Thinking Out Loud with Alan Shlemon - How to Assess an Article

Episode Date: June 2, 2026

Alan provides three simple steps to help you assess an article that is hostile to your Christian convictions.

Have you ever read an article that's hostile to your convictions, but you felt overwhelmed by it and were unsure how to respond? Well, that happens to me a lot. And in this episode of my podcast, I want to explain three simple steps that help me handle that type of an article. I remember reading an article one time where the author talked about how some Christians say that their faith supports abortion. Now, I'm pro-life, so of course that caught my attention. And after I kind of scanned it, the article rather quickly, I was a little concerned. It was long. The author had a ton of citations. And so I just sort of felt overwhelmed. And so I want to provide you with the way that I handle such a situation. When I come across an article and I'm feeling overwhelmed or I think, man, this article makes a compelling case against my view. How do I handle it? And basically, I apply three rather

simple steps. And this is very consistent with what we've taught at Stanton reason for numerous years. But the first step is this. I slow down. All right? In the words, when I first scan the article, I just kind of went through it rather, you know, rapidly. But this time I'm going to say, no, I need to slow down. Like, I get it. The author's a professional. The article is long. It's published. It gives it sort of this aura of credibility. But I need to slow down, take a deep breath. Don't panic. And instead, I need to take some time to think about what the article is claiming, okay, and why.

And, I mean, it might be that they're right, but it could be that they're wrong as well, right? But I'm not going to find out by just simply making a snap judgment. So this is why I say, just slow down, take a deep breath, and actually the next two steps are what you need to slowly go through, okay? The second step is this, and this is more important than the first. the second step is to determine the claim that the author is making or determine the conclusion that they want you to believe, right? What are they trying to persuade the reader to think, right? So figure out what those claims are. Now, it might be one claim, like one major claim, or it might be several. But either way, it's important for you to slowly read the article

so you can discover or extract from the article what those claims are. And in the article that I was reading, of course, the claim was Christians or Christianity allows for, and in some cases even requires abortion. Now, yeah, bold claim to be sure, right? But now that I know what their actual claim is, I can now move on to the third step, which is even more important than the first two. And this third step, and this one is so often overlooked, when people are trying to assess an article and its validity. The third step is to look for evidence or look for reasons that support the author's claim. So once you figure it out the claim in the second step, you want to now look for evidence and reasons why that claim is true in the third step. And the reason why you want to

look for evidence and reasons is because unless they provide evidence and reasons for their claim, they are not making an argument. And this is very important to understand. People, who offer claims or opinions or say, I want you to believe this, are not making an argument. The only time they're making an argument is when they add evidence and reasons to back up their claim. So think of an argument like a house. Okay. So a house has a roof and has walls. But if you just saw a roof sitting on the ground, you'd be like, okay, that's not a house, right? Do not ever invest in such a property. Okay. Walls are needed. to support to hold up the roof. And in this analogy, the claim or the person's opinion or what

they want you to believe is the roof. But unless you have walls, which would be the evidence and reasons why that claim is true, then you don't have a house. You do not have an argument. And so the question then becomes, okay, well, do they provide evidence and reasons for their view? Or are they just merely asserting their opinion? Now, it's easy to offer your opinion. It's easy to offer claim. It's easy to make an assertion about something, but it's an entirely different thing to provide evidence and reasons why that claim or why that assertion is correct or true. And so without evidence and reasons, they don't have an argument. They don't have a house. They just have a roof on the ground. Now, in the article that I was reading, I kind of looked for it. I said, okay, well, what's the evidence to

back up the claim that Christianity allows for or even requires abortion? And after I read it, slowly, I discovered there was no evidence, no reasons. The author didn't make a biblical case for her position. She didn't provide any sort of moral reasoning. But here's what the author did do. Remember, the claim is Christianity allows for or even requires abortion. And what the author did was they simply cited Christians who believe abortions permissible. So there is this one a female reverend that the author cited, who said, there's a lot of folks who are pro-choice or who support reproductive dignity

and freedom because of their faith and not in spite of it. Okay. That there's a female reverend who says that there are pro-choice Christians does not mean that Christianity allows for or even requires abortion. It just means that there's Christians who believe abortion is permissible.

But it doesn't, explain what those Christians' reasons are, right? I mean, that there might be pro-choice Christians is noteworthy, but the real question is, is why are they pro-choice? What evidence do they have that their position is consistent with Christianity, with the Christian worldview? It'd be like saying to someone, Christianity allows for or even requires Nazism. And you're like, well, what's the evidence you have for that? Well, there's some Christians over there, that are Nazis. That's not evidence that Christianity allows for or requires Nazism. It just means that there's some Christians who allegedly claim to be Nazis. But that doesn't mean that Christianity and

Nazism is consistent with each other. Now, it's also worth noting, with regard to this particular author and this article that I was looking at, that the Christian teaching, the Christian moral position actually refutes this person's claim. That it refutes the claim. It refutes the claim. It refutes the claim that Christianity allows for or even requires abortion, right? Because scripture teaches that it's wrong to kill innocent human beings. And we know from scientific evidence that the unborn is a human being, therefore, according to scripture, it's wrong to kill unborn human beings. So not only does the author not provide evidence for her assertion, in other words, not only does she not make an actual argument, but there are arguments that are vigorously opposed

to her assertion and her claim, right? So again, this is just three simple steps that I take when I find an article that I kind of might scan through or read or hear about, and I'm kind of overwhelmed by it, slow down, determine the claim, determine what the author's making, what kind of claim the author's making, and then number three, find evidence and reasons whether they provide any evidence or reasons to back up their claim and turn their claim into an actual bona fide argument. So again, I think that will help you. I, to this day, still sometimes will come across an article where I'm like completely caught off guard or overwhelmed by or nervous about. But when I

take these three steps, oftentimes I find out actually, no, they don't have an argument. Or maybe the argument, they do have an argument, but the argument is bad, right? They do provide evidence and reasons for their position, but the argument itself is not convincing or has other flaws. So anyways, I hope that helps. And that's all I have for you today. It's a short podcast. But if you've enjoyed this episode, I encourage you to share it with a friend.

And don't forget to subscribe to my podcast so you don't miss any future episodes. And I look forward to thinking out loud with you next time.