Bush administration, and came back to the White House again in 2017 to serve in the Trump Administration, publicly resigning in 2020. She is author of Kingdom of Rage: The Rise of Christian Extremism and the Path Back to Peace, and is a frequent guest on national news outlets, and the Chief Strategy Officer at Moonshot. She is based in the Denver, CO area.Show NotesKingdom of Rage: The Rise of Christian Extremism and the Path Back to Peace by Elizabeth NeumannElizabeth Neumann’s faith journey and background in public service.Christian, North Texas/Bible Belt, more theologically conservative—an “evangelical mutt”Body of Christ is made up of different communities—personally gravitating towards more nerdy churches, an emphasis on Bible studiesPublic service as a way to live out the faithWorking for George W. Bush campaigns for governor and president—federalism, conservative, to the states: faith-based community initiatives and Bush’s compassionate conservative agenda9/11 as a moment of changeWorking in Homeland Security, specifically in the Domestic Terrorism UniteInstances of domestic violent extremism: Pittsburg Tree of Life (2018), Christ Church in New Zealand (2019), and El Paso Walmart (2019)Do you think of them as domestic terrorism? Do you think of it as a kind of violence that’s brewing from within? How does the Department of Security try to understand threats to America from within?Intelligence is used to inform responses to challenges, yet the means to collect don’t work domestically and domestic material support of terrorism is not understood as criminalNo way to designate domestic terrorism groupsThe threat has been there all along; domestic extremists require a shift in the focus - many Americans (3%, roughly 8 million people) believe in the necessity of violence for political aimsWe don’t talk about it so people don’t know about it, but the church is equipped to discuss and address the underlying drivers that mobilize people to violenceHow did you experience perspective shifts?COVID in 2020, protests against COVID procedures, and the protests surrounding the murder of George FloydWeaponizing of crisis by Trump administration for re-election campaignThe ANTIFA movement; authoritarian responses from Trump that were illegal and unconstitutional; no longer anyone in the room to tell him noJanuary 6 highlighted a security failure that was both day of as well as a result of 20 years of ignoring a threat from withinWould you be willing to share a bit about what motivated your decision to leave the Trump administration?Presidential personnel interviews as a loyalty test; people being pushed out; how far were people willing to go for Donald Trump?Hatch Act: prohibits federal employees, including political appointees, from engaging in political activityChristian nationalist mindset—How does Christianity get radicalized?Extremism: when an in-group perceives a threat to its success or survival by an out-group and hostile action is necessary—this is the nature of contemporary politics which are saturated in fear and anger.The plausibility of violent actionViolence is not the option taught by Jesus and the ScripturesViolence has a historic presence in the Christian traditionChange in the presence of Christianity in society that is unsettling for some, but cannot be an excuse for extremists and violent actionWhat are the prospects ...
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    58 mins
  • Learning to Disagree / John Inazu

    Learning to Disagree / John Inazu
    Jul 3 2024
    Genuine disagreement is vanishingly rare. But to disagree with careful listening, empathy, respect, and independent thinking—it’s an essential part of life in a pluralistic democratic society.In this episode, legal scholar and author John Inazu joins Evan Rosa to talk about his new book, Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect. He’s the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion at Washington University in St. Louis.Together they discuss the challenge of disagreeing well in contemporary life, replete with the depersonalization of social media; the difference between certainty and confidence; what it means to think for oneself, freely and independently; the virtue of humility in civil discourse; the prospect for political dissent and civil disobedience; how to pursue the truth in a culture of principled pluralism; and practical steps toward empathic and respectful disagreement.About John InazuJohn Inazu is the Sally D. Danforth Distinguished Professor of Law and Religion at Washington University in St. Louis. He teaches criminal law, law and religion, and various First Amendment courses. He writes and speaks frequently about pluralism, assembly, free speech, religious freedom, and other issues. John has written three books—including Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect (Zondervan, 2024) and *Liberty’s Refuge: The Forgotten Freedom of Assembly* (Yale, 2012)—and has published opinion pieces in the Washington Post, Atlantic, Chicago Tribune, LA Times, USA Today, Newsweek, and CNN. He is also the founder of the Carver Project and the Legal Vocation Fellowship and is a senior fellow with Interfaith America.Show Notes"Yeah? Well, you know, that's just like uh, your opinion, man."Get a copy of Learning to Disagree: The Surprising Path to Navigating Differences with Empathy and Respect (https://www.jinazu.com/learning-to-disagree)Disagreement around civility and civil discourse particularlyIdentifying and naming disagreementPractical limits of human relationship as a reality of disagreementWhy you picked up learning to disagree, disagreement in particular? And why is it important to you? What drew you now to make a comment about disagreement?Liberty’s Refuge: The Forgotten Freedom of Assembly (https://www.jinazu.com/libertys-refuge)Right of Assembly in the first amendment and what it means in groups - Madison and factions (Federalist 10?)Confident Pluralism: Surviving and Thriving Through Deep Difference (https://www.jinazu.com/confident-pluralism)Constitutional lawThe First Amendment as what secures the ability to disagree - Freedom of Religion and Freedom of Speech“One is, even if that was part of the, original focus, like any ongoing tradition, it can be lost or ignored. And so there's this sense in which each new generation needs to understand and appreciate it for intrinsic reasons and not just because they read it in a book.”Individual thinking but the reality of not doing anything individually as we are involved in embodied human relationshipsWhat starting points are there? You begin with empathy, what other starting points do you like to introduce to help people understand where you’re trying to take people with this?Complexity and compromise and recognizing that compromise isn’t always possibleHumility in competing visions of truth and what is best for the world; no good or bad, just different persuasionsA desire for certainty which fear and laziness underlineI wonder if you could speak a little bit more to the legal background and why you think that is so helpful and so instructive for going through this framework of learning to disagree?“Maybe only prudentially in order to try to defeat it, but the work of understanding the other side's argument in the best light possible is itself a work of empathy that allows you to step into the headspace of the opponent a little bit and allows you to see why someone who is not dumb or is not You know, completely outside of society might actually think differently.”Supreme Court and difficult, political decisionsApplying the approaches that are taught in law schools in every day lifeThree branches of government and checks and balancesLoss of human relationships with colleagues in Congress and the increase of them in the Supreme CourtPolitical dissent and political dissidentsWhen to disagree?Protests, assemblies, and activismThe privilege of dissent in the United StatesSocial pressures, social stigma, and the confidence and responsibility to dissentHow to cultivate respect for the one who you disagree with?Love your enemies and the Christian calling for interpersonal relationship with the person you disagree with; there is no guarantee of reciprocityQuestion of belief, right belief and orthodoxyDifferences matter, especially in theological conversation, but that doesn’t mean we should rest in ...
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    36 mins