Avsnitt
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The flâneur and the philosopher are joined this week by Jack Wilkie, author of the Church Reset Substack, and of a book by the same name, Church Reset: God’s Design for So Much More. Jack was previously a pastor in the Churches of Christ but has since focused on his writing ministry and his podcast, Think Deeper.
Jack recently wrote a post titled, “Why I Won’t Be Encouraging My Sons Toward Ministry.” We discuss with him why this is, and why he left pastoral ministry himself.
We discuss the nature of the pastoral role as well as the current pulpit supply-chain, taking uprooted young men and placing them around the country in a Christian brain-drain. We consider the sacred-secular divide this creates and offer some alternative models of church and discipleship.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Takeaways
* The current system of filling pulpits in churches is flawed and disconnected from the rest of the church community.
* There is a need for a more organic, homegrown approach to leadership development in churches.
* Small churches should focus on training and equipping their own leaders instead of relying on hiring pastors from outside the congregation.
* The emphasis should be on the quality of leadership and the growth and maturity of the church, rather than the size of the building or the number of attendees.
* Finding the right church involves considering factors such as the spiritual health of the congregation, the influence on family and children, and the opportunity for active participation.
* Disciple-making is the responsibility of every member of the church, and it involves training and guiding others in their walk with God.
* Churches need to move away from a consumeristic mindset and prioritize hospitality, community, and a focus on Christ-likeness in everyday life.
* The church should provide guidance and wisdom on practical matters of life, such as parenting and finances, in addition to theological teaching.
* Unity in the church requires a balance between specific requirements, expectations, and encouragement, while respecting individual differences and preferences.
* Churches should prioritize roots and generational connections, encouraging families to stay close and passing on wisdom and values to future generations.
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It was my and King Laugh’s privilege to speak with Dr. Nigel Biggar about doing theology from experience.
In his recent book Colonialism: A Moral Reckoning and in previous books like In Defence of War, Dr. Biggar’s biblical and theological erudition has been matched by his philosophical rigor - and especially by his knowledge of history. Doing work that not even historians dare to do, Dr. Biggar has brought moral wisdom, especially from the Christian tradition, to bear on contemporary debates.
At the same time, his engagement with history and empirical observation of the human condition has brought experience to bear on Christian theology. We discuss the consequences of Bible-only theology and the need to advert to empirical sources. The legacy of colonialism is considered, and the need to avoid ideological thinking both of the secular progressive type and the insular Christian kind.
Dr. Biggar is Emeritus Regius Professor of Moral and Pastoral Theology at the University of Oxford. He is the author of many books, including In Defence of War, Behaving in Public: How to Do Christian Ethics, and What’s Wrong with Rights?
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Read King Laugh’s Letters to the Seven Churches of Pine County
Like a latter day apostle John, King Laugh has been composing seven letters to the churches of Pine county. Therein, you will find love for the church and biting critique, not unlike the letters of Revelation, or the prose of the wittiest satirists. Read carefully!
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I also offer consulting on getting into Ph.D.’s and related academic or intellectual career advice.
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Saknas det avsnitt?
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Dr. Miles Smith IV, Associate professor of history at Hillsdale College, joined the King and I for a conversation about what we can learn from Ex-vangelical narratives. “Ex-vangelicals” have been deconstructing for several years, whether to leave the faith altogether or to become a different kind of Christian. In all cases, the object of critique is the particular subculture of 80s and 90s evangelical Christianity.
With historical perspective and Protestant conviction, Dr. Miles Smith IV agrees with much of the ex-vangelical critique, but with a different conclusion: Historic Protestantism was never well-represented by 80s and 90s evangelicalism. That movement was much more shaped by history, politics, and sociology than the faithful would like to admit.
As always, our conversation came back to the church, pastors, and laypeople, but with new insights about the 20th century rise of American Protestant clericalism. Enjoy this enlightening discussion with Miles Smith.
He followed up by publishing an essay, “Reading the Exvangelicals,” yesterday at Mere Orthodoxy.
By the way, Miles has just released a book addressing questions of Christianity and the pre-Civil War era of America: Religion and Republic: Christian America from the Founding to the Civil War.
Check out Miles’ X account as well: https://x.com/IVMiles.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Books mentioned:
Jon Ward’s Testimony: Inside the Evangelical Movement that Failed a Generation
Mike Cosper’s Land of My Sojourn: The Landscape of a Faith Lost and Found
Andrew L. Whitehead’s American Idolatry: How Christian Nationalism Betrays the Gospel and Threatens the Church
Sarah McCammon’s The Exvangelicals: Loving, Living, and Leaving the White Evangelical Church
Sound Bites
* “What was weird about 80s and 90s American evangelicalism that's not representative of say historic Protestantism?”
* "If you're my age and guess what, you don't have anything to go back to, your kind of choices are, okay, maybe the world was right and evangelicalism lied to me about the world or..."
* "Evangelicals talk all the time. It's actually their sacrament, right? Like the, because of course the, the, the primacy of the preached word is so important."
* "Just live the faith. They're not really checking in on what you're doing."
* "Where did the professionalization of the ministry come from?"
* “There’s no universal competency that comes with a collar.”
* “The ‘professional Christian’ idea is a 20th century phenomenon.”
* “What is the good life? Well, the good life is to love your neighbor as yourself.”
* “The church is the building.”
* "The church, the gospels don't have a lot to say about politics."
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Book Discussion
02:17 The Rise of Ex-Evangelical Memoirs
11:53 The Conflation of Leadership and Authority in Evangelicalism
23:16 The Role of Gurus and Celebrity Figures in Evangelicalism
27:28 The Importance of Prudence in Christian Decision-Making
30:47 The Pitfalls of Professionalizing the Ministry
32:24 The General Nature of Admonitions in the Church
33:30 The Professionalization of the Ministry in the Early 20th Century
36:14 The Influence of Scientism and the Darwinian Framework
38:10 Socioeconomics and Church Growth
52:59 Redefining the Concept of a 'Dying Church'
59:36 Exploring Christian Nationalism
01:00:07 Integrating Different Disciplines into Theological Discourse
01:01:34 The Misconception of Theology as Sociology or Politics
01:02:32 The Church's Role in Saving Souls
01:03:56 The Church's Stance on Politics
01:10:07 Evangelicalism: Politics vs. Theology
01:15:21Fostering Love and Community in the Church
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Colton Beach joins us to speak about his experience as a gay Christian, committed to the traditional Christian sexual ethic, in the church. For Colton’s personal backstory, check out his interview with Preston Sprinkle. I learned about Colton when we both attended our first Revoice conference in June 2023, which I wrote about here.
We talk with Colton about the analogy between accepting chronic illness and admitting one is gay. We ask why Reformed, gospel-centered churches revert to a prosperity gospel when faced with same-sex attraction. We ask questions about the goods of celibacy and marriage in the Christian life.
Central to our conversation is the theology of sanctification or Christian spiritual growth: Does growing mean being tempted less, or obeying more even if temptation continues? Was Jesus Christ an asexual, or a man subject to the desires and infirmities of our human nature? The implications are many and deep.
Read Colton’s Writings.
Check out Revoice, where Colton volunteers.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Check Out King Laugh’s Latest:
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Dr. Joseph Minich, residential teaching fellow at The Davenant Institute, joins King Laugh - before you go further, subscribe to his Substack, Laughing with God - and Joel Carini this week on The Flâneur and the Philosopher. Our topic is the ideology of Mark Dever’s Nine Marks ministry. While on the face of it, designed to limit the pastor’s authority to the word of God, we detect in Nine Marks’ teaching an unjust accruing of authority to the sole preaching pastor.
Dr. Minich tells us about his review of Jonathan Leeman’s Political Church, an account of church authority arising from Nine Marks’ ministry. Leeman, in that book, attempts to argue that pastors have a spiritual authority, less than that of God, but greater than that of any congregant with a Bible. But is that the nature of church office and church authority? Or is there no spiritual distinction between clergy and laity?
King Laugh and I also present our critique of the ideology of expository preaching and the church-focused Christian life. It is laudable to aspire only to preach what is consistent with biblical teaching. And yet, in so restraining the pastor, we deny the capacity and duty of exercising human reason and judgment, which are the only way to apply Scripture to the messy complexities of concrete life. Given that the pastor is not the expert on life in all its complexity, this also opens up a parity among wise, mature Christian individuals: the priesthood of all believers.
This summer, Dr. Minich will be offering a course at Davenant House, “Reading the Bible and the World: Protestant Wisdom Foundations I.” Learn more and sign up here.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Sound Bites
* "They have tried to make it possible to do so with imbeciles by making the process of arriving at that so simple that you could train a 20 something to do it effectively."
* "There is a conflation of what really ought to be authority, where you need wisdom, you need to be able to judge, to govern, you need to exemplify the things that you're talking about versus leading, which is usually a matter of gifting."
* "They speak with an absolute authority because the minister, if they deviate from this, is perceived as a rogue."
* "You're outsourcing your own judgment, whether your moral conscience or your intellectual firing, rather than them turning around and saying, hey, you should read books and also it's really hard to know things and it could take a while to really know something and do that, grow."
* "There's a lot there, and the pastor who says on bioethics, I am a little bit beyond my wheelhouse - Mr. Christian with an MD, you have some insights here, but you also need some philosophy because being a doctor alone doesn't help you just realizing like the complexity of all the different types of knowledge."
* "The appropriate way to approach it is that the pastor is really just the end stage of any godly man in the congregation who meets the qualifications."
* "Don't come ask me everything. Actually, you grow wise."
* "The church and its leadership can become like the kind of boyfriend or husband who makes you need them so badly. It's almost abusive."
* "If the way that you are engaging with the people you love and serve is that they can't do anything without you, that's the opposite of what you're supposed to be doing."
Chapters
00:00 Introduction and Background
02:05 Personal Background and Involvement with Davenant
06:22 Critique of Jonathan Lehman's 'Political Church'
13:17 The Dangers of Clerical Caste and Man of God Syndrome
23:24 Equipping the Saints and Cultivating Independent Thinking
28:08 The Parent-Child Dynamic in Pastoral Relationships
36:18 The Dangers of Dependency on Pastors
37:55 The Limitations of Pastors' Expertise
39:20 Cultivating Wisdom and Knowledge Among the Congregation
41:30 The Role of Pastors as Informational Vending Machines
45:42 The Importance of Raising Up New Pastors Within the Church
49:53 Focusing on the Practical Aspects of the Christian Life
53:05 The Relationship Between Authority and Submission
58:23 The Role of Pastors in the Lives of Congregants
01:00:53 The Anxious Relationship to Knowing
01:03:45 The Responsibility of Congregants to Cultivate Wisdom
01:06:40 The Growth and Development of the Congregation
01:11:03 Cultivating Wisdom and Independence
01:12:58 The Role of Elders as Guides
01:13:54 Accountability and Humility in Leadership
01:16:28 The Role of Parachurch Organizations
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This week, Joel Carini and King Laugh are joined by Michael, author of Build the Village, a publication about building community beyond mainstream institutions.
I came across Michael through his engagement with Aaron Renn’s cultural commentary, but as a member of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints. (Michael wrote this review of Renn’s recent book, Life in the Negative World.)
In my judgment, the LDS church is an interesting example of a church that has already adjusted to “the negative world,” i.e., adopted a minority mindset and practiced a kind of large-scale Benedict Option for over a century.
Our conversation explores the topic of building Christian community and the role of individual initiative within the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, and how this can be replicated for evangelicals.
We also discussed the importance of intentional parenting and the role of fathers in passing on faith and values to their children. We had an excursus on the creation of culture and music within the Christian community. We concluded with a discussion on the need for rites of passage and intentional guidance for boys as they transition into adulthood.
Listen on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Takeaways
* The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints emphasizes strong social fabric and tight-knit community, with members actively supporting and serving one another.
* Lay leadership and individual initiative play a significant role in the LDS Church, with members taking on responsibilities and actively participating in the community.
* There is a need for churches to bridge the gap between young people and older generations, creating shared experiences and connections outside of traditional church assignments.
* Churches should offer unique experiences and opportunities for youth, providing them with something distinctive and appealing that aligns with their interests and values.
* Fathers play a crucial role in passing on faith and values to their children, and their emotional warmth and closeness have a significant impact on faith persistence.
* Rites of passage and intentional guidance for boys are essential in preparing them for adulthood and teaching them the skills and values necessary for a successful life.
* The church and community should provide opportunities for men to interact, lead, and debate, allowing boys to witness and learn from these experiences. Separate yourself from the unhealthy homeschool culture to foster independence.
* Create a vision of family life that goes beyond negotiating roles and responsibilities.
* Find meaning in ordinary life and prioritize everyday tasks.
* Cultivate a sense of human flourishing and train children for their future roles.
* De-optimize your life to prioritize family and home.
* Take an intentional and customized approach to family life.
Sound Bites
* "Latter-day Saints have a strong culture of individual initiative and proactive service within the community."
* "Lay leadership in the LDS Church allows for a sense of shared responsibility and reduces the burden on the bishop."
* "The transition from youth to adulthood can be challenging, and more can be done to support young men during this critical period."
* "When the adults in the room take their own cultural making responsibilities seriously and together offer the youth of the church an experience, the youth are generally gonna respond well to that."
Chapters
00:00 - Introduction and Background
08:11 - The Importance of Individual Initiative in the LDS Church
23:52 - Challenges in Protestant Churches: Bridging the Gap
27:21 - Creating Unique Experiences for Youth
32:01 - The Role of Fathers in Faith Transmission
32:53 - The Negative Impact of Pop Culture on Dating and Relationships
34:28 - Creating a Christian Alternative to Pop Culture
51:40 - The Importance of Rites of Passage and Intentional Guidance for Boys
01:01:20 - The Role of the Church and Community in Shaping Boys' Development
01:07:27 - Fostering Independence and Preparing Children
01:14:55 - A Vision for Family Life
01:20:43 - Finding Meaning in Ordinary Life
01:26:22 - Cultivating Human Flourishing and Training Children
01:29:41 - De-optimizing Life: Prioritizing Family and Home
01:35:50 - An Intentional and Customized Approach
The Natural Theologian is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
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Ross Byrd joined and King Laugh and I this week to discuss preparation for the gospel. Ross commented a couple of months ago on one of my essays that Jesus did not spend his ministry planting the seed; he spent it tilling the soil:
“The truth (the seed) is simple and plenty. The problem is the lack of fertile soil. Jesus came to till the soil, to play the long game—not just to give us the truth, but to make sure the truth could go in.”
Our discussion highlighted the importance of patience and incremental growth in understanding and accepting the truth. We also touched on the limitations of light switch-like conversions and the need for a gradual journey of becoming. We are embodied and in time; we can’t have an angelic, aeviternal view of conversion.
Our conversation ranged over other areas, including the sacred-secular divide, whether episcopal church government might solve some things, and the journey from wonder to work and back to wonder again.
Ross Byrd runs Surf Hatteras, a premier summer surfing camp for teens, and teaches theology for the Virginia Beach Fellows. He writes Patient Kingdom here on Substack; go give him a subscribe! He stepped back from being an associate pastor seven years ago to devote himself to these other callings full-time. He lives with his wife and four children in North Carolina.
Ross’s Comment on my Jordan Peterson Article
Ross’s Article:
Sound Bites
"Jesus' ministry is almost more about soil-tilling than seed-planting."
"The truth itself is so simple. You miss it because it's simple, not because it's complicated."
"Conversion is not a moment, but a process of becoming."
"It wasn't going to be very easy to do that in the Episcopal Church."
"We're not just handing you the reins of the sermon. Why don't we just the priesthood of all believers for those things - until and unless you show spectacular competence."
"What is the validity of 20-somethings being given church office?"
"It's a holiness that has to do with the way that the Spirit moves upon His people and the way that Jesus promised that He would when two or three are gathered in His name."
Chapters
Part I: The Master Soil-Tiller
0:00 Introduction to Ross
1:21 Soil Tilling in Jesus' Ministry
07:51 Patient Preparation v. Truth-Bombs
15:53 The Role of Time and Embodiment in Conversion
24:50 Salvation by Information Alone
Part II: From the Pastorate to Surf-Camp
40:06 Ross’s Story: From the Pastorate to Surf-Camp
48:44 The Bourgeois-Boomer-Baptist Booby-trap
Part III: Ecclesiology: Episcopal or Egalitarian?
56:47 Ross Challenges Us on Ecclesiology
1:15:03 The Holy and the Common
Part IV: Maturity
1:39:26 The Grandfather and the Second Naiveté
Last Week’s Episode:
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This week, the King and I spoke with Dr. Lawrence Feingold, professor of theology at Kenrick-Glennon Seminary, a Roman Catholic seminary in St. Louis, MO. Professor Feingold is the author of The Natural Desire to See God According to St. Thomas and His Interpreters, among other books. He trained in Carrara, Italy as a classical sculptor, alongside his wife. Both were converted to Christ while in Italy, where Dr. Feingold then studied theology for nine years. The fruit of his study was The Natural Desire to See God, a rebuttal of five decades of interpretation of Aquinas known as the Nouvelle Théologie, stemming from theologian Henri De Lubac.
Traditional Thomistic interpretation had held that man’s supernatural end - the beatific vision, seeing God - transcended human nature; it exceeded what human nature was capable of on its own. God could have created man in a state of pure nature, not offering him the beatific vision, without any injustice to man. Even if man had not sinned, the offer of a supernatural telos was an act of grace, a free offer of something not deserved.
In parallel with Protestant Neo-Orthodoxy, the Nouvelle Théologie argued that human nature could not be understood apart from its supernatural end. Human beings, in virtue of their nature alone, had a supernatural telos. This conclusion led some interpreters, including John Milbank, to an explicitly Christian politics, denying the possibility of any liberal neutrality. All thought about secular things and all political activity must be based on explicitly Christian principles.
In The Natural Desire, Dr. Feingold argued for a return to the traditional Thomistic synthesis. Man has, by nature, a desire for the good itself, a desire that nothing created can satisfy. But man’s supernatural end is disproportionate to his nature; it transcends his natural end and only comes to him as a gratuitous offer.
My own project parallels Dr. Feingold’s in its reaffirmation of nature in Christian theology; see my book, The Natural Theologian. I reject the Nouvelle Théologie and radical orthodoxy for the same reason I reject Christian presuppositionalism, worldview-ism, and coherentism: They ignore the goodness of created, finite human nature in itself and the possibility of natural human knowledge.
In the interview, we discuss Dr. Feingold’s own path to faith, including how a love of Christian art paved his way to Christianity. We discuss the Catholic debate over the natural desire to see God and its theological and cultural implications. Finally, we discuss how I am attempting to appropriate some aspects of his view for Protestant theology - and to reject others. The discussion closes with an exchange on whether Christ’s grace, in addition to restoring nature, also exceeds and elevates it.
Enjoy this conversation of The Flâneur and the Philosopher.
You can also listen to this and previous episodes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and YouTube.
Chapters
* Introduction 0:00
* Dr. Feingold’s Conversion 2:08
* Art as Preparation 8:34
* The Bifurcation of Art and Theology 15:38
* The Creator and the Creature 22:51
* The Retreat from Nature 28:29
* De Lubac’s Position 32:40
* Aquinas’s Position 39:09
* Platonic v. Aristotelian 48:24
* De Lubac Again 1:00:52
* The Gratuity of Creation 1:07:10
* Brainless Slugs 1:15:50
* Practical Implications 1:24:39
* Natural Law 1:33:31
* Protestant Doubts about Grace Elevating Nature 1:36:51
* The New Commandment 1:45:53
* The Sacredness of Secular Life 1:49:04
Resources
Dr. Feingold’s The Natural Desire to See God According to St. Thomas and His Interpreters
De Lubac’s Surnaturel, or The Mystery of the Supernatural
Steven Long, Natura Pura: On the Recovery of Nature in the Doctrine of Grace
St. Francis De Sales’ Introduction to the Devout Life
John Paul II Fides et Ratio and The Theology of the Body
Music: Lofi Study Musician: FASSounds Site: https://pixabay.com/music/beats-lofi-study-112191/
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Today, Samuel Barnes, author of Missing Axioms and The Iconoclast, joins the King and I to discuss the role religion, the secular, and identity play in the political right. The conversation begins from our dueling articles, my “Toward a Religious Right,” and Samuel’s “Against a Merely Religious Right.”
In my essay, I argued that, if the political right, conservatism, does not make its object the conservation and continuation of a religious heritage, then its adherents will tend to identify the object of conservation as a racial or ethnic group. In order to preserve both morality and a kind of universalism, the Right should be religious.
In Samuel’s essay, he argued that the Right is not merely concerned with the preservation of a religious heritage or any philosophical proposition. It is also concerned with the preservation of peoples in all their particularity - as the Québecois are concerned with their ethnic identity, the Welsh with theirs, the English with theirs. These are fine-grained, historic ethnicities, not races, mind you.
It should be noted that Samuel is himself English, and that the divide on the Right we are discussing is partly due to differences between the US, a propositional nation, and the countries of Europe.
What follows is a lively exchange about the nature and purpose of politics, from first principles. Enjoy this episode of The Flâneur and the Philosopher.
Remember you can also listen on Apple Podcasts and Spotify and watch on YouTube.
Chapters:
2:00 - What is the right preserving?
10:00 - Is politics a godly or an earthly thing?
22:00 - Is effective change through politics anyway, or through culture, ideas, and religion?
29:00 - Is preserving ethnic identity a goal of the right?
43:00 - Does the Right have a positive vision of the good life? Or are we merely against things?
53:00 - How can the Right save us from the tyranny of pleasure?
To learn more about our guest, Samuel Barnes, visit samuelbarnes.com.
The Natural Theologian is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.
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On this second episode of “The Flâneur and the Philosopher,” independent philosopher Daniel Garner joins the King and I for a lively discussion of the question of elders. While many churches have elders, we lack a reliable method of cultivating elders from the raw material of laymen. Christian discipleship and growth into maturity are, more often than not, left to chance.
Probably, our churches’ difficulties in cultivating elders are related to our society’s disintegration, loss of belonging, and glamorization of youth with its beauty and ignorance. Garner, author of the magisterial work of social philosophy Belonging Again (Part 1 is available here, and Part 2 is soon to be released) brings sociological and philosophical tools to bear on the question. In the end, he suggests that an elder is someone at the intersection of a dweller and a cultivator of free speech - part hobbit, part wizard.
You can also listen to this podcast on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or YouTube Podcasts, in addition to here on Substack! And if you missed last week’s episode, check out “Make Sermons Short Again” with Jack Prophesy.
Enjoy this conversation of “The Flâneur and the Philosopher.”
For more on Daniel, see his website under “O. G. Rose,” his pen name together with his wife Michelle. Check out his YouTube channel and his Twitter. Find his books on Amazon, including Volume 1 of Belonging Again. You may also enjoy his interview with me on my book The Natural Theologian: Essays on Nature and the Christian Life.
This is a public episode. If you’d like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit joelcarini.substack.com/subscribe -
This is the first episode of my new podcast, “The Flâneur and the Philosopher,” together with my friend King Laugh.
Putting it in a nutshell, “The Flâneur and the Philosopher” is a show in which a lover of wisdom and an ambulatory social critic seek the good through friendship and conversation.
One of our driving questions is whether the church is and how it can lead people to live examined lives, leading to spiritual maturity. I explored some of the limitations of contemporary Reformed theology, seminary, and being a theology nerd in previous essays.
Let My People Prophesy
The question this episode is whether revering the sermon as the central act of Protestant worship limits spiritual growth. Our guest, Jack Prophesy, argued as much on Twitter this week:
Strong words.
King Laugh and I put Jack’s critique to the test and explore ways that the church could better embody the priesthood of all believers.
You can find Jack’s links here: jack.prophesy.com
Subscribe to King Laugh here to inspire him to write a Substack finally!
If you enjoy the podcast, share it with someone!
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