News Roundup- SBC DOJ Investigation, Dan Darling's Co-belligerency, Pronoun Hospitality

The Conversations That Matter Podcast.

I'm your host, John Harris. As always, according to some, the wicked, the dangerous

Confederate apologist who makes light of things like slavery and wants to convert everyone by the sword because of his version of Christian nationalism.

Who admires regimes like, as we all know, the horrible white supremacist

Rhodesia. Who celebrates things like the dastardly white boy,

Summer. Oh no, that's John Harris. Yes, according to some, I am the basest person around, and this podcast is more base than you can imagine.

Unfortunately, though, when people hear those things, the few who do, and then they come and they listen, they find out, it's not as interesting as you guys made it.

I thought it was going to be really out there, lots of fireworks, but we were disappointed.

But anyway, I hope you're all having a good week. It is a good week for me in some ways.

In other ways, I've been frustrated. Let's just say plumbing is not my forte.

I spent like two and a half days on a bathtub. I mean, this should have taken me two hours if I was good.

Three hours, okay. It took me like, it was, I ran to Lowe's like three times. And anyway,

I think I finally got it working. But I had leaks everywhere, and I'm like, am I over -tightening?

What am I doing to cause this? I had to keep getting new hardware. Maybe it's a cheap tub.

What is it? But anyway, I'm doing well. The weather is very nice. I went for a nice bike ride yesterday.

I try to take a weekly bike ride, like a four - or five -hour bike ride, and it was really good weather for it. And I finally did order a bicycle, a road bicycle.

That's what I needed. I have this mountain bike I ride on like 70 -mile bike rides, which for those who know anything about cycling, you need a road bike.

Or a gravel bike if you're going to be doing it on gravel. But a mountain bike, you know, that's, I mean, but, you know, the positive side is my legs are becoming swollen.

Like, the muscles are just like starting to form as I have to pedal this clunky, like heavy,

I think it's actually, I don't know if it's aluminum or steel. I think it might be steel -framed, part of it at least. Bicycle, it's just heavy.

And up these challenging hills. Anyway, good stuff though. Good stuff. And, yeah,

I've got a lot to talk about on the podcast today. Man, I don't even know where to start. There's just so much.

I figured I would start, by the way, I just wanted, I know I've talked about this a number of times on the podcast, but I thought

I would mention this. I've mentioned it periodically, but I wrote this book, Sacred Conviction, under a pseudonym a few years ago.

Some of you who are new to the podcast may not know about it, but the story, I don't want to get into the whole thing just because it's, you know, it's kind of long.

But the Spark Notes edition is, I wrote a paper when I was in seminary in like 2011.

I got a good grade on it. I was doing some original research, using primary sources that weren't being used in any of the secondary sources on this particular topic.

And there aren't many books really on this topic anyway. But it's about the theological divisions that kind of contributed to some of the tension that the

North and the South had between each other during the Civil War. And the unique thing about this book, and there are definitely some things

I want to change in this, but the unique thing, and I stand by this, is I made the point, this is really my thesis, that the scope of evaluating that theological conflict, or conflicts really, needs to start in the late 1700s at least.

That the scope needs to be broadened. And most people who talk about this in the historical profession, want to start in like 1845.

And it's all just slavery. It's a moral, the moral challenge of slavery. South wanted slavery. North against slavery.

And it's just cartoon. It's a simplistic cartoon. And that's part of the reason that I think I'm fastidious on this particular podcast, or I try to be with sources, because I just don't,

I don't trust any, I don't know if you guys are like that. I just don't trust almost anything from academia, from the media. Like I have to really do my homework, before I'm going to give you something, that I can put my name behind, and say yeah this is accurate.

Because it is just, and there's been like three big incidences in my life, I can think of, where I was at an event, and the media covered it, and later on, and then it got into the history books, some of those things.

And I'm like this is totally inaccurate. I was there, you know. And most of the time the problem is, the paradigm is too narrow.

It's cherry picked. You take some facts, sometimes you make up facts, but you take some available facts, but you ignore other ones.

That would change your paradigm. And so instead of creating a paradigm, to interpret something, that makes sense of all the available information, we just take a limited sliver, that is the narrative we want, and that's what we go with.

And unfortunately in history, relating to topics, there's so many in history, it's almost everything now, but my little foray into the historical profession, really proved to me,

I was like wow, like 98 % of historians are totally compromised. It's critical theory. And critical race theory,

I know has been popular, for like the last two years in the media, but like, I'm talking about like new left ideas, critical theory, going back, you know, for the last like 30 years,

I would say at least, academia has been inundated. In a historical profession, no exception to this, with new left ideas and critical theory.

And it's unfortunate, but it just changes the way that things are evaluated. So one of the things, is this idea of the conflicts, leading up to that particular, or the disagreements, theologically leading up to that particular conflict.

And so if you start the clock, in like 1799, I think that's where I start the clock, and you look at the various conflicts, between the regions, you find a lot of conflicts, and there's probably some

I've even left out, but conflicts that, weren't even related to that particular issue.

You find a conflict over higher criticism, the South primarily, trying to hedge against it, with apologetics curriculum, implementing it, into their colleges.

You have the North, instead adopting higher criticism, from Europe. You have, conflicts over even things like, the scientific racism of the time, which was mostly based in Philadelphia.

But in general, a lot of more Northern colleges, in general the

North, was just much more willing to accept, these kind of proto -Darwinian ideas, like phrenology, and that kind of thing.

Ideas like the size of your skull, and whether or not, that actually determined, your mental capacity.

And it was mostly Southern clergymen, who were fighting this stuff. And so, I talk about that,

I talk about, and I do talk about, the conflict over slavery, but I show that it actually, was more of a conflict, over biblical authority.

It wasn't, slavery was an occasion for the conflict, but that wasn't actually, the primary conflict. And so it's important, one of the things that,

I said at the beginning, was, and I didn't expect to open, the whole show this way, so I probably, let's see, should find it.

But I say in the introduction, one more important matter, this is on page, 11.

It should be stated at the outset, that no aspect of this work, can justify, nor is intended to justify, the

American slave labor system. Because, I'm pro -slavery. Yeah right. So, there you go.

The reason, by the way, and I've said this on the podcast, before, and my personal, social media, going back now years, the reason that,

I did it under a pseudonym, was because at the time, this was right, when the woke stuff, was really getting going in the church,

I thought man, you know that, some of that research that I've done, I've added to some of it over the years, I've never put anything out there, in the public sphere, but I, I feel like this information, should get out there, because there's all these people, running around saying, that, the

Southern Baptist Convention formed, simply because, they reduce it all down to, a desire, to, keep and hold slaves, and, in like a nefarious, kind of evil, black hat, white hat way.

One side in the North, the Boston Mission Board, was just, totally against slavery, and then you had

Southerners, who were totally for slavery, and said well, we're going to keep our slaves, because slavery is good, and it wasn't quite like that, and that's one of the things that I, in my research, that I, like my jaw was on the floor, looking at some of these primary sources, and I'm reading people, and I'm like wait a minute, this is, most of these people, wanted slavery to go away, they just, you know, they were progressive emancipationists, or gradual emancipationists, they weren't, you know, defending slavery, in the abstract, so much as they were, just defending what the

Bible, teaches about it, recognizing, many of them at least, the prominent ones, recognizing, so many of the defects, the anti -biblical things, that accompanying it, but wanting to still hold on, to a biblical ethic, and anyway, agree or disagree, obviously, we're, we're downstream from this, and we have a, completely different, labor relationships, in this country, yeah, we're all owned by the government, we were slaves, to the central authority, in Washington, no, well, yes, with the

IRS agents, that have just been hired, I think that might be true, but, you know, looking, looking at men of their times, and, within the system that, was before them, and, and how they, tried to apply biblical principles, to it, you get a different story, and so anyway, that's kind of, that's kind of what this is about, and,

I, it's been sitting around, there's a couple of things, I really want to change in it, and, you know, nothing, that I can think of, that's like major, major, but I'm, I'm a different person,

I write differently, I probably emphasize, different things, and, and so, I do have a number of, unwritten books in my head,

I don't know if anyone else has those, and one of them is, I do want to, to do a larger book, just in general, on the

South, the antebellum South, I probably should do one on the North too, but I mean, I got, I've had this idea of doing one on, the

Dutch reaction to Yankees, right, like, Ichabod Crane being the quintessential Yankee, but I live in an area right now, the

Hudson Valley, it was Dutch, and anyway, like, it's a historical thing, I'd love to do a study of that, but, but I'd also like to do something on, so many of the misnomers out there, in the historical profession, about the

Civil War, about the Constitution, and the founding period, there's like 10 books that I'd like to write, and I just don't have time for it, but, anyway, my next two books,

I'm probably going to do another one on social justice, just to kind of wrap things up, in a tidy bow, and then I actually have one on World War II, that I'd like to write, and it's just fun, it's fun to do research, but anyway,

I figured I would let everyone know about that, for those who don't know, as many of you probably already do, but, there you go, and, let's see, what else do we have on the agenda, on personal stuff, this is, this is the kind of podcast, some people will complain about, because they'll say,

John, like, get to the meat, and I like meaty podcasts, but every once in a while, and I know others of you, you like this kind of thing,

I like to just be a little more personal, and down to earth with you, and just kind of tell you, this is where things are at in my life, how's your life going, put the comments, on the

YouTube channel, if you, or Rumble, or Facebook, by the way, I guess I'm on Facebook too, and, you know, let's just have a little more of an informal, podcast, and I'm not sure exactly, where the whole thing's going, so we will find out, but, let's see, where do we want to start, let's start with, let's start with this,

I have just some announcements, that I'd like to make, oh no, my, my, my sign up genius page, has been, let's see if I can get back into it, yes

I can, okay, so I'm gonna talk about the men's retreat, just remind everyone, please, please, please, consider coming, we got 40 people, who have said yes, that they're gonna come, there's 11 maybes, sign up guys, and I know there's more than that coming, let's see if I can pull this up, so you guys can see what

I'm looking at, should be able to see what I'm looking at, there we go, there's

Russell Fuller, hey, come on out, please, seriously come on out, I think it's gonna be a good time, and,

I'm looking forward to it, and, it's old school, like you send in a check, I've never done this before, so I figured keep it simple, send your check in, if you want to support the conference, or you just wanna, you wanna come, and get your payment in, and confirm your registration, the way that's gonna happen, is you just send a check, to the address, and the address is right there, to Grace Bible Church, and, you know, make the check, obviously out to Grace Bible Church, just itemize, it's for the men's retreat, put your name there, and, we have a running list, and, we're looking forward, to you coming out, it's gonna be a great time, and I'm still thinking of special things, we can do,

I think we'll do some panel discussions, maybe, I know 80 Robles is gonna be there, so maybe I'll utilize, that, you know,

I know some other pastors are coming, I think Edwin Ramirez is telling me, he's gonna come, he's got a podcast too, you can check out on YouTube, so I guess

I'll be the odd one out, I will be the odd one out, if we do a panel with the pod, a podcasting panel, because, not, not only, will

I be, you know, everyone's like, cause you're the only white guy, no, not cause I'm the only white guy, cause I'm not,

I'm not a post -millennialist, I, and, and, and so, I'm gonna be outnumbered, by Edwin Ramirez, and 80

Robles, if we do that, maybe, maybe I'll make the special topic post -millennial, no, I, I don't, I don't get into eschatology that much, even though I, I don't think it's not important,

I think it is, I just, it's, I think there's other things, and the triage, there's just other things that I think are important to study, and I, I, I just never have been as interested, but, you know, it is important, so maybe, maybe we'll do something,

I don't know, but, and there, I'm trying to think, is Edwin Presbyterian? I think he is more

Presbyterian, so I will be outnumbered on that, too, I'll be the only Credo Baptist, if we do a panel, see,

I haven't talked to them about this, I need to talk to them, but, it's gonna be fun, you're gonna wanna come, you really are, and just be part of this, and I'm, I'm already talking to someone about filming it, so people have asked me, hey, are the lectures gonna be available,

I wanna say yes and no, so don't, don't think that you're like, oh, I can just get the lectures, it's not gonna be like that, some of the stuff's not gonna be filmed,

I'm gonna make sure of that, because I want you to come, but, you really come, not just for the lecture, you come to be with other brothers and sisters in Christ, who have a lot in common with you, in these dark times, there's, to find someone who has a lot in common with you, on these issues, is important, and we're gonna be in the woods, we're gonna be, there's,

I mean, there's only 40 people right now, who are, and it's a total of what, maybe, I think, 46 people right now, it's gonna be more by the time we get to, the deadline,

October 1st, and maybe I'll even extend it out, but look, you're gonna wanna reserve a place, because it is limited, and,

I'm shooting for, probably 75 people at least, and so, anyway, you're gonna wanna come, that, that's one announcement, second announcement,

I just wanna let you know about, Bradford Christian College, Bradford Christian College, if I can pull it up here, you can, check this out, this may be a good option for you, some people, take different roads, when it comes to college, and for some, you wanna go to a brick and mortar school, you want that, quote unquote, college experience, and there are some

Christian colleges, where you can have that experience, but there are different learning styles, and I know for many homeschoolers especially,

I was like this, it is really important to, be in the home, learning in your late teenage years, mid to late teenage years, where you're ready for college, but still not quite ready, maybe to go away from home, and be in that environment, and so Bradford Christian College, is just one of the places you can go, that provides that online learning, but it's not just like, you know, like a bigger school, that offers online learning, where you take some tests, you have some proctors, but you never really form a relationship, this is much different, this is what

I like about it, and why really, this is the root reason, why I'm actually willing to, advertise this to you, because I don't wanna advertise anything, that I don't think is helpful, and I think for some, this might be helpful,

Bradford Christian College, is accredited, so you have that, and they have, they have degrees, in a

BA in theological studies, and a BA in a Christian education, so it is uniquely Christian, but there's mentorship, there's, and you're meeting on like a weekly, or bi -weekly basis, with your mentor, so it's not, an approach that's just, kind of abstract academic, without any application, or relationships, you're actually getting, this sort of hybrid, where you actually have someone, you're forming a relationship with, you're meeting goals, you have a bit of a life coach, kind of thing, but you're also doing college, and so I think it's, it's between these worlds, of a brick and mortar school, and an online, you have

Bradford, and so I would just check it out, it might be an option for you, if you're looking into, where to send your children, and you're thinking, well you know, they're not maybe quite ready, for that brick and mortar, yeah this might be a good option, so you can go to the website, bradfordchristiancollege .com,

and check it out, and there's more information there, and check it out, so I wanted to let you know, about that as well, now let's get into, some news stories, can we do that, big one that people, have been messaging me about, is the

Southern Baptist Convention, the US investigating, Southern Baptist Convention, over clergy sexual abuse, that's right, the

United States, who could have predicted, who could have thought, who might have warned, I don't know, Rod Martin maybe, maybe some people from CBN, hey if you weigh, this attorney -client privilege thing, hey if we go down, this guidepost solutions path, we might be opening us up, ourselves up to some lawsuits here, and lo and behold, oh that's not a lawsuit, that's the federal government, investigating us, and I read from the

Guardian, now this is the Guardian, so take it with a grain of salt, leaders of the Southern Baptist Convention, said on Friday, that several of the denominations, major entities, were under investigation, by the

Department of Justice, in the wake of multiple problems, related to clergy sexual abuse, now Megan Basham made the point, in her article for the

Daily Wire, that look, this is not, for a group of people this big, they don't have unique sexual abuse problems, but the narrative has been crafted, and now you have the

Department of Justice, taking advantage of it, congratulations, the SBC's executive committee, has received a subpoena, but no individuals have been subpoenaed, at this point, this is an ongoing investigation,

I mean there's really not much more to say, other than what's been said, just reactions to it, so Mark Devine, who

I'm hoping to book, actually for next week, on the podcast, put out an op -ed, and I just want to, give you a little bit, of what he said here, he said, that, tyranny, not justice, social or otherwise, accounts for the behavior, of the

Department of Justice, to educated eyes, parents who push back, CRT, and transgenderism, down the throats of their children, are not domestic terrorists, supposed crimes, committed by the former president, do not account for the raid, on the

Florida home, and no supposed, crisis of sexual abuse, in the SBC, prompted Attorney General Merrick Garland, to investigate the institutions, of the largest

Protestant denomination, in America, Southern Baptist voting patterns, did, oh man, this is just,

I mean, and look, they're not investigating, the Catholic Church, they're not investigating, have they ever, maybe they haven't,

I'm just not aware, but they're not investigating, the teachers union, I mean, you want to talk about, an organization, that has confirmed, according to the

Department of Education, an abuse problem, it would be, the teachers union, but,

I don't see an investigation there, against the directives, of their erstwhile leaders, evangelicals, including

Southern Baptist, twice voted, 80 plus percent, for Donald Trump, these voters show, no signs of exchanging, their politics, for Russell Moores, the daily wires,

I just mentioned her, Megan Basham, let's see, I don't want to get, past some of this stuff, actually, he cites some of the things,

I just cited, how this isn't unique, but he's going down the line, of saying look, this is cultural, Marxism, this is, this is really just, a targeting, of one's political enemies, and, it's nothing more, than that, so,

I'll read you, the last section here, Trump voting Southern Baptist, have known for some time, that the actions and aims, of this

Democratic Party, have nothing in common, with the love of Jesus model, and that he expects, of his followers, this are, okay, so this is from, the

Western Journal, Mark Devine, I just, I want to say, I pretty much agree, with his analysis here, now, with that, came,

I'll show you this, do we, that's not it, well, we'll talk about that too, but that's not, it's this, okay, so, this is a statement, from, the

SBC Executive Committee, and you have, Adam Greenway, and Danny Akin, and just everyone,

Bart Barber, Al Mueller's on here, they're all, Kevin Eazell, they're saying, yeah, we're, we're on board, or they signed it at least, and it says this, the

SBC Executive Committee, recently became, aware that the DOJ, has initiated an investigation, and then they say, that, the leaders, have a firm conviction, to address the issues, of the past, and are implementing measures, to ensure, that there's never repeated, in the future, we recognize our reform efforts, are not finished, in fact, those efforts are continuing, and we have this abuse reform, implementation task force, that they're putting people on, that shouldn't be on it, our committee, our commitment, let's say, to cooperate with the

DOJ, is born from, our demonstrated commitment, to transparency, address the scourge, of sexual assault, sexual abuse, while so many things, in the world are uncertain, we can be certain, that we serve a mighty

God, it's just basically saying, we're cooperating, we're going to cooperate with this, and so, yeah, don't worry, don't fear, we're going to do all we can,

I guess, to make it a comfortable experience, for the DOJ, or at least a smooth one, now

I wanted in that vein, to bring this up, this is First Baptist Church, in First Southern Baptist Church, in Waterford, California, August 16th, 2022, and it's to Bart Barber, and it says,

I'm writing to you, to let you know, that our members, have voted unanimously, to remove ourselves, from the SBC, the issues for us, and I want to read for you, these issues, listen to this, here are the issues, accepting

CRT, social justice at seminaries, and convention, movement towards women pastors, lifeway resources, selling items, antithetical to scripture, misuse of funds, by the

North American Mission Board, firing of conservative professors, from SBC seminaries, the election of the last, three

SBC presidents, the ERLC, and it's softening, towards homosexuality, and abortion, plagiarism, by the last president, and no real strong rebukes, by the six seminary presidents, the attitude of the stage, at the last two conventions, the necessity to join, the conservative

Baptist Network, to find fellowship, and identification, that one, it's like yeah, like we have nothing in common, with these other folks, you have to join

CBN, to find fellowship, that idea of considering, the formation of a committee, to determine what pastor means, oh man,

I highly favorable, and push towards pragmatism, and a lack of trust, in the sufficiency of scripture, it has become embarrassing for me, to say that I'm a member of the

SBC, and then second Corinthians six, talks about do not be bound, with unbelievers, this is scathing, and this is exactly right, this is exactly right, this is the way to approach this, and this is what

I've advocated, for now I don't know, two years at least I think, since yeah, a year and a half,

I've at least said look, you got to leave, and I know people disagree, I know there's people, if you're going to stay fight, you fight, that's your job becomes that, but if you just want to do ministry, and you're like man, this whole thing,

I would just, it's just a drain, on the resources, and time we'd put into ministry, then hey leave,

God's not, he didn't die to save the SBC, he died to save the church, and that's just my opinion, but we will talk, probably next week to some folks, who

Lord willing, are wanting to stay in the SBC, and we'll keep that discussion ongoing, for the strategy, should

I stay or should I go, I know the arguments, but anyway that's where I've come down, and that's where this church came down,

I just thought yeah, with everything going on, I mean they didn't even mention, I don't think they mentioned the plagiarism, and just there's so much, there's so much, okay so that's

SBC stuff, let's talk, this is also SBC stuff, I wanted to bring this to your attention,

I just thought this was kind of, interesting, so let's see if I can, show you, all right so, sorry, sorry for the technical difficulties here, this is an article, by Daniel Darling, Daniel Darling, who is the director of the,

Land Center for Cultural Engagement, at Southwestern Seminary, and he's done interviews with MSNBC, we've talked about before, anyway,

Daniel Darling, writes this article, this is August 16th, and in the article,

I just want to refer you quote, even if Barstool conservatives, Barstool conservatives, are ascendant in an age, that rewards vulgarity, okay so, conservatives who have potty mouths,

Christian conservatives, should be wary of cobelligerence with them, so all that means, cobelligerence means, we should be, we should not, be, this would be like the

Soviet Union, United States in World War II, we should not be, even though we're different than them, we shouldn't even be in the same battle, assisting one another, or, you know, just fighting the same enemy, and seeing ourselves, in any sense to be, on the same page, on a particular issue, we're not the same, we're so distant, we're different, true conservatism at its heart, seeks to conserve the good, which is not limited to, but must include the dignity of the unborn, and the goodness of the nuclear family, well yeah,

I agree, that conservatism, would have to conserve those things, so, so okay, agree or disagree, that's his stand, however,

I give you, Andrew Walker, with the opposing view, this is Andrew Walker, in June 3rd 2020, that's not ancient history, it's only 2020, this is while Washington DC, was like on fire right, as so many of our

American cities were, as Trump would say, our beautiful American cities, were burning down, and this is what,

Andrew Walker had to say, Christians need to be careful, not to make, the same mistake, as they engage, with efforts to root out, race based injustice, it's possible, to condemn looting, and rioting, and highlight the value, of peaceful protest, at the same time, you don't want, to deescalate things, in order to go back, to normal life, you still want, that protest, and you want change, so guess what he's saying, hey, we're co -belligerents, that's what he's saying, we're, hey those peaceful pro, the

BLM protesters, who aren't burning stuff down, look, hey simmer down, with the burning stuff, don't do that, don't do the rioting, and looting, we can condemn that, but look the protest, we gotta, we gotta be behind that, we gotta be, and of course, who was behind that right, who is

BLM, what was the whole narrative, that the police, the history of the country, everything was just, systemically racist, and beyond redemption, it needs to, you burn it down, you know, completely revolutionize it, and law enforcement, needs to be dismantled, and recreated, and we know the whole narrative,

I don't have to go over it, so Daniel Darling is saying, yeah, yeah, that's what we need to do, we don't want to deescalate things, to go back to normal life, we want protest, and change, okay, alright, well, that's,

I don't even know what to say, I mean, he, against the looting, but, we're, co -belligerents with BLM here, to some extent, at least,

Christians should be committed, to fighting for justice, no matter how long, it takes to arrive, as Bishop Michael Currie, the first African American, to serve as presiding bishop, of the

Episcopal Church, said in a recent statement, on activism, I wonder if he is, an orthodox,

Michael Currie, okay, opening and changing hearts, does not happen overnight, the Christians race, is not a spirited, sprint is a marathon, alright, so, no problem there, and all of a sudden, though, we're in 2022, and look, those barstool conservatives,

I don't even want to be mentioned, the same breath with them, no co -belligerency there, okay, can't work towards the same goals, with them, but you can with BLM, that's

Daniel Darling, good job, alright, and that's Southern, that's one of the, most influential

Southern Baptists, ethicists, can I say the word, ethics, ethicists, there we go, ethicist, now, other news stories, that caught my eye, here's one, this is so, it's funny,

Latino owned, Colorado barbecue restaurant, criticized for its plan, to host white appreciation day, this is kind of like, white boy summer, when the people, or at least, the people

I know, who are the most, you know, they post all the, white boy summer memes, it's very simple to me, what they're doing, they are, some people

I think, misunderstand this, they say, well it's a bad music video, by Chet Hanks, well actually, no, because I remember, the white boy summer stuff, it preceded that, the video, now,

Chet Hanks did say, it's going to be a white boy summer, and after he said it, it was like, the internet went crazy, and people started taking it, and running with it, but long before there was a video, but anyway,

I digress, that's just one of the, misunderstandings out there, really what it is, I think, at least with the people I know, I don't want to, talk about people

I don't, but the people I know, is they're just tired, of all this, these holidays, and observances, and, all the things that are focused on, now, minorities, or sexual deviancies, or I mean, you have the pride month, you have, black history month, you have

Juneteenth, you have, now we've had for decades MLK day, which kind of, combined

Lincoln, and Washington's birthday, now into president's day, so I mean, you put one on the calendar, you had to take one out.

You have, I mean, and there's all the other things, by the way, that aren't like from the federal government, but you just have them celebrated in the elite circles, especially in academia and in corporate

America. So you have your Hispanic Heritage Month stuff. You have Indigenous Peoples Day. The list just goes on and on.

And these are all fairly innovative and new. And I think what the White Boy Summer thing is, it's kind of a reaction to that, when people say, like, look, let's have something where we can just, yeah, we know we're all sinners.

We know that Europeans have their problems, just like other people have their problems, etc. But what we're trying to say is, look, there's some positive things about Western civilization,

European civilization. And White Boy Summer is this kind of like attempt to say, hey, the things that white people enjoy those kinds of sports that a lot of white people like to do.

Water sports, hiking, I don't know. I mean, I'm looking at thinking of the memes that I've seen. Let's just say that there's some positive things to being white or positive things that Western civilization and white people have given to the world.

And some of the people I know who celebrate this the most are not even fully white. They're like they're

Hispanic or they're, you know, they're they're something else. But they just are recognizing that, hey, there's actually white people aren't the devil.

Can we say that they're not the devil? And here you have a Latino owned Colorado barbecue restaurant, which

I would I mean, I want to go a barbecue restaurant. Are you kidding me? Man, I'm why have

I why is it not in my mouth now? That's the question. That's the real question of this podcast. Why is the barbecue not in my mouth?

They want to celebrate white people by having a white appreciation day because it's it's obvious why because white people have been kind of they gotten a bad rap.

They've been like made to bear the brunt and the guilt of like everything. And so they're saying, you know, let's just have a white appreciation day.

I thought it was funny. You have the civil rights activist in the story, Ricardo Romero.

It's wrong and a perpetuation of racism. If you're going to give a discount, give it to the whole community.

Well, I don't see them complaining with affirmative action. I don't see them complaining, you know, during 2020 with all the black square stuff and the special preference that's given in basically segregated graduations.

And I mean, I don't even a gospel coalition even got into the segregation thing, segregated conferences, segregated all kinds of things.

There there wasn't an outcry. In fact, that's part of the work we got to do for justice. But if you single whites out for anything positive, oh, my goodness.

Oh, my goodness. You probably like Rhodesia. That's that's probably what it is.

You really, really like that white supremacist regime, which was really more of a meritocracy.

But that's that's what's going on now. Let's let's talk about this, shall we?

This is I wanted a new story that caught my eye. I wanted to give you the bad kind of Christian.

If there is a bad kind of Christian nationalism, I think this is kind of it. And I just thought it caught my attention.

I know this is a left wing source. I know right wing watch. I wouldn't I mean, I'm sure they can edit things and cut things and, you know, all that kind of stuff.

And this isn't a clip, though, I think where that's really in play. It's not like a clip where context is going to make this any different.

But this is something I have heard articulated from Christians. And so I do think that it is important to talk about.

So we're going to talk about it. Let me just play the clip. This is the lieutenant governor, Dan Patrick of Texas. And here's what he had to say at CPAC at CPAC.

Ninety five percent of conservatives believe in God. OK, 95 percent.

Seventy two percent of Democrats believe in God. Only 67 percent of liberals believe in God.

And sadly, only 60 some percent of young people believe in God. We were a nation founded upon not the words of our founders, but the words of God, because he wrote the

Constitution. He empowered them. We were a Christian state and we've been blessed because of that for so many years.

Now, I don't want to get too hard on the guy. I know the left is getting is beating this guy to a pulp. I don't want to get too hard on him, especially as someone who the left, you know, doesn't care for me either.

So it's, you know, we can have co -belligerency. I can have co -belligerency probably with Dan Patrick on like probably a number of issues.

Here's here's the thing, though. And let me see if I can. People can't see me right now. Let me move my camera.

Here's the thing with this. I think that I think we get into trouble.

I think conservatives get into trouble when they start going down this path. This I don't even know what word to use.

Hyper American exceptionalism, hyper Christian nationalism. I don't even know.

I don't know what to say. But where they attribute to the United States this divine, divinely inspired founding.

And it's actually similar to kind of I think what Mormonism teaches on the United States and its eschatological significance.

See, eschatology is important, but it's not true.

It's not true. Now you here's what you could say, and maybe it was just poorly phrased. You could say Christian principles inspired the founding of this country.

Christian men and who applied their beliefs were very much involved with influential upon the founding of this country or the the we the assumptions that we that we've always accepted in our civilization are in line with or based upon Christian principles.

I think that's the way you would probably want to say it. And I just wanted to just say for FYI, for everyone out there, just be careful of language like this, where you start saying things like God wrote the

Constitution. God wrote the Constitution. We have to somehow keep this separate where, yes, you know, people who follow principles and Proverbs are going to be more successful.

And we can look at the United States and say, yep, lots of sin, lots of worse humans. But there was a basic recognition of some biblical wisdom, and it has led to some prosperity.

I think we can say that. I don't think there's any problem there. I think though, once we start saying that there's a special or insinuating a special covenantal relationship that we're such a shining city on the hill that God there's a covenant that we have with God, wherein we we're just like Israel.

And if we disobey, you know, judgment, if we obey those things, I think in general can be true.

Blessed is the nation is God is the Lord. Okay, there's a general principle, but we're just we don't have a special relationship necessarily.

We're not Israel. In that sense. We're not God's chosen people, because we're

Americans. Okay. And I hear a lot of leftists talk about it. Like, that's what Christian nationalism is. You conflate the ecclesiastical with the civil and you think that Americans are like the the unique more, you know, better than everyone else, because they're more

Christian and God's, you know, bless them more, because he's got a special relationship with it.

And it's like, I'm like, I hear that. I'm like, Yeah, you know, not most people don't believe that. No, come on. That's, we just believe that Christian principles and ideas and laws or instrumental in the founding of the country.

And we think they should be instrumental. And they should be determinative in some things and our identity, certainly that we're a

Christian country. And in that sense, not that everyone's a Christian, but we have a basic Christian identity. Sure. God didn't write the

Constitution, guys. And it's not on par with Scripture. And we got it. We cannot treat it that way. Because the Constitution is a document written by man that has problems.

It's not a perfect document. It's a great document. It's not a perfect document. And in fact, that's why there's an amendment process and why there has been amendments, and there probably should be some more amendments.

And, and also, because it's a written Constitution, and because of all the things that have happened with positive law and postmodernism, it's become now almost not worth the paper it's written on.

And so it's it's not it's not going to be a safeguard from everything. It's not this divinely inspired catchall or, you know, gate that is going to keep all the evil out or something.

So anyway, there's so much more I could say, and I've already waxed long about it. But hey, just just be careful of that.

Just an FYI of saying stuff like that. I don't know exactly where this is leftist or saying it's David Barton.

It might be I don't know. I don't know exactly where that's coming from. Okay, another story here that I caught my attention.

Wyoming is the first state to terminate its relationship with panorama education founded by U .S.

Attorney Merrick Garland's son -in -law. And this is written by Adam Andrzejewski, if I said that right.

Looks like the Cowboys are going in a new direction. Wyoming State Superintendent of Public Education just announced that state education is terminating its relationship with panorama education.

Per Superintendent of Public Instruction Brian Schroeder, the Wyoming Department of Education will not be renewing the current contract with panorama education.

After weeks of consideration, the superintendent has determined that this action is the best. Panorama is co -founded by Xan Tanner, the son -in -law of U .S.

Attorney Merrick Garland. Panorama received national attention last fall after Garland's, let's see, okay, so parents who are objecting to CRT in their children's curriculum found out, it's this, this company is pushing it.

Panorama's survey business is the gateway drug for the controversial CRT teachings. Using information gathered from Wyoming State Auditor Christy Racines, transparency website, our auditors at openbooks .com

found $257 ,000 in state payments to panorama. As far as we can tell, this is the only panorama contract ever canceled by a state education agency.

Okay, so I just, I hope other states go in this direction. It highlights a few things that I thought were interesting.

One is how, man, how many hands are in the pot sometimes and then just when you have

Merrick Garland going after parents, but these parents are objecting to something, what was it, his son -in -law is directly involved with, it's like, hey, where's the conflict of interest here?

And Wyoming, I think is doing good to say, you know, we're not going to be implementing this kind of curriculum anymore.

We don't need the CRT stuff. We're dropping this. We're not using this stuff anymore. And so good for them, good for them.

And, okay, I think that's pretty much all I wanted to say about this. Let's go to the next story.

Roy Moore, Roy Moore, anyone remember Roy Moore, the 10 Commandments judge who ran for Senate and then got kind of me too'd.

And then Al Mohler and Russell Moore and all kinds of other people came out and were saying how horrible, I mean,

Al Mohler was on CNN saying how horrible Roy Moore is. We should just believe women, right? That was

Al Mohler of, what was that, 2017? And now Roy Moore wins defamation case against Democratic PAC, jury awards him $8 .2

million. Roy Moore wins defamation case. We'll pray for Judge Moore because he's going to, that's going to be appealed and he's going to have to keep fighting.

But I would say good news for the most, I was one of the few at the time, I didn't really have much of a platform, but I was one of the few that I knew of on social media.

There was like three of us who were not going along with this. And we're saying, look, this, you know, you have flimsy things like, oh, look, he wrote in my yearbook and it proves that he must've like raped me or it was, it just did, that dog did not hunt.

And it, it reminded me of the Herman Cain thing. And I was just like, do not judge this before evidence comes out.

We can't do this. And the Kavanaugh stuff happened not too long after that. And Kavanaugh by the skin of his teeth was able to get through it.

Roy Moore wasn't. He lost the election. And, and, you know, if you remember Trump backed

Roy Moore, but the Democrat or the Republican establishment did not. And I think even Ted Cruz and people,

Glenn Beck, I remember Glenn Beck was just ripping Roy Moore a new one. It's like, guys, why, since when did you all become on the

Me Too train? So anyway, that's a positive development in my mind.

And if there is evidence, I'd like to see it. I just haven't, I looked into the whole thing at the time. I just didn't, there wasn't any evidence. And so anyway and then we have, this is just making its rounds.

I'm not sure if this is new or if this is older, but it's making its rounds now. But anyway, it came across my feed and I figured

I'd play it for you. This is J .D. Greer on transgender pronouns. Check this out. You know, some people on one side are going to say, hey, we got to tell the truth.

And the truth is this person is male or female. So I would be lying if I called somebody who was female identified as male.

There's others that say, well, you know, look, as a courtesy, you should refer to a transgender person by their preferred pronoun.

And it's sort of a generosity of spirit kind of approach. And you see evidence in the Bible of that.

And so you kind of got those, the arguments that I've heard go basically along those two lines. Is it a generosity of spirit or is it you telling the truth?

Personally, I think, again, this ought to be a charitable discussion. I lean a little bit toward generosity of spirit.

That's where Andrew Walker, you know, that's where he also is. You know, it's if a transgender person came into our church, came into my life,

I think my disposition would be to refer to them by their preferred pronoun. When we want to talk about gender,

I will be clear with them. All right. All right. So that's J .D. Greer. And this isn't new. I mean, as far as the pronoun hospitality thing, he said that for a while.

Now, Andrew Walker said this. My own position is that if a transgender person comes to church, it is fine to refer to them by their preferred pronoun.

If and when this person desires greater involvement or membership, a church leader will need to meet and talk with them. The best solution is to avoid pronouns altogether if possible, calling a person by their legal name or preferred name.

Now, that was Andrew Walker in 2020. Andrew Walker in 2020.

So this is, you know, two, a little over two years ago, two and a half years ago that Andrew Walker's saying this.

My understanding is from people that are closer to Walker, that he does not believe this anymore. I don't know of anything online.

Maybe there's something I don't know of where he's retracted this. And one of the reasons I wanted to just mention this, it's not the only one,

I just wanted to preface, there's two reasons really. One was I think that this issue is not going away, especially for people in the business world.

I was just talking to some people at my church who, I mean, they're inundated with this stuff and they have to try to use proper names all the time.

And it's, this isn't going away overnight. So that's one thing. And I'm, you know, talking to, coming up,

I'm talking to a podcast with Rosaria Butterfield. Rosaria has basically gone the opposite direction on this and said, wait, that was a mistake.

And what I'm hoping is that other Christian leaders, I'm hoping people like Andrew Walker do the same thing. I'm really hoping that he can come out there publicly and say,

I know this was out there. In fact, it's being used by people to justify this. I don't agree with this anymore because guess what?

It's a lie. It's a lie to do that. And I don't want to participate in a lie. And that's what I'm hoping.

Rosaria has been humble enough to do that. And I hope other people are willing to do that as well.

Okay. There's just been, I guess, you know, I'll just add to it. There's just been so many that I can think of that have, like Al Moeller does this, where he switches positions on something, never makes out like nothing ever happened.

And it's like, you know, when, when people are using your, your stuff, your content, where you've advocated something you disagree with now,

I do think at least if you remember that you once advocated something different and there's no way with some of these big, you know, big ticket items,

Al Moeller doesn't remember saying things like apologizing for his belief in like same sex or homosexual orientation and that kind of thing.

There's no way he doesn't remember that. Come on. But you know, it, I think you just have a responsibility to, to let people know because you know, it's error and and we all grow and we all commit errors and we, we hopefully grow from them and we learn.

All right. So I wanted to let you know about that. Probably the last item, just for the sake of time, there's other things

I want to talk about, but for the sake of time, there's a book coming out called Biblical Critical Theory, How the Bible's Unfolding Story Makes Sense of Modern Life and Culture by Christopher Walken and forward is by Tim Keller.

And look, it's 40 bucks for the audio book, $40 for the audio book. I'm probably going to have to listen to this thing when it comes out

November 8th. I don't want to, but I probably will. Biblical Critical Theory. There's an article about it, which I was going to go over.

I don't think I have time. We'll save it. By Christopher Walken, which probably basically shows what he's arguing in his book, but anyway, doesn't look good.

And I think that's, that's where we're going to leave it for today. So that's all for, for the

Conversations That Matter podcast. I feel like I'm missing something. I don't think I am. I think that's it. We're going to talk about some other things including,

Oh, I am missing. I know what I'm missing. Okay. All right. We're not done yet. Show's not over. I did want to something that I haven't pulled up that I'm going to see if I can pull up.

I did want to, to talk about two things. One was just,

I don't do this all the time. And in fact, I don't know if I've ever done this. I want to do this for this particular church.

I have my reasons for it, but you can go to discerningchristians .com. And by the way, if you have a good church, please go there, create an account and put your church there.

We need it. We need that network of churches. But here's the thing. A lot of churches are still having a hard time finding a pastor who's not compromised.

And so there was someone I was talking to recently who I've met in person who's lives outside of Chicago.

And I'll put the info in the, in the info section. Once I find it, who just wanted to, you know, they, they, they're trying to find a pastor and they're fatigued about it.

And I just want to say, look, if you're a pastoral candidate, I think it's, if I'm not mistaken, I think it's more of a baptistic kind of non -denominational church.

If you're one, if you don't mind living outside of Chicago in the suburbs and you want a church, I would say apply.

And I'm just going to give you the info in the info section. So you can apply. And if you're a pastoral candidate, so I just want to help them out on that.

Maybe I'll do more of that kind of stuff in the future, just to kind of help network people, but want to let you know that. And then the last thing, last but not least,

I forgot to mention this. I wanted to follow up just because there were, there were a few people who were sensitive to, or disagreeing with some things

I said last week on the podcast about rightly ordered affections.

And Doug, I talked about a Doug Wilson article. And in hindsight, I probably should have taken more time and done.

Doug Wilson wrote an initial article where he's essentially arguing against identity politics by showing that Christianity is really the only it's, it's the significant identity.

The other stuff is just, it doesn't compare. And he he also is trying to make a point that Christians need to be charitable to one another and, and have more love for each other because they'll know we were

Christians by our love. And that's part of, I think why he but, but there it's, it's the way

Doug Wilson writes. Sometimes it's a little difficult. It's very Chestertonian. It's, it's kind of, there's a lot of rabbit trails and things like that.

And so I think I, for the most part understood what he was saying, but I kind of,

I talked about his clarification article. I didn't talk about the original article. So that was the original article.

And that's where he said that he has more in common with a Nigerian woman than an American conservative. Who's not a

Christian just because a Nigerian Christian would, would share Christ with him.

And therefore there, there would be, they would have more in common and any, but he said that the lines are always vertical. And so that the, the way to,

I guess the glue that holds us together is, is much more stronger that you, and I think with that, you have more of a duty.

You have more of a love, more of an obligation to people who are Christians. Okay. And then, and then a lot of people were objecting by, you know, quoting

Bible verses about how we're supposed to love one another. And this applies to the church and Christians have a unique love first to the household of faith and then beyond.

And so I want to just very briefly address this if I can, because I don't want to spend too long on it. I think I've already said my piece.

I don't really have anything that's out there that's blaring that, that I want to retract. There was some things that I, I don't think

I should have said, like, I think I, I said, I made a, just an offhanded remark that perhaps

Doug Wilson, it's, I speculated that because maybe he's more of a one kingdom guy that, you know, he sees things that way.

And I was actually talking to Thomas Accord and he, Thomas was like, I don't think Doug Wilson actually is a one kingdom guy.

So I'm not quite even clear on that. He might be a two kingdom guy. So I probably shouldn't have said that.

Just forget, forget. I said that, that was, that was just an offhanded speculation. I probably shouldn't have said, but other than that,

I don't know that I have much to really retract. I think I stand by what I said. And I, what

I see is people coming from a few different, who have taken objection to my statement and what

I wrote after that, I made a post. Some people seem to think there's one category that says everything is race.

Some people say like all our identity is wrapped up in our race. I don't really know anyone who believes that, but I know there are people who do.

And then, or that's the determinative factor, racial determinism. And then you have the people who say race doesn't play any factor at all.

And I would, I'd rather use the biblical language if possible. Let's talk about nation instead of race, maybe.

But the concept in the Bible of nation, and this would carry through really, to be honest with you, the age of exploration, the term race is very similar.

In fact, ethnos, the Greek term ethnicity, you know, is often how, that's the word that's often translated people, or I think even nation.

So you were talking in the same kind of family here. And for most of human history, you would not have conceived of people from other cultures with the global economy coming to you and then sharing all kinds of things in common.

They had their people, you had your people, and things were broadly generally divided over. People groups were divided by language, primarily by religion would be part of it, by genetics, that is part of it, by race would factor into this.

I think of race more broadly as beyond just genetics, but just your people, your people would be your race. That's how it was really used, especially before Darwin.

But there's all these things, complicated things, some of them that make you, you. And today, because of globalism, and because of,

I think a number of factors, industrialization, there's just, I can have a next door neighbor who's from, let's say his parents are from Vietnam.

And I share, he's my neighbor, though, and maybe we go to the same church, and I can share more in common with him and be best friends.

And then I do people who might share more in common with me genetically, but aren't my neighbors, and don't go to my church, okay?

And so here's how I'm looking at it. I'm looking at this as there's a number of things that confer identity.

And race is one of those things. And it's an important thing.

It's not the only thing, okay? People who say that race shouldn't, isn't even part of that equation,

I think you're just being, like, come on. That's how I feel about, like, come on. Like, you don't really, you don't think that, you know, obviously, in the

New Testament, you don't even see Paul himself, right? Yearn for the salvation of his kinsmen, according to the flesh, willing to give up himself for them.

There is a love that I think does exist there. And that's not wrong. And I think that's actually, in a world where everyone's moving around all the time, and regions don't mean as much, and they're broken families, and just that, to take every element that confers identity, and then just say it doesn't matter,

I just think it creates a lot of insecurity. And so I do think that that's just one part, that's one ingredient in the recipe that makes you you, okay?

It's not the only thing. It doesn't mean it determines everything at all. It just means it's one of the ingredients.

And I would hope people, no matter what your cultural background is, or your race, your people, whatever that is,

I would hope that you are somewhat interested in that, that you do have, I don't know, just you can see

God's hand, hopefully, in the story of what brought you to saving faith. And you can look back and you can see the story that God has has woven in just your genetic line, even, if that's possible.

That's not possible for everyone. But anyway, so I think that's one area that I kind of,

I'm just not in that paradigm. So when people criticize, and they say things like, you know,

I'm not emphasizing race enough, or I'm emphasizing race too much. I'm not, I'm not emphasizing race.

I emphasize culture, if I anything. But I'm, I do think that obviously, one of the things that does confer identity, and I'll put it this way, here's a good make it very practical for people.

There is a special love I have for the household of faith, I'm supposed to have that love.

There's a special love I have for my kinsmen, according to the flesh. Okay, when I am in regions,

I realized this when I was in Appalachia, actually, I hadn't grown up in Appalachia. But I realized as I was looking at and seeing the last names, there's a lot of Harris's up there.

And seeing that a lot of people look like me, and just my heart kind of bleeds for them a little bit, especially because they're so impoverished.

I think that's okay. Like that, does that make you a racist or something? Like, no, I think someone who wants to marry someone else, and it's fine.

Some of my best friends, and even members of my family are in interracial marriages. I'm not against that at all. I just I do think though,

I don't think it's wrong, though, for someone to prefer to marry someone who's more or be attracted to someone who's more genetically similar to them or shares a similar culture or heritage.

That's not really unnatural. So the thing is, I put that as one of the ingredients.

I don't think that's the whole enchilada and people who want to say that there's nothing significant about it. I just think don't like,

I don't know that it's in touch with reality. And so that's one of the objections

I got. And the other, well, I already mentioned the other objection that, you know, you should love other

Christians more. And the answer to that is, yes, but that's also an element of proximity. And that's my whole point.

There's any point that I made in all of this, it's that there's the temporal world, there's the eternal realm, two kingdoms.

And yes, I share much more in common with, I need a Nigerian who I've never met, who

I don't share a culture with, who I don't share a language with. But if they're a Christian, I share much more in common with them in the eternal realm.

And if they're in proximity to me, and I'm able to do something to help them, which we have on this podcast, absolutely, we're going to help them.

But I also have neighbors who are closer in proximity to me, who share a lot of these other things, these temporal world things with me.

And that's also very important. An American, someone who's an

American, I share a lot with them. And we're going to be involved in some of the same efforts, we have some of the same cultural attachments.

And if we're going to construct a society and find a glue to hold that society together, that's one of the things you're going to want to look at, it's going to be important.

So yeah, of course, loving other Christians is part of that. But I mean, if you wanted to have fun with this, you could pit obligations to your family.

If you don't provide for your family, you're worse than an unbeliever, and then obligations to the church. What about the starving people in your church? Who do you feed?

You're supposed to value the household? Well, of course we know, you feed your family. That's who you have a responsibility towards first in that scenario.

So it's going to take a little bit of thinking and just application of some obvious truths and some things in scripture,

I think. But the point is that it's proximity. It's the relationship that you have, and how proximate they are to you, that's going to determine in some ways how you treat them, and how much of a commonality you share with them.

And so I just wanted to say in closing, I guess, I think it's helpful to use the biblical categories nation.

We have, is there, this is a question I'd ask in closing. Do you have an obligation to your people or your nation or your country, if you want to put it that way, but specifically, you know, your people?

And what is that, John? I don't know. Yeah, in a fractured society, like 20, in 2022 in the

West, yeah, it is getting harder to figure that out. But, and I'm not, and people hear that sometimes and think

I'm talking about race or something. I'm not. No, I'm not. I'm talking, I'm saying that it's much more complicated than that.

It's the people that you live in proximity to, and there's different things that confer that. So race could be one, but your culture, your language,

I think that though your faith does play into this, into proximity. But if it's nation, a biblical category, which we got to figure out what that means, nation or ethnos, do you have an obligation at all to them?

Is there any kind of attachment you have at all? That's a question I'll leave open -ended.

I think it'd be good to struggle through that and figure that out. And ask yourself, if you don't know who your people are, ask yourself and come to a conclusion on it, on what that is.

Maybe you have, there's multiple answers to that, but I think at least we should be free to ask the question without immediately being smeared as racist or something.

That's ridiculous. It's a purposeful misunderstanding. And people who say that stuff should be ashamed.

Most of them aren't. But yeah, they're, most of them are ignorant in my opinion. So I'm not saying that about people in this audience necessarily.

I understand some of the objections to this. And some of them actually were pretty good. In fact, we're going to talk about the

One Kingdom, Two Kingdom thing in a podcast probably next week. Lots more that could be said, but I need to land the plane.

It's after an hour and I got stuff to do. I got to, now that I put in the bathtub, I got to put in the toilet and man,

I don't even, and the cabinets and the sink and two sinks and more painting.

And there's a lot, but anyway, my house is coming together and appreciate all your prayers.