The Briefing with Albert Mohler - Friday, October 17, 2025

Episode Date: October 17, 2025

This is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.Part I (00:14 – 09:53)ChatGPT Takes a Turn Into Porn: ChatGPT Announces It Will Soon Allow A.I. “Erotica” for ‘Verified Adults’ChatGPT will soon allow erotica for verified adults, says OpenAI boss by BBC News (Lily Jamali and Liv McMahon)Part II (09:53 – 13:03)Sanity on Anti-Semitism in California: Governor Gavin Newsom Signs Bill Targeting Antisemitism in Public SchoolsGavin Newsom’s Blow to Antisemitism by The Wall Street Journal (The Editorial Board)Part III (13:03 – 25:38)What is the Difference Between Nationalism and Patriotism? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters From Listeners of The Briefing by Part IV (25:38 – 29:43)How Can I Rightly Understand God’s Emotions Without Demoting or Domesticating His Holy Nature? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters From Listeners of The BriefingSign up to receive The Briefing in your inbox every weekday morning.Follow Dr. Mohler:X | Instagram | Facebook | YouTubeFor more information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to sbts.edu.For more information on Boyce College, just go to BoyceCollege.com.To write Dr. Mohler or submit a question for The Mailbox, go here.

It's Friday, October 17, 2025. I'm Albert Mowler, and this is the briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview. Sometimes the world can change very quickly in moral terms. You wouldn't think so, but it's true. You can look at events such as, say, the Rovi-Wade decision handed down in January of 1973. One moral reality here, and then a different moral reality, at least in terms of the American government and the judiciary the day later. And it's also true that with technology, it happens sometimes even quicker. Because even with something like the Roe v. Wade decision, you had oral arguments.

It was in lower courts and eventually got it to the Supreme Court. You saw it coming. There are other things that are happening now so fast you don't see them coming. But sometimes when they do happen, you say, maybe I should have seen this coming. I want to talk about a headline about Chat GPT. Because at the beginning of this week, ChatGPT did not offer its platform for artificial intelligence porn, but it does now. It was effectively something that could be switched on. It had been switched off. Sam Altman, the head of ChatGPT's larger corporate owner, OpenAI, said

Tuesday of this week that the platform will begin allowing users who have verified they are adults to access what is explicitly in the policy called erotica. Altman said in a statement posted to Quote, now that we have been able to mitigate the serious mental health issues and have new tools, we're going to be able to safely relax the restrictions in most cases. He went on to say, quote, as part of our treat adult users like adults principle, we will allow even more like erotica for verified adults. Now, the erotica part, we are told it's set to come into effect in December. Chad CPP has to roll out what it describes as age gating.

and do so more fully. Age gating. How do you like that? Okay, so what we're being told here is, don't worry, this isn't about kids. It's only for adults. I don't believe that for a moment, by the way. I don't think age gating works. I think, actually, one of the scariest things is that parents would think that age gating works, or frankly, that politicians would buy the claim that age gating works. We know previous efforts to gate ages. That has not worked. But I want us to look at the language used by Sam Altman here. You know, he is one of the leading figures, one of the most important figures in Silicon Valley. He is one of the most important figures in the expanding world of artificial intelligence. And he is in so many ways indicative of people who really operate out of a technological imperative,

out of the belief that this is going to happen, it must happen. And not only that, they want to be the masters of it happening. And they want to be, of course, the financial beneficiaries of it happening. You'll see the technological determinism. that's one of the facets of this worldview. A technological determinism. It will be done. It must be done.

We must do it. We must do more of it tomorrow than we're doing today. That technological determinism is very much a part of Silicon Valley culture. And honestly, the investor culture has, to a significant degree, followed the same pattern. But notice the language that Sam Altman used. As part of our treat adult users like adults' principle, we will allow for even more like erotica for verified adults. Okay, I just wanted us to note what's going on here.

This became evident in the 1960s and the 1970s. It became far more evident with the rise of print pornography as a massive industry, particularly in the 1960s. So how would you account for, say, Playboy, Penthouse, the pornographic magazines of the day, and then, of course, the burgeoning film industry, which, didn't exist as an industry unto itself until the 1960s, really exploded in the 1970s and 1980s. That was before the digital age. It exploded many times over after that. But, you know,

how did you describe it? It became known as the adult entertainment industry. Now, one of the Christians have to always watch is when language is being intentionally used as a moral discount. And that's exactly what's going on here. A moral discount is when you say, this isn't. This isn't drug abuse. It's a drug dependence phenomenon. You can say it's not a lie. It's a half-truth. You can do all kinds of things. And of course, mitigating issues by moral euphemism is something that has a very old history. But when you talk about something as explicit, and yes, I do mean to use the word in this case, explicit is pornography. It is explicitly immoral. It is explicitly a rejection. of the purpose of human sexuality. Is explicitly a rejection of the virtue of modesty? It is the commodification of human beings. It is the exploitation of human beings. By the way, at every stage in the process, the exploitation in terms of most heterosexual pornography, you're talking about the exploitation of the women who are involved, the exploitation also of

those who are the consumers of the pornography and also the exploitation of those who are affected outside even the use or the making explicitly of those products. You refer to it as adult. Does that solve a problem? I would argue it does create a distinction in the problem. It's a distinction that is found throughout civilization when we say harm to an adult is not measured the same way as harm to a child. And also adults have at least some matter of choice. Now, we do this even with something like at least what's purported to be the structure when it comes to legalize gambling. You know, at least in theory, it's impossible for a five-year-old to become a titan of online gaming. However, as you know, there are ways around that, too.

The point is, we say that's adult. That doesn't make it right. Can we just stipulate that? Saying something is adult entertainment actually raises the question as to how immoral it must be if you're going to define it that way or other activities along the way. the same lines. When you have Sam Altman say, as part of our treat adult users like adults' principle, well, okay, so what morally would that possibly cut out? If you're going to say the only issue here is how we identify things and define them as adult, then what's not authorized by this? Because when you then say pornography, or his term was erotica, well, you know what's going on here.

Now, as Christians, let's just remind ourselves that pornography, erotica is the direct. direct intentional lie in misrepresentation and abuse of God's gift of sexuality and God's plan in creation order for sex as the unitive act between a married couple, the generative act of producing babies and offspring. You turn that into commercial exploitation. It's not only that something's gone wrong, everything's gone wrong. And of course, the principle that conservatives warned about and Christians warned about in the 1960s is exactly what's going on now. And that is that not only does porn become a corrupting influence in individual lives, it becomes a corrupting influence in the entire culture and the entire civilization. And furthermore, the boundaries are

always exceeded. People say these are the boundaries of pornography. And then the next thing you know, well, the boundaries have been moved. Then they keep being moved and they keep being moved. You know, Sam Altman didn't deal at all with, frankly, some of the unspeakably horrifying things I'm not about to describe on the briefing that are under the category now of erotica. And just imagine artificial intelligence is going to allow the creation of bots used for pornographic purposes and for customized pornographic entertainment films, whatever. It's really a scary thing. But it just points to the fact that there is no technology, which is morally neutral.

Let's just remind ourselves of that. That includes the wheel. When the wheel was invented, it can be used to make a willbarrow. You can carry good things or you can carry stolen goods. When you put it on a car, you can go to good places, you can go to bad places. You can use it for good purposes or for bad purposes. You can rescue someone or you can kidnap someone. Technology is never morally neutral.

And one of the moral dimensions of technology is what does this now facilitate? What was impossible before this switch was flipped before this particular? particular development became online or available. What was impossible yesterday that's not only possible, but actual now. I also just want to warn before I leave this issue that we just have to watch again and again Christians can't buy the lie that some adequate system here is protecting children and minors. That's just a lie. I want to tell you why it's a lie in a way you might not think at first. It's a lie because I do think kids are going to find their way to what is behind this. this firewall or whatever they're going to call it here, age gating. But the other thing is,

children are corrupted because adults using this kind of online platform, they're going to be corrupted. Parents are going to be corrupted. Brothers and sisters are going to be corrupted. Neighbors are going to be corrupted. We as Christians have to understand the moral circle doesn't end with the age-verified adult, even if there is such a thing. All right, now I'm going to make a little bit of history on the briefing. I'm going to say something positive about California Governor Gavin Newsom. I don't think I've done that before. And this is quite legitimate.

Just last week, he signed legislation into law in California, which will outlaw anti-Semitism in public schools. And he finds himself down with opposition, unexpected opposition, first-time opposition from the teachers' unions in the state of California. they are aghast that California's Democratic governor, who by any measure is a liberal. And by any measure has been quite predictably a friend of the teachers' unions. He evidently signed this law, and the law establishes an anti-Semitism prevention coordinator in the state office of civil rights. Quote, this official will train teachers, administrators, and local school boards on how to spot, prevent, and respond to anti-Semitism. And then the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal.

So this is interesting. This isn't just, you know, some online news source. This is an official statement from the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal. They write, quote, believe it or not, this isn't already part of anti-biased training in many school districts. So the editorial board of the Wall Street Journal gets to the heart of the problem. How can it be new? How can you be in the year 2025 in California only now have anti-Semitism training as a part of the teacher training and school culture there in the public schools? the story gets interesting, quote, the teachers union and anti-Israel groups are most upset about the

bill's requirement that instruction, quote, be factually accurate and aligned with the adopted curriculum and standards, end quote, okay, wait just a minute. We have the open statement here that you have the teachers union and anti-Israel groups upset about, well, what will be the requirement they'd be upset about? That is that instruction, quote, be factually accurate and align with the adopted curriculum and standards under existing law and, quote, be consistent with the accepted standards of professional responsibility rather than advocacy, personal opinion, bias, or partisanship. This is being opposed by groups predictably, such as the Council in American Islamic Relations. That group said, and I quote, that the legislation would silence discussion of Israel's

ongoing campaign of genocide, ethnic cleansing, and forced starvation of children and families in Gaza. As the Wall Street Journal's editorial board says, silent, students can still discuss the war in Gaza, but teachers can't portray the Jewish state and its supporters as genocidal killers. All right. So it's just very interesting. And Gavin Newsom, who clearly has his eye on the 2008 Democratic presidential nomination, this shows you what happens. There are political quandaries on the right, to be sure.

This is a political quandary on the left. How in the world can he sign this legislation and keep peace with the teachers' unions and, frankly, with the far left of the Democratic Party, which is turning openly anti-Semitic? And certainly anti-Israel. It's going to be very interesting to watch. But, you know, when you see someone do the right thing, it's the right thing. And Gavin Newsom, California's Democratic liberal governor signing this legislation, was the right thing. And again, the Wall Street Journal editors are right. Why did it take so long? Okay, let's turn to questions. I'm always glad to hear from listeners to the briefing. Just write me at mail at albertmoler.com. And I'm thrilled with the questions that come such smart, intelligent questions. And I, I, I like to talk about the ones I think will really help other people also to think some of these issues through. A young man from Oklahoma writes, and he's writing asking a question about nationalism, patriotism,

and the city of God by the towering theological figure of the early church, Augustine. And this is what he writes. He says, quote, I sense there is a distinction between patriotism and nationalism. American patriotism seems rooted in gratitude, sacrificed freedom, and a foundation. for Christian morality or of Christian morality. Nationalism, on the other hand, appears to be a kind of ultimate allegiance that seeks to preserve the nation at all costs. Is that a fair assessment? And he talks about Augustine's city of God, reminding us that our true home is in the heavenly city, but God has left us by his providence here in the earthly city with a mission.

So let's talk about this. Number one, the word patriotism and the word nationalism. You know, it's very interesting. This is a very bright young man who writes in, saying that he sees a distinction, American patriotism, he says, seems rooted in gratitude, sacrifice freedom, and a foundation of Christian morality. You know, I think all those things belong together, except perhaps the foundation of Christian morality. I think some people would define patriotism just basically as gratitude for sacrifice and freedom and say those who have fought in wars and protect the nation. But let's remind ourselves of the derivation of the word, patria, refers to father, refers to fatherland, the land of our fathers. And of course,

it means fathers and mothers. But the point is, you know, the word patriotism might actually be a tighter word than the word nationalism. And in the 20th century, patriotism understood rightly, etymologically, may have been a more dangerous word than nationalism. But, you know, you raise a very good issue. What should be a Christian patriotism? And I would argue that informed by scripture, a Christian patriotism should be thankful for the fact that God has given us preserving units in human society that turn out to be worthy of our allegiance and worthy of our faithfulness and worthy of our love and worthy of our common commitment. And it is true that our fatherland, our mother land, the place where we have been given life and in which we've been raised and has given us great blessings, we owe a certain allegiance and, well, there's the word patriotism to it. It becomes an even more important issue, I think, when you understand the particular nature of America as a project.

And so the United States of America was begun to establish a new patria. A new order of the ages is actually a part of the original American experiment. It was a reset. And you know, this is where we have to remember, there's continuity and there's discontinuity. The American Revolution, I often argue, was both continuity and discontinuity. What the American revolutionaries were trying to overthrow was not Western civilization. They were seeking to perpetuate and extend Western civilization. They even largely extended the Anglosphere. So even the political patterns of Britain and Britain's larger culture, they were just Americanized and brought over and I think improved upon, frankly, in terms of the American constitutional order.

And so in continuity, what kind of statement were the founders of this country trying to make in terms of continuity? What kind of architecture did they use? They went to ancient Greece and ancient Rome. How are so many of the founders, including most famously George Washington, often portrayed in classical garb, like they're walking in Athens or walking. in Rome. This country was built upon discontinuity, yes, a new order of the ages, but absolute continuity with the Western civilizational pattern, which honestly, the nation's founders and the framers of the constitutional order saw as their ambition. They understood both parts of that.

Okay. Patriotism is tied to that, and I think it's probably the most commonly used word about our proper allegiance, proper devotion, proper appreciation, proper celebration, But there are obviously limits to patriotism. That doesn't mean my country right or wrong. It is my country right or wrong, but our duty, especially in a constitutional republic, is to seek to make it right rather than wrong. We have a responsibility here. It's quite different than if we were living under a totalitarian government or an autocracy. So patriotism is a good word. I'm not embarrassed by it. I think a proper patriotism. I like that phrase. I grew up hearing that phrase. Christians are called to a proper patriotism. And that's one that's biblical. one that understands the state can't claim ultimate allegiance. It can claim an earthly allegiance, and in fact, it can and should. Okay, so the other word is nationalism, and this man, again, very intelligently writes, it appears to be a kind of ultimate allegiance that seeks to preserve the nation at all costs. Is that a fair assessment?

No, I don't think it is, but I can understand in current usage why you might think that. I would argue that nation, and that's a word that, of course, is used in English, but we could go back to linguistic origins. But for one thing, I want to go back to the table of the nations found in Genesis in which you have the establishment by God's providence of different nations, ethnic, well, you say first, that might mean ethnic groups, but they're going to be gathered in different nations. And thus, you look at the Old Testament, you already have,

the rise of groups are identified as nations. Israel is identified as a nation. And at one point, Judah is also identified as a nation. And there are other nations around them. Israel is surrounded by powerful nations that want to extinguish it. So the word nation, I don't think is a problem at all. And in fact, I'm going to argue for a certain form of nationalism. And so why and how?

I don't believe in any kind of idolatrous nationalism, a form of fascism. And yes, the 20th century warned is that those kinds of things can happen. That's where this takes on an ultimate allegiance. the nation is really positioned in eschatological terms. And sometimes American Christians can be tempted to talk that way, as if America is the final destiny of history. It isn't. The kingdom of Christ, and that's Augustine you raise. It's the heavenly city where we have our primary citizenship.

And that's where we place our greatest hopes. We don't put ultimate hopes in the earthly kingdom, even the earthly kingdom of the United States of America. But going back to the table of the nations, I think there is a basic biblical principle, and it comes down to the Christian principle of subsidiarity. And that is that there are basic units that cannot be jumped over and have human flourishing. You can't jump over marriage. You can't jump over the family. You can't just jump to neighborhood. You can't just jump to city. You can't just jump. Here's one of the most fundamental conservative insights of the 20th century. And Margaret Thatcher put it in her own inimitable way.

When she was asked about the importance of society, she said, I don't believe it exists. Now, let me just say, I think there is such a thing as society, but I think what Margaret Thatcher was saying is it's an abstraction. You talk about society, and it's a way of avoiding talking about families, marriages, neighborhoods, cities. You know, society is an abstraction, and politics should be about the specific. Okay, but when you talk about a nation, I think a nation over the course of history, however you're going to define it, and you know, it's a pretty stable term right now. It's fascinating to see that between the beginning of the 19th century and the end of the 20th century, what are the most stable concepts that wasn't stable before is the concept of nation? And you could look at such developments as the Treaty of Vesphalia. You could look at the Congress of Vienna in the 19th century.

and then, of course, you could look at the various chapters of the 20th century. And so by the time you get to the end of the 20th century, you look at a map, you see nations. Everyone pretty much knows what they are. And I think we can fail to see that's kind of an innovation. It used to be kingdoms. It used to be empires. It used to be amorphous things. And there was terra incognita.

Who knows what's there. So that's one of the achievements. I believe that in the Providence of God, in respect to creation order, the nation is a unit. that is biblically recognized. Now, I'm not saying the United States of America. I'm not saying that it has to be a nation that's transcontinental between the Atlantic and the Pacific in North America with 50 states. I am saying that there's a, there's a limitation. So let me just tell you the alternative. The alternative is the absence of nations. What do you have? A global civilization? Okay. Here's a clear biblical principle. There is no such thing as a global civilization. I mean, frankly,

some nations can get so large that you have to question whether that's a manageable civilization. But, you know, the globalist ambitions of the far left, and frankly, of the cultural elites in the 20th century, even, you know, someone like Woodrow Wilson in the League of Nations, you know, whatever it was, it was either going to be nations or a league. It wasn't really a League of Nations. And I would say the same thing about the United Nations. I don't want it to just disappear because someone's going to recreate it somewhere else. And I agree with Harry Truman. If you're going to have it, have it where the United States can get to it right quick. And we can decide who. can fly into the United States or not. The last thing we want, the United Nations located in, I don't know, Paris or Geneva or somewhere. So it's a problem, but I think Harry Truman is right. It's a problem we're going to keep close at home rather than to let it get far away. But, you know, the United Nations, by definition, isn't united. You have a security council in which you have several countries with a veto, a single veto power, and it's been used almost every crucial point in the history of the United Nations. It has shown disunity,

rather than unity. And this spectacular failure of the United Nations to bring about a peace or prosperity or any other human good. I'm not saying it never does anything right. I'm just saying, if it does so, it would have been more efficiently done by someone else already. I think there's also a Christian understanding of the nation as requiring pre-political commitments. And we're running out of time for today. But I think one of the most important things to understand about a nation is that there are pre-political commitments. So in other words, the nation really doesn't decide what's right and wrong. The nation doesn't decide ultimate issues. The nation has to respect that. That's key, by the way, to the American experiment. The American founders did not invent marriage. They wanted to respect

marriage. They didn't even invent common law. They wanted to respect common law. And it gets back to inalienable rights and all kinds of things. I think there's a proper Christian nationalism. I think there would be an improper Christian nationalism that elevates the nationable. nation unbiblically. But I think with respect to subsidiarity and creation order and God's plan, and frankly, just trying out of love of neighbor to build a decent society, I think it's very difficult to imagine how that can be done efficiently at a level larger than a nation. Also, the nation is a legally defined entity that has responsibilities. And for instance, can be held morally responsible. We talk about rogue nations. We don't talk about rogue regions. We don't

talk about rogue neighborhoods. We do hold governments in particular responsible, and I think that's inevitable. So it's a great question. And I think there can be an improper patriotism or a proper patriotism for the Christian, but I think a proper patriotism is actually required. And there can be an improper nationalism or a proper nationalism, but I defy those who want to say that you can get by without a healthy nation based upon the right pre-political commitments. And that includes for Western civilization, biblical law, biblical morality, and respect for creation order. Finally for today, a really brilliant, a very insightful question from a 19-year-old young woman. And she writes in saying, how can I rightly approach the topic of God's emotions without demoting

or domesticating His Holy Nature? End quote. I just love hearing from a 19-year-old young woman who asked such a wonderful, faithful question. Number one, God doesn't change. Our emotions change. As we know, our emotions, they are both controlled and uncontrolled. They are both holy and unholy. And you know, you said it exactly right. You don't want to demote or domesticate God's holy nature. So what that means is, number one, this is something like John Calvin, very helpfully defined this. When you have a biblical, reference to God, you know, expressing emotion where God's wrath is poured out or his anger is poured out. You have to ask, is this moral? Is it judicial? So in other words, if I get angry, it's because I've lost

control. And by definition, that's sin. God's anger is judicial. It is coming out of His holiness and its absolute righteousness. And it's, by the way, it's God being completely consistent with his character. Okay. Another question to ask is, does this imply change in God? Because God doesn't change, you know. And as the scripture says, God doesn't change, therefore we're saved. So if God changed, we are doomed. So is God happy here and sad there? Is God elated here and angry there? The answer is no. He is absolutely consistent. So we can never interpret or use references to God's emotions as implying change. Okay, there's another issue here. And that is, to what extent do we rightly understand such statements to be condescension, accommodations to our understanding?

And you say, well, how does that work? Well, the same way it says that God saves with his mighty hand and his outstretched arm. He doesn't have a hand or an arm. He is spirit and does not have a body, but you know what, we can't think of action without a hand or an arm. And thus, that's an accommodation. It helps us. As Calvin said, look, there are things we can only understand because God leans over and whispers them to us so that we can understand them. One day we will see no longer through a glass darkly. That doesn't mean that we're going to know everything about God because he's infinite and we will continue to be finite, but we will see him face to face.

what was cloudy will be clear. And such a sweet question. So again, I go back to the fact that at least part of this is that we have to use the language of emotions for God's righteousness and His holiness being manifest when it comes to say human sin. His wrath poured out upon sin. He doesn't decide to pour his wrath out upon sin. It is the natural consequence because of his nature. He doesn't change, but he does reveal himself in language that helps us at the human scale to understand him, his mighty hand and his outstretched arm. Otherwise, we're not saved. So we're thankful for that. I'm thankful for this question. Let's strive for faithfulness. Let's try to keep the theological category straight. And I'm so thankful for a young listener who's doing her best to keep the theological

categories biblically straight. Thanks for listening to the briefing. For more information, go to my website at Albertmohler.com. You can follow me on X or Twitter by going to X.com forward slash Albert Moller. For information on the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to sbtsketeas.edu. For informational on boys' college,

just go to boysccollage.com. I'll meet you again on Monday for the briefing.