Theology in the Raw - 837: Christianity in a Post-Trump World

Episode Date: January 7, 2021

Whether you love him or hate him—and it seems like these are the only two options—we are now living in a post-Trump world. What does this mean for Christianity? How should Christians think through 2021? Preston and Karen sit down to banter around about all things related to Christianity and culture. 

Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. If you have benefited from listening to the show, if you've been blessed by it, then please consider supporting it through Patreon. That's patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw, patreon.com forward slash theology in the raw. And you can support the show for as little as five bucks a month, get access to premium content and join the Theology in the Raw community. We've got some great discussions and things that happen on that platform. So consider coming on over and joining the crowd. I have on the show today, my friend and somebody who I've learned a lot from over the years, Dr. Karen Swallow-Pryor. Dr. Pryor, or as I like to call her, Karen, is research professor of English and Christianity and culture at Southeastern Baptist Theological Seminary.

She formerly taught at Liberty University. She's the author of several books, including the most recent, her most recent book on reading well, Finding the Good Life Through Great Books, put out by Brazos Press. And she's also the co-editor of Cultural Engagement, a Crash Course in Contemporary Issues. What I love about Karen, what I love about Karen is that she is unwaveringly committed to the scriptures. She's a solid Bible-believing Christian, and yet she is also full of wisdom, wisdom, wit, and sass. And if you follow Karen on Twitter, I don't follow her on other social media accounts, but I've seen her on Twitter and I love how she is provocative. She's creative. She keeps you on your toes. So I'm super excited to have Karen back to talk about, what's the title of this?

We wanted to talk about something like being a Christian in post-Trump America. That could take us in many different directions. So I think you're going to really enjoy this interesting, engaging conversation. Please welcome back to the show for the second time, the one and only Dr. Karen Swallow-Pryor. Hello, friends. Welcome back to another episode of Theology in the Raw. I'm here with my friend, Dr. Karen Swallow Pryor. You've already heard of her credentials. We share a love of books. And now I could literally sit here in my basement and just read all day. Are you kind of like that? I mean, obviously, you're a bookie person. But does a glorious Saturday look like you and a stack of books and a cup of coffee?

Well, actually, you know, it's almost like the reverse because I grew up loving books. I had my nose in a book all the time. That's all I did was read. And then I became an English professor and continued to read. And then like Al Gore invented the Internet and everything changed. No, but no, but also it's not just, you know, digital media, but even just as a writer, I find myself, you know, I have to write a lot and I'm a slow writer and it takes a lot of time. And so a lot of times, even as I'm writing, I'm thinking, oh, I wish I could be reading right now. So I actually spent feel like I spend less time reading than I did as a young person because I didn't have anything else. That's all I did. So now I'm grown up and

I have other responsibilities. I got a couple of questions on reading, actually, before we jump into some other conversations about politics and culture and so on. Okay, so I am really bad at reading fiction. And yet, most wise people in my life say, look, I know you're a public intellectual. I know you need to read nonfiction. I know that's probably what you do. You need to read fiction. It will help you think better, read better, write better. It helps with your imagination, your creativity.

Would you agree with that? I'm going to assume you're going to agree with that, but I just want to get confirmation from somebody who knows what they're talking about. Should I be reading fiction regularly? Is that something that you would say is really important for me to do? Yes, but I want to expand if I may. Okay, you may. May I expand?

You may. Yes. So fiction is a pretty broad category that includes Jane Austen and like, you know, I don't know, Harlequin romances or something. So when you talk about fiction, like I want you to read literary fiction, which means, you know, Jane Austen, Toni Morrison,

Charles Dickens, you know, people who write, who use words as an art form to tell a story. There's nothing wrong with, you know, reading a mystery novel or, you know, the latest, you know, pulp fiction or something. But if you're that's just entertainment and that's fine. That's like a little bit like watching television, even though it's still reading. But when you read literary fiction, it's really for formation, not information. formation, not information. And so you read it in a different way, even than you would when you would read philosophy or theology, because it's basically like looking at a painting. You know, you go to a museum and you look at the painting, not just because you want to see what a bowl of fruit looks like. You go because you want to see how the artist used paint to recreate some experience.

And so literary writers are using words to recreate an experience. You just, you can certainly, you want to get caught up in the story, certainly, but it's also a matter of paying attention to how the words create that narrative experience. And so that means slowing down and, you know, not just getting the information, but just really observing the story in the same way that you would observe, you know, a painting. Okay. I've been reading. And that changes you. It doesn't just inform you. It's not like you're just reading to find out, oh, what was London like in 1852? It's more like experiencing it through the medium of language. I've been into kind of some of the famous dystopian novels,

like 1984, Fahrenheit 451. I just read. Okay, those are great. Lord of the Flies and stuff. Because, you know. I love that stuff. And they are great stories. Yeah.

But they also do more than just entertain us. Right. And I feel like those are slightly different because there is so much societal, moral connection with themes going on today. So it's almost like 1984 in particular is almost on the fence between fiction and nonfiction. I mean, there's so many things. I'm like, wow, well, that just happened last week on social media. And like, how did you predict that 70 years ago? Now, very true.

When I'm reading, so I'm reading right now. And please don't defriend me. But I mean, I've literally never read To Kill a Mockingbird or Catcher in the Rye. So I'm in the middle of To Kill a Mockingbird right now. I ordered Catcher in the Rye. Just I, I'm in the middle of to kill a mock you right now. I ordered catcher in the rye. Some, just some stuff that I just missed out on in life. When I'm reading literary fiction,

like you said, it's forming you. Do I need to be actively paying attention to the forming? Or if I just get absorbed in the book, is it kind of a passive? I'm absorbing language and imagination and moral dilemmas. Like, does that make sense? Like, do I need need or do I need to be taking notes and highlighting phrases? I mean, just being absorbed is wonderful. And you that that's really all all that is that's required to have that formative experience.

But I guess it's often often literary fiction can pose a difficulty, you know, just because it's either, you know, it's not straightforward or challenge that exercises kind of your empathetic and, uh, perspective, perspective muscle, um, and, you know, and accept that and ask, ask questions about it. But if you're completely absorbed, then it's going to do the work that it's supposed to do, um, which is primarily to tell a good story. But it still does it in a way that's just different from, you know, just cheap, you know, supermarket fiction. Yeah. Vampire romance. Yeah. I don't think they sell those books in the supermarket anymore. I don't even think we use the word supermarket anymore. But I'm old. So here we go. So I need you to catch me. Let's transition now to just a broader cultural conversation. I want to have you on because

I feel like you're one of the best people I know who is solidly evangelical. You know, you're you teach at an SBC school. And yet, I shouldn't say and yet and also, you're a very self critical, like, like you're a critical thinker, like, like, you don't just accept things, you're not afraid to push back challenge. You're not afraid to stir the pot, Karen, in case people didn't know that about you, which is why I really, I really appreciate you. But I've actually been gone for the last few months. I don't know when this podcast is going to release, but I was on an extended study break. I didn't check the news. I didn't, I still am.

Well, I actually have an assistant who does some of my social media, so it might look like I'm more active than I am. Um, but it's amazing when you kind of unplug for a little bit, how, first of all, delightful it is. And second of all, how much you you're like life isn't as bad as i thought it was or i don't know like it doesn't seem like the whole world's caving in but maybe it is i don't know but can you can you give me a i would love to hear your global thoughts on 2020 is that too big of a question i mean as we read 50 years from now and people are reading

about 2020, what are they going to, what are those history books going to say? And how have you gotten through this year as an evangelical Christian who's very socially, culturally in tune? That is a big question, but I, yeah, I want to answer it. I'll try to get, paint a big question, but I yeah, I want to answer it. I'll try to get paint a big picture and then maybe that will you know, that can that connects to some of the very specific things about this time and place in our country anyway. So I just got fresh off of an interview with this morning with Sven Berkerts, who is who wrote the Gutenberg Elegies and Changing the Subject, which are I just refer to Sven as the Neil Postman of our time. And if you don't know who Neil Postman is, anyone who's listening, he wrote his most famously Amusing Ourselves to Death, in which he talks about the sort of transition that we're going through from print culture to

electronic culture. I mean, he was writing, Postman was writing in like 1984, I think, or in 85. And so it was really even before the digital age, but he was writing about the age of television and celebrity as it was then, very prophetic. And everything that he's, he predicted is, has come true. And so Sven writes about the more current digital age. And as we were talking, we were talking about how Postman talked about a 500 year old print age and

age of print and all that, that it does to us as citizens and people to be literate and to read and the kinds of presidential debates that defined early America because we were a literate culture and how debates were really more like long, hours long speeches. And now we are in this digital age where everything's reduced to social media soundbites and image and celebrity and very ephemeral. this thing that's been going on for the past few decades as we've really transitioned from a print culture to a digital media culture. Now, that's kind of a lot, but I think that we are, in many ways, emerging into another kind of 500-year moment of human civilization. year moment of human civilization, you know, so we had 1500 years of Christendom before the Reformation.

The Reformation brought about a great number of changes, including the printing press and a literate age. And now we're entering a post-literate age that's defined by digital media. And I think 2020 is kind of a hinge moment in this transition it's like the 1517 the year the good was a 1450 when the gutenberg it's it's one of those it's going to go down as kind of that that yeah that turning point yeah i mean that's phyllis fickle talked about that didn't she and um oh's that? The great. Are you familiar with this?

She had that kind of every 500 years. I actually just got that book. Oh, yeah. It's really good. I haven't read it yet, but someone else recommended that to me when I was talking in this way. They told me I needed to read that book and I just got it. I've used the 500 years, like the fall of Constantine or no, the conversion of Constantine, the East West divide in 1054, which, which might, that might not have, well, maybe it had a greater impact than I realized.

And then of course, reformation than now the internet. But yeah, she, she wrote about that. I think it was like eight years ago or something. So even then it's, it was a bit prophetic. Do you, so when you say this is kind of a transitionary year, a kind of, do you, this soundbite driven culture, are you seeing it coming to a climax and people are going to start to go

beyond that to back to more long form conversations? Are you saying this is now kind of the beginning of even more? Yes. That's what I'm saying. Oh, no, really? No, I mean, because to go to go back to the more specific example that you were talking about the election, like there's really nothing at all surprising about not the election itself. Well, yes, the entire election, but I mean, not the election itself. Well, yeah, the entire election, but I mean, leading up to it and what we're in now, this sort of this, this debate over what the truth is and what reality is in terms of something as theoretically quantifiable, concrete and tangible as counting ballots. Right. I mean, concrete and tangible as counting ballots right i mean i mean how more how more measurable and factual can you get than that yeah and yet our country believes you know a good you know is divided over the reality of a very physical, tangible, concrete reality. And that questioning of basic

reality has come about because of, you know, this soundbite age and this disconnectedness of all information, pieces of information from other pieces of information. We have so much information, we don't know how to knit it together into a form of knowledge, let alone wisdom, like Joe Rogan, probably the most popular podcaster, you know, he's got three to four hour conversations, right? And, you know, he'll have six, seven, eight million downloads per episode when CNN can interview Biden or Trump and get a million views, you know, and Rogan talking about sometimes nothing for three hours, but just having a long form conversation. So oftentimes they're very stimulating conversations.

And there's many I mean, other podcasts seem to be really taking off. be a sign that a growing number of people are looking for more long form discussions rather than the soundbites rather than the 30 second clip to, you know, stir the pot on some mainstream media outlet. Is that is there anything to that? Do you think or? Well, let me let me confess that this is something with which I'm entirely unfamiliar. I did not even know that such a thing existed as a three hour podcast. And I'm not sure I needed to know that. No. And here we are on a podcast. I actually don't even listen to podcasts, but let me, so let me think out loud for a minute about that. I do find the, the, the length of the conversation is certainly kind of, you know, is good.

That's better than a soundbite. But I was actually literally thinking about this the other day because people send me podcasts all the time and they tell me I should listen to this and listen to that. And I don't. When I'm running, if I'm not listening to music, I'm listening to books on audible and I realized that I don't like podcasts present company excluded because it no it's they are they they're wonderful yeah um but their limitation is that it's people they are we are thinking out loud we're sort of drafting, which is fine. But we aren't polishing and constructing. Right.

You know, we aren't – like a book. A book is polished and constructed and revised and edited. And so a podcast is more like a work in progress, which is fine in itself. Right. But like you said, you said the podcast was three hours about nothing. Well, yeah. I know you didn't mean that literally, but I think there's also sort of a freestyle, even if it's long, that is similar to a three-hour podcast to a tweet let me back up so yeah uh sometimes again going back to the joe rogan example and i only you know i don't know if you know he got um

spotify signed him for 100 million dollars to be exclusive on spotify rather than itunes you know because they saw this, his, I mean, it's super popular. Yeah, it's crazy. That's like being a football player or something. Oh, yeah. I don't know. And so, yes, sometimes he'll have his, some friends on the show and sometimes they end

up just bantering around. I would say the majority of the time, or at least half the time, he will have an expert, an intellectual, oftentimes like a scientist. He'll have a lot of controversial people on. And so he does bring on like an expert who is bringing loads of expertise. And he asks hard questions. He'll push back. You know, six million downloads.

But I that still is still a different direction than reading a book from cover to cover. So I yeah, maybe we just don't know exactly what I, I do think it's scratching an itch specifically for people, even though they have fallen into the addiction in many cases of the soundbite, Twitter culture, whatever. I think there still is this hunger for deeper, more meaningful, longer conversations. He had, he had Bernie Sanders on hour-long episode this is a short one and it was really it was fascinating i've never listened to bernie sanders more than five minutes because most outlets it's just a little fight it's just a soundbite you know but they hear him and i'm not a bernie sanders fan i mean there's some things he says that i might resonate with but i mean i um it was really interesting i was like wow this is an

actual human being because i can hear them talk and think and get pushed back on and push back and explain you know and um it was it was refreshing even though much of what he said i was like i'm not sure i'm on board with that but um i don't know no i i agree with that that it is a positive sign given you know the other other impulses pushing against that kind of thing. It just there is sort of an ephemeral nature of it, even if it's long. And so that's, you know, I think that's, you know, that's I mean, again, to go back to Neil Postman, who is just a huge influence on my thinking and has been for 30 years. It's just, you know, there's a, there's, and it's, there are pros and cons. So it's not that a matter of, of, I mean, I have my bias. I, I,

I'm fond of print culture. But there's a kind of a permanence and a commitment and an authority that comes with putting something in print theoretically um you know now you know any anybody anybody with a blue check on twitter i guess can publish a book or plagiarize a book um and sell a lot of copies but that's part i guess that's part of the end of a real print culture as well the blue check on twitter so how do you even how does that i don't know that i have a blue check so i can do you have to sign up for it or they give it to does that even – I don't even know how that works. I have a blue check, so I can – Oh, you do? Do you have to sign up for it?

Do they give it to you or are they – I don't even know. It's a very mysterious process, and it's become more mysterious. Like people – I actually don't remember how I got – like there's – and I think that since I got it, they've suspended the process. I really don't know because people have asked me, and I've even looked it up and and it's just very weird um but yes it was something i filled something out for but i think you can't even access that thing anymore i i don't know what do you think about the conversation surrounding censure censure censorship censorship why can i say censorship and um social media some of the stuff regarding twitter and to i think a lesser extent facebook but um what can you subcribe for an alien that just landed on planet Earth? Like what's going on in that conversation? And do you have any thoughts on what's going on?

Yeah. I mean, you mentioned 1984, so I'll probably invoke that as well. I mean, so true censorship really in its true definition can only be done by the government. That censorship is a government action traditionally in law. But we use the term to talk about, you know, we use it in a different way. There's that second meaning where like I could censor you right now by hanging up or something, you know, I can or I can censor my own thoughts by repressing them. And so Facebook and Twitter, you know, they're private companies and they, you, we we think that they aren't.

We forget that they are. And they're trying to be actually can feed into paranoia that already exists and end up pushing these conspiracy theories further away. But I don't know that even, you know, I have some ethical questions that are constantly arising about Twitter and Facebook anyway, simply because of the fact that they have to employ lots and lots and lots of people to review vile content as part of their jobs in order to prevent those things from being disseminated. I'm talking about things like child pornography that people try to post and gets taken down. And so there are huge, huge ethical concerns that private companies and we as individuals have to deal with just because we are in this what i like to call this new dark age of just rampant information and media i i do have a yeah i guess i do i am concerned with it because like you said who's to determine what is dangerous and bad ideas you know especially in this day and age like and my only real experience with it because i'm way too small for anybody to care but like even on on i started a

youtube channel this will be on youtube and all sometimes i'll get a video that's demonetized or dimmed down and it's always something that, I mean, some of it's like, like I just had an interview with a girl who identified as trans in her teenage years, took testosterone, transitioned partially, and then ended up detransitioning back to female. And it's very critical of how she was, she would even say, verbally abused and brainwashed by certain ideologies and stuff. And that was demonetized.

She's just telling her story. So then they would say that's dangerous. There was a Reddit thread called Detrans, which just told stories of people who have detransitioned. And that's deemed to be dangerous. And even people who do detransition, they say, no, people see me as if I don't maintain a trans identity i'm viewed as toxic dangerous right wing hitler nazi bigot all these things and it's like whoa wow really like or even anything to reflect any kind of christian view of sexuality all those videos almost all of them are are demonetized um on my youtube so somebody and i could see because i'll always request a a

it's an automatic review computerized that demonetizes it then they say you can you can request confirmation and i could see there's always two views so two people or one person's viewing it twice so there is a real person on their side i don't know their worldview i don't know their moral framework they may see christianity is dangerous for society so i just yeah, yeah, I don't know. This is a tough thing for me. Yes, I would agree. I hope everyone would agree that social media platforms should not host child pornography.

Should they host stories of somebody who used to identify as trans and doesn't do so anymore? Should they host somebody advocating, here we go say reparative therapy both you and i would not agree with that but because we don't agree with it does that mean that needs to be censured censured censored off the internet like i i i think i have a problem with that like i think that does go back to will that lead to a 1984 scenario where which is disastrous, really? And I'm not a yeah, I don't know. No, no. I mean, I these are these are real concerns. And this is why I've always been extremely extreme, I guess, in my First Amendment and free speech views. Extreme, I guess, in my First Amendment and free speech views.

And again, informed by the 17th century Puritan John Milton, who wrote one of the first treatises from and also that treatise was from a very conservative Christian point of view, arguing for in our terms today would be freedom, the free press. That's not the term that was used. But because because even if these private companies have the right to do this, it it actually, again, it's I mean, we need to encounter what we believe to be wrong ideas with with good ideas. And it's it's dangerous not to do that, to push them underground. And so the companies really should follow the first, you know, they should follow constitutional law, which already deems child pornography and yelling fire in a crowded theater, you know, not covered by the First Amendment. And so these other things are still so far not against the law. But yeah, we are entering a different time as Christians. We are entering a post-Christian culture. And that leaves a lot of questions for us to ask.

And I have talked to Christians who are really scared scared i mean they they might be deemed conspiracy theorists and and that that term though i mean it's kind of a negative term like you present an idea like hey i think there's a guy that has an island where there's like underage kids having sex with well-known people it's like oh you're a conspiracy theorist and then jeff epstein gets a lot you know arrested and dies in prison or whatever it's like um sometimes there are actual things happening and if you just brand them a conspiracy theory then all of a sudden you're seen as a wacko you know but um i don't know i i i i guess i would definitely lean towards let people engage the idea as far out as it may seem to some people um jesus rising from the dead and

reigning at the right hand of some invisible creator god is a absurd idea to many people um that could be you know a conspiracy theory so i guess i'm more of a fan of letting people sort it out for themselves um to engage the idea and if it really is a hack job ridiculous conspiracy theory then present better evidence to the contrary and show why the evidence used to support that theory is actually wrong. You know, I think the Flat Earth Society should absolutely be allowed to promote their ideas on Facebook and social. If they really are that far out, then it shouldn't take more than five minutes to refute them. But some people say, well, you're platforming dangerous ideas. And I just I don't I just don't even know if I agree with that as a concern.

If it really is that bad of an idea that everybody should be able to recognize it as a bad idea, then it then platform it. Let David Duke spout off his ignorance. And ninety nine point ninety nine percent of humanity is going to say, what an idiot. You know, like I don't I don't think we should censure him, should we? No, I mean, I agree with you. But I think I think the real problem is that we are in a place where ninety nine point nine percent of people are not going to do that. So but that so that's where our real work is. It's not in in. I mean, we should let all of these ideas air. um but we still have a lot of we have work to do in helping people distinguish you know to know how to weigh good sources from from bad and to you know i mean so so but that's a that's a different question right because because because 99.9 percent of people do not think that David Duke's ideas are crazy.

That's the problem. Well, maybe. You're in Virginia, so I'm out here in, well, I'm in Idaho. I mean, you know, not to get too political, but, you know, we, you know, I mean, I don't, I don't think Trump won the election just on abortion. Yeah. Yeah. Should we go to,

should we talk about Trump? He attracted a lot of voters for that reason. And I understand that, but the white supremacists who support him didn't support him because of abortion. Yeah. Are there really a lot? I hear it again. It depends on who you ask.

Like how many actual, right. I mean, according to it depends on who you ask. Like, how many actual, right? I mean, according to like Robin DiAngelo, you and I are white supremacists because we're participating in, you know, a white dominant culture and, you know, benefiting from the privileges. And that means we're part of white supremacy. But I mean, like the old school definition of white supremacy, the people who are, you know know either wearing hoods or you believe that people of color are not fully human or whatever do you really is that is that a i mean i could be totally naive like i just see that as such a tiny tiny tiny part of the population it's not really carrying much influence at all but maybe i'm totally wrong and i'm sure i have listeners of color who are like maybe screaming at me right now i'm totally wrong and i'm sure i have listeners of color who are like

maybe screaming at me right now i don't know maybe maybe not what do you think yeah i mean i i i i i don't know i mean i guess it depends on the definition i um yeah i don't know i mean how many how many people out there are sexist i I don't know. Can we count them? I doubt it. I mean, we all, you know, it's not a binary black-white category. You either have this view or you don't have this view. We are creatures of culture. We are influenced by our cultures and by our institutions.

Our institutions are influenced by, you know, they are our institutions are are exist from the past. They don't exist from the future. And so we inherit. This is what it means to be a human being is to be, you know, to be part of a culture and to be influenced by culture and relationships and by history. And by history. And if, you know, to deny that we are influenced by the past is to deny that unintentional, you know, um, implicit bias or however you want to say it. Like there's, I'm sure I'm guilty of this. I'm sure I am of doing things or saying things that do come off as, and are taken to be sexist, even though there's no intention in my heart, but it's just being, well, just what you're saying. saying i mean being conditioned by a white male dominant culture has to have a an effect on me on some level that i don't even see that it may take a journey to to to weed out so um

we could chase down that thread for a long time you brought up trump i didn't um but what what what um so we're we're recording this i'll just say this is early December. I'm not sure this is probably maybe released in early January. What does life in a post Trump? And maybe we need to unpack that post Trump America look like for the evangelical Christian? Are you celebrating the election? Are you not sure who actually still won? Again, this is early December. Or are you indifferent? Are you mourning? Where are you at on this? How do you look forward to 2021 in a post-Trump or at least a post-President Trump era? How are you feeling about that? Yeah, no, no, I don't think it really matters to me. It didn't matter who won. I think it's a loss for America, a loss for the church, either way that we've gotten to this point. I mean, I am, you know, it's no secret I am a never Trumper, but I also, you know, would never vote for Biden and, you know, am not inclined to have never been inclined to vote for a Democrat. But it's sort of common wisdom that a big reason why we got Trump was kind of a reaction to the previous administration's liberal policies and liberal social agenda. is a pendulum swinging from, you know, one extreme to another. And I'm not sure when that the swinging of that pendulum will slow or whether, you know, in 2024, we will just see a

pendulum swinging, you know, back again in whichever the opposite faces us. And, you know, I just don't see a way forward until the Republican and Democratic parties kind of implode on themselves and some sort of new party or approach develops out of that. Do you think that's a possible outcome? Because they do seem to be at an all-time high, I think. I don't pay too close attention to politics, or at least I haven't in the last couple of years, but it seems like things are more tense, more divided, more divisive, more tribal than they ever have been. Maybe since the Civil War.

I don't know. I've heard people say that or since pre-civil rights era. Do you see it as a possibility that they will kind of implode on the inside and some kind of other system rather than a dominant two party system emerging? Is that a possibility? Well, it's interesting. I just read a column by that I did share on Twitter. So this is back, you know, whenever this is airing at some at some point in December, a Jonah Goldberg column where he was talking about the time in the 1960s, when if you said you were a Democrat or Republican, either one, the next question would be, well, are you a conservative or a liberal? liberal because those two parties were not aligned with conservatism or liberalism at that time. And conservatives saw an opportunity to advance the conservative agenda through the Republican Party.

So at some point in the 60s, 70s, the Republican Party became aligned with conservatives. I'm a conservative. I'm not a Republican or Democrat. I don't see the Republican Party as conservative anymore. But it also wasn't always. So so these kind of, you know, these I'm not a student of political science or history or even, you know, America. I study British literature. But, you know, we have not always had these two parties. These two parties, identities and platforms have not always been the same. They have always been changing over the course of, I would say, decades. And since we're all people who are going to live for decades, not centuries, sometimes we don't realize how different these parties or the party system was at one time. There were different parties. And so I think these will change too.

And that's the opportunity that we have right now going forward is to change them. Yeah, I think I'd be healthy. Again, I am not invested into the party system. As I say many times, I'm an exile living in Babylon. And I findlonian politics actually pretty like entertaining like it's it's um it's yeah it can be fascinating and and and i can see how um people can get swept up into it you know i think the media outlets do a great job of sucking you in and touching you in areas where you you know, it gets you angry and your tribalistic

juices start flowing and so on. But I and so I take this with a grain of salt, but it does seem from my vantage point as an outsider looking in that the Democrat. The party and maybe it's true, the Republicansans but the democrat does seem to have a growing clear kind of division between the for lack of better terms the radical left and the classical liberals um i see a lot of um tension there where you have the kind of a radical left it does feel a little more like 1984 almost verbatim almost verbatim there's like some things i'll read i'm like you know that's a quote from 1984 right and you're saying it positively versus

the kind of classical liberal that's a big advocate of free speech that you know um wants ideas to compete in in an arena but would definitely not be conservative they would be pro-gay marriage pro-abortion pro you know pro-choice, and so on and so forth. But they seem to be disagreeing significantly from the sort of radical, illiberal left, as some people call it. Is that an accurate assessment from what you know? And is there something similar going on within the Republican Party where there's a growing, strong difference? Maybe it's between the anti Trumpers and the pro Trumpers. I mean, I could imagine that you both might be Republican, some people, not you, but I could imagine that under that broad umbrella, there is some strong tensions there.

I just listened to a debate between is it David French and who's the bonhoeffer guy um eric metaxas yeah it was on a podcast see karen you gotta and and you would not guess that these two are in the same political camp like they were right they humanly opposed to each other yeah i mean the old binary categories just don't fit today. And I think we're seeing kind of some growing pains out of that. And yeah, and there are, there are, you know, there's jockeying for power from the various interests that are aligning themselves with, with both parties. themselves with, with both parties. Um, and so both parties are kind of, uh, you know, subjected now to those, those power plays on the parts of different groups. Um, and I don't, I don't know what the outcome will be, but I think we are going through a pretty dramatic shift right now. Do you, what, what's your hope for the church in 2021 in the quote unquote post? I guess my hope for the church is is first of all, to be the church in the way that the church is to be the church in all times and all places.

We tend, unfortunately, in the American church to think of ourselves to tie. You know, this isn't news to anyone, but to tie being an American with being the church. We have to be the church first. We have to love God and love our neighbors. And we have to witness to the faith, hope and love that is, you know, is is the essence of our faith. is, is the essence of our faith. Um, but at the same time, you know, I, we, God in God's sovereignty, he has placed each of us where we are. And if he has seen fit to have us live in America in 2020 and 2021, then there are, um, responsibilities that we are to steward. And, uh, and so we can't just pretend that we're

not Americans. I mean, I'm not, you know, I'm not a separatist. You know, so I'm not a I'm not a patriot, you know, I'm not going to go to a patriot church, or but I'm also not a separatist. And I don't think that's what we're called to be. There's, I think we're called to be, I think we're called to be, you know, faithful in the places where God has put us. And so what it means to be a faithful Christian in America looks in many ways just like what it means to be a faithful Christian in, you know, 18th century India or 17th century Japan. But it also means, you know, what it looks like for, to be a faithful Christian in 2020, America has with it,

just as it does for anyone, some particular responsibilities and we need to steward those faithfully and well too. Yeah, so I seek to go to the city, you know, Jeremiah, you know, I referenced being an exile earlier, but that doesn't mean I should be indifferent to whatever society I'm living in. It's advancement and, um, and well, it's seeking good in creation or, or, or establishing a just society. I should never expect it to look Christian. Um, on my, the kingdom of the world will always be radically different than the kingdom of,

um, of God. Um, and yet I do think we should address issues of justice outside the church walls when we see that. I guess my concern, because I have gotten, you know, my exile living in Babylon political stance. People do push back in two areas there. Number one, you know, well, it's you have the privilege as a white male to say that other people don't have the privilege to just, you know, remove themselves from the political scene. don't have the privilege to just, you know, remove themselves from the political scene. And the other one is kind of what I was saying, like the other critique would be, you know, that I'm not seeking the good of the city. I guess with both of those pushbacks,

though, I would still push back to the pushback saying, no, I agree with both of those things. I just don't know if American 21st century partisan politics is the best means to address issues of justice and and i just i i don't see i see i don't get myself in the to my how long does this lobster want to cook here I do question the accuracy through which we even know about the political scene. And what I'm referencing is our knowledge of what's going on in the political scene is mediated through extremely narrative-based, biased media outlets. And I don't think most people appreciate just how narratively driven they are. And they've gotten way, way worse because they're losing money. They need clicks. They need to get you angry. They need to fire you up. So I don't even, yeah, I don't know.

People that are staunchly for or against others. This is where the church needs to do more discipleship, right? Yeah, I don't know. That's a really good point. This is where the church needs to do more discipleship. Right. And it's not, you know, we think of discipleship as as teaching the doctrines of the faith. And of course, that's that's that is discipleship is that. But it's more than that. It's also discipleship for our you know, what it means to live in this culture in this time. And, and what you just said is so well put and so insightful that we just don't even realize how driven by these narratives that are not of our own making or our own even conscious awareness.

Um, we just don't realize how much we are. And so part of discipleship is making ourselves aware of that. And because these are the times that we live in. Yeah. Right? Yeah. Yeah. I mean, if you actually did pay attention to the, and I do, this year I've dabbled in, you know, looking at news.

I've got left-wing, moderate, and right-wing news outlets that I listen to. And it's just, again, it is almost entertaining but extremely sad to see how narratively driven each one is. And then it's like, well, we're not even really seeing politics for what it is. We're seeing a narrative creation of these scenes. You know, if I listen to a right-wing outlet you know all they're going to do is show clips of biden forgetting what state he's in and bumbling around and saying the most radical thing and um if i listen to a right-wing you know critique or sorry if i listen to a left

wing critique then it's they'll handpick you know the most racist sounding thing trump could have said and twist it in the worst possible direction you you know? And it's like, these are truth. Whatever's going on out there is being highly mediated to us. More than ever, I think. I mean, I think more than ever. Like maybe 20 years ago, there was a bit more real journalism going on where people said, hey, here's the facts.

You sort out what you think. That doesn't really exist anymore. And maybe to come full circle back, where I do find it most helpful is going back to like two hour long conversations on a podcast or something where i feel like it's just you have a lot more space to kind of air out kind of this event that event what's really going on you hear different viewpoints and so on but um anyway what you've been describing is exactly the post-modern that that, you know, evangelical Christians were warning the church about, you know, 20 and 30 years ago, but they don't even recognize it now for what it is. It's basically that, you know, in the in the modern age, we were driven by facts and there were fewer facts.

So it was easier to kind of put the facts together and get a somewhat comprehensive understanding of the whole. Now we live in an era where there are so many facts, so much information that we can't possibly grasp, you know, any representative amount of it. And so the picture that I constantly have in my mind is that old parable of the blind men standing, you know, around an elephant. And each one has a part of the elephant, you know, the trunk, the tail, the foot, and they're describing what the elephant is based on that little bit of information they have. Well, that is exactly where we are in this information age. There's so much swirling around that our description, our understanding of, you know, we could have a correct understanding of the trunk or the tail. Right. But we do not have any idea what the elephant is. And so but we don't even know that there is an elephant sometimes.

sometimes um so we we have these we tell so we but the facts are correct right our little handful of facts right is accurate but it's it's detached from the larger reality and so that is the place that we are in right now and even just recognizing that um you know as as human beings but even more importantly as christians is is crucial in this moment. Yeah. So, you know, it's going to keep getting worse. You're saying like that. Well, you know, I mean, again, this is why I call it a new dark age, right? I mean, in the dark ages before the Enlightenment, and that's a term that people don't use that term anymore because it's, you know, it's biased. But I think it's helpful here. You know, the people were subject to superstitions and myths and folktales and to even worse to to abuses by institutions and powerful people. And so we find ourselves, I think, at the other end of the modern age

and the age of literacy in kind of a similar place. There's just so much information. We're also subject to such partial truths that they might as well be superstitions or myths or fairy tales. We're just about out of time, Karen. You got a couple more minutes? Because I really wanted to ask. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Go ahead. Yeah. So I don't know if, again, this is growing in number, if it's just always been this way, but it does seem like a, it feels like, again, I'm not saying this is a factual claim, but as a subjective feeling, it feels like there's a growing number of Christian leaders that keep falling or just, I don't know.

Your own former university, very well known. Jerry Falwell had some interesting photo shots of his vacation on his yacht with black water in his hand, whatever. And, you know, his secretary. And I don't even know what ended. I mean, I think he got fired. Is that a done deal or what was or is that still going on? That might be so old news. That is a done deal. It was a pretty there were years of this kind of abuse of power, which I think is, you know, really was the real problem and

lack of accountability in the institution, because it takes a lot of, you know, time and money and freedom to perpetuate these kinds of abuses for so long. I mean, anyone can fall, of course. And, and, you know, that's not the issue. The issue really is the kinds of things, structures in place that allow these things to go on unchecked for so long. Wow. There's a lot there. Did that really hurt Liberty or is Liberty doing fine? What's the aftermath been? At this point, it's Liberty seems to be doing fine. And they have said that they're, you know, moving forward and cleaning house, they've opened an investigation, whether or not that really that the real change that needs to take place only time will tell. As I implied in what I just said, it wasn't just a matter of one institutional leader doing these things. He doesn't do them in isolation in any institution.

The people who are around a leader and who ignore the red flags or do not implement systems of accountability, they're still there in the case of this institution. And often that's what happens. Um, and it takes, so it, whether or not those structural changes that are needed and those personnel changes that are needed, um, will take place. I don't know. So that's, I pray so, because there's a lot, you know, I mean, uh, that it, there's just so much good that could happen there and has happened there. And just more recently, Hillsong Church in New York City, the lead pastor, Carl Lentz, I think, who I have friends who are pastors in New York City, said that church is just exploding. And they said in a very positive way that God's doing some amazing things. And I think it's been confirmed he had an affair and got fired or let go of his job. And there's been many, many others over the last few years.

Some of them are like, well, that's not too shocking. Other ones are like, wow, that really is kind of coming out of nowhere. Would you point to what you just said, that there are certain structural things that are enabling these kind of situations from happening? And if we don't change the structures, accountability, maybe money and fame, whatever, celebrity-driven culture, are you saying that until we change these structures that we'll probably keep seeing these things from happening? Oh, absolutely. And, you know, I'm not, you know, I'm an English professor. I read books. I'm not, you know, an institutional leader. So but it's not rocket science either. Right. I mean, that you can find out on the Internet, you can find 800 to 1000 word think pieces on how to,

you know, build in some accountabilities that are very basic and no brainers for any institution. And so, you know, so there are lots of things that can be done if you want them done. And then I think there's so that I think there are structural institutional safeguards, but then there are also the human realities that we have to recognize things like loyalty and nepotism and and just,ism and just relational power. These are things we're all subject to and vulnerable to. And so we need to be aware of that. I mean, some abuses that go on and cover-ups that go along with them aren't even tied to an institution. They're just tied to a friendship or relationship that is,

you know, is something that has some sort of pragmatic value or even just, you know, a personal value. And so we have to have a growing awareness of how easily we can become complicit in something just because we have a loyalty or a friendship or something of our own that might be at risk if we, you know, tread too heavily on someone else. So there are the sort of, you know, institutional structural things, but there are also the human things that we just, we need to become aware of. And I think that's, I actually think in this age that we're in, that we've been talking about so pessimistically, I actually think this is a good thing that's emerging. I think that there, to talk about 500-year moments again, I mean, I think that we are seeing, recognizing the kinds of institutional abuses and cover-ups that have been taking place in a way that's similar to that recognition from, you know, 500 years ago.

Yeah. Wow. Yeah. I mean, certainly it's social media and our iPhone culture and everything. It does make it harder to get by with stuff, right? It was, um, or it gives you another avenue to air out your stupidity and other people to see it, you know, um, chasing down tweets from 12 years ago or whatever. And it's like, um, well, Karen, I've kept you, kept you over an hour. Thank you so much for your time. Always a delight to talk to you. I just, I love, love,

love hearing your perspective about just kind of everything really. So, uh, thanks for what you do. Thanks for being bold and courageous and I wish you the best over there at Southeastern. Oh, thank you. Thank you for having me, Preston. Good to talk to you. You too. you