Podcasts about european christians

When we say the name “God”, have we assumed too quickly that we know what we mean? We use that word quite regularly, without much strain or prolonged consideration, as if the meaning of the word were self-evident. But what if you had to explain – indeed, translate – the word “God” into a language that had no such concept? That would force you, I think, to really reckon with what you mean and what you assume when you use that word: the name, “God”. That is not merely an intellectual exercise; that was in fact the experience of the 16th and 17th Century Jesuit missionary, Matteo Ricci. His primary mission was to China, where he strove to bring and share the Gospel of Jesus Christ to those who often had not only a different language but also a different imaginary landscape than that which European Christians were accustomed to.In our episode today, the eminent scholar of the Sino-Western Exchange, Professor Anthony Clark, talks with me about Matteo Ricci, evangelization, inculturation, and the legacy of dialogue. Anthony Clark is Professor of Chinese History at Whitworth University, where he also holds the Edward B. Lindaman Endowed Chair, and he directs the Oxford Lewis-Tolkien Program, the Rome History and Culture Program, the area of Asian Studies, and the Study in China Program. He joins me today, in studio, while visiting Notre Dame to deliver a lecture titled “In the Footsteps of Dialogue: China and the Legacy of Matteo Ricci.” Follow-up Resources:Find out more about Professor Anthony Clark at his website: https://anthonyeclark.squarespace.com/China's Saints: Catholic Martyrdom During the Qing (1644–1911), by Anthony Clark“China's Religious Awakening after Mao,” by Ian Johnson, article in Church Life Journal“Religion in China, with Ian Johnson,” podcast episode via Church Life TodayChurch Life Today is a partnership between the McGrath Institute for Church Life at the University of Notre Dame and OSV Podcasts from Our Sunday Visitor. Discover more ways to live, learn, and love your Catholic faith at osvpodcasts.com. Sharing stories, starting conversations.

This is our most ambitious and most important podcast series yet”- Peter Laarman, Episode 1.Long ago, European Christians cast Jesus in the image of their imperial rulers, who wanted art portraying a fair-skinned Savior. The world still feels those consequences today.Join Front Row host Peter Laarman and guest Grace Ji-Sun Kim, as she explores the historical and theological implications of Jesus becoming white and God becoming a white male.Follow them on this challenging intellectual journey, which discusses how whiteness becomes centered, even among people who are not white, and the toll that white supremacy takes on everyone, even those who live under the umbrella of “white.” We'll get glimpses at the ways in which the church has the capacity to challenge this modern ideology that allows for misogyny, homophobia, and a violent capitalism, based on violence and extraction.Find Grace Ji-Sun Kim's book here.

This is our most ambitious and most important podcast series yet”- Peter Laarman, Episode 1.Long ago, European Christians cast Jesus in the image of their imperial rulers, who wanted art portraying a fair-skinned Savior. The world still feels those consequences today.Join Front Row host Peter Laarman and guest Grace Ji-Sun Kim, as she explores the historical and theological implications of Jesus becoming white and God becoming a white male.Follow them on this challenging intellectual journey, which discusses how whiteness becomes centered, even among people who are not white, and the toll that white supremacy takes on everyone, even those who live under the umbrella of “white.” We'll get glimpses at the ways in which the church has the capacity to challenge this modern ideology that allows for misogyny, homophobia, and a violent capitalism, based on violence and extraction.Find Grace Ji-Sun Kim's book here.

This is our most ambitious and most important podcast series yet”- Peter Laarman, Episode 1.Long ago, European Christians cast Jesus in the image of their imperial rulers, who wanted art portraying a fair-skinned Savior. The world still feels those consequences today.Join Front Row host Peter Laarman and guest Grace Ji-Sun Kim, as she explores the historical and theological implications of Jesus becoming white and God becoming a white male.Follow them on this challenging intellectual journey, which discusses how whiteness becomes centered, even among people who are not white, and the toll that white supremacy takes on everyone, even those who live under the umbrella of “white.” We'll get glimpses at the ways in which the church has the capacity to challenge this modern ideology that allows for misogyny, homophobia, and a violent capitalism, based on violence and extraction.Find Grace Ji-Sun Kim's book here.

This is our most ambitious and most important podcast series yet”- Peter Laarman, Episode 1.Long ago, European Christians cast Jesus in the image of their imperial rulers, who wanted art portraying a fair-skinned Savior. The world still feels those consequences today.Join Front Row host Peter Laarman and guest Grace Ji-Sun Kim, as she explores the historical and theological implications of Jesus becoming white and God becoming a white male.Follow them on this challenging intellectual journey, which discusses how whiteness becomes centered, even among people who are not white, and the toll that white supremacy takes on everyone, even those who live under the umbrella of “white.” We'll get glimpses at the ways in which the church has the capacity to challenge this modern ideology that allows for misogyny, homophobia, and a violent capitalism, based on violence and extraction.Find Grace Ji-Sun Kim's book here.

“This is our most ambitious and most important podcast series yet” - Peter LaarmanLong ago, European Christians cast Jesus in the image of their imperial rulers, who wanted art portraying a fair-skinned Savior. The world still feels those consequences today.Join Front Row host Peter Laarson and guest Grace Ji-Sun Kim, as she explores the historical and theological implications of Jesus becoming white and God becoming a white male.Follow them on this challenging intellectual journey, which discusses how whiteness becomes centered, even among people who are not white, and the toll that white supremacy takes on everyone, even those who live under the umbrella of “white.” We'll see how the church can challenge this modern ideology, one that allows for misogyny, homophobia, and a form of capitalism based on violence and extraction.Find Grace Ji-Sun Kim's book here.

Full Text of ReadingsWednesday of the First Week in Ordinary Time Lectionary: 307The Saint of the day is Saint Devasahayam PillaiSaint Devasahayam Pillai's Story Neelakandan Pillai was born into an affluent Hindu family in 1712. As a young man he went into the service of the royal household in India's Travancore province. Eventually put in charge of state affairs, Pillai became acquainted with Captain Eustachius De Lannoy, the Dutch naval commander who trained the king of Travancore's forces. Their relationship awakened Pillai's interest in the captain's Christian faith. At his baptism in 1745, Pillai chose the name Lazarus, or Devasahayam in the Malayalam language. His wife and other members of his family were baptized at the same time. Soon after, Pillai's enemies convinced the royal court that he was using his position to force others to convert, leading to his imprisonment. European Christians in Travancore came to Pillai's defense, urging the king to release him. After three years the king complied under condition that Pillai go into exile to a hostile territory. Though beaten and tortured almost daily, Pillai consistently responded with kindness, openly praying for his captors. Shot to death by local soldiers in 1752, Pillai's body was transported to St. Xavier Church in Kottar. Later when his remains were interred beneath the altar, the site became a popular pilgrimage destination. In 2012, Devasahayam Pillai became the first Indian layman not connected to any religious institute to be beatified. Ten years later he was canonized in Rome. His liturgical feast is celebrated on January 14. Reflection At the May 15, 2022, canonization Mass, Pope Francis said that the lives of the saints prove that holiness is not an unreachable goal accomplished by a select few but comes from acknowledging and sharing God's love. Pillai, he said, exemplified the Christian call “to serve the Gospel and our brothers and sisters, to offer our lives without expecting anything in return, or any worldly glory.” Saint of the Day, Copyright Franciscan Media

Jews (Jew does NOT equal Israel) are cursed: -- Jeremiah 42:18 “ . . . and you will become a curse . . . “ -- Jeremiah 44:8. “. . . that you might be cut off and become a curse and a reproach among all the nations of the earth.” -- Jeremiah 44:12. “ . . . and they will become a curse an object of horror, an imprecation and a reproach. -- Isaiah 65:15 “You will leave your name as a curse to My chosen ones, and the Lord God will slay you. But My servants shall be called by another name (Acts 11:26) -- 1 Corinthians 16:22 "Anyone who does not love the Lord [Jesus Christ], he is to be accursed. Maranatha." God's people are Christians (Acts 11:26) Jews are the cursed Children of the Devil. (John 8:44) Jesus Christ make is clear that the Jews (the Synagogue of Satan) will bow down before the European Christians in order to make it clear whom God loves. Rev 3:9 Isaiah 62: God's people is the Chiistian Church for we have already come to Mount Zion and Jerusalem. Hebrews 12:22. Jesus Christ IS the Land. Jesus Christ IS the Nation.  Isaiah 66:8 Preachers and Pastors who support the Jews are at enmity with God and put for their hands to support evil. Fritz Berggren, PhD www.bloodandfaith.com.    6 January 2024 A.D. This guy is brilliant:  https://www.instagram.com/realtaylorransom/reel/DBK0FbAMM0O/

It's our season finale! We're answering listener questions and talking:-        Staying grounded and emotionally healthy post-election-        Some mistakes people are making in their election analysis-        Why the politics of identity will never go away in America-        How the Church can and can't fight anti-Blackness and other forms of injustice-        Where you can hear us in between seasons-        And a lot more!Mentioned in the Episode:-        Disarming Leviathan: Loving Your Christian Nationalist Neighbor by Rev. Caleb Campbell-        Our newsletter from last week with a worship playlist and sermon Jonathan recommended-        The Webinar Intervarsity is doing with Campbell on Tuesday – Register here.-        The article on patriarchy by Frederick Joseph: “For Palestinian Fathers, Sons, and Brothers”-        Our free guide to processing and acting on the injustices you encounterCredits-            Follow KTF Press on Facebook, Instagram, and Threads. Subscribe to get our bonus episodes and other benefits at KTFPress.com.-        Follow host Jonathan Walton on Facebook Instagram, and Threads.-        Follow host Sy Hoekstra on Mastodon.-        Our theme song is “Citizens” by Jon Guerra – listen to the whole song on Spotify.-        Our podcast art is by Robyn Burgess – follow her and see her other work on Instagram.-        Editing by Multitude Productions-        Transcripts by Joyce Ambale and Sy Hoekstra.-        Production by Sy Hoekstra and our incredible subscribersTranscriptIntroduction[An acoustic guitar softly plays six notes in a major scale, the first three ascending and the last three descending, with a keyboard pad playing the tonic in the background. Both fade out as Jonathan Walton says “This is a KTF Press podcast.”]Sy Hoekstra: The beauty of the church is not in how good it is. The church is beautiful in the light of Christ, not in the light of its own good work and goodness. The church is beautiful when it is people collectively trying to put their faith in the grace that governs the universe, and not put their faith in their own ability to bring the kingdom of God into this world.[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “I need to know there is justice/That it will roll in abundance/ And that you're building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]Sy Hoekstra: Welcome to Shake the Dust, seeking Jesus confronting injustice. I'm Sy Hoekstra.Jonathan Walton: And I'm Jonathan Walton. We have a great show for you today. It's our season four finale. We're answering listener questions and continuing our discussion from our Substack live conversation two weeks ago, about where to go from the Trump election as followers of Jesus.Sy Hoekstra: And because this is the finale, let me just take a quick second to tell you where we are going from here. We are gonna be doing our monthly bonus episodes for our paid subscribers, like we usually do when we are not on a season of this show. We are going to be doing them though slightly differently. You will have the opportunity to hear them at one point if you're not a paid subscriber, because we're gonna record them like we did two weeks ago on Substack Live. So if you want to see those when they are being recorded, download the Substack app. If you get on our free emailing list, you'll be notified when we start. You just need to go ahead and get that app, it's both on iOS and Android.And if you wanna make sure that you're getting our emails in your Gmail inbox, because we've heard some people tell us they're going to the promotions folder or whatever Gmail is trying to do to filter out your spam, but actually filtering out the stuff that you wanna see, you just have to either add us to your contacts, or if it's in the promotions folder, just click the “Not promotion” button that you can see when you open your email. Or you can actually just drag and drop emails that show up in your folders to your inbox, and then it'll ask you, “Hey, do you wanna always put emails from the sender in your inbox?” And you can just click, yes. So do one of those things, add us to your contact, drag and drop, click that “Not promotions” button that'll help you see those notifications from us.Jonathan Walton: If you'd like access to the recordings of those bonus episodes, plus access to our monthly subscriber Zoom chats, become a paid subscriber at KTFPress.com. We would so appreciate it and you would be supporting our work that centers personal and informed discussions on faith, politics, and culture to help you seek Jesus and confront injustice. We are two friends resisting the idols of the American church in order to follow Jesus faithfully, and would love for you to join us. So become a paid subscriber at KTFPpress.com.Sy Hoekstra: And we've said this before, but we should probably say it again. If you want a discounted subscription or if money's a barrier to you joining us as a paid subscriber, just email us, info@ktfpress.com. We'll give you a free subscription or a discounted subscription, no questions asked. You will not be the first person to do it if you do. Other people have done it, we've given it to them. We won't make it weird because we want everyone to have access to everything that we're doing. But if you can afford to support us, please as Jonathan said, go to KTFPress.com and become a paid subscriber. Let's jump into it, Jonathan.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, man.Sy Hoekstra: We, a couple weeks ago on our Substack Live, we were talking about processing through grief and like what we have been hearing from people. We've had lots of questions and lots of conversations since then. So we're sort of combining, amalgamating [laughs] lots of subscriber questions into one, or even just questions from friends and family. I just wanna know how you are continuing to process the election and what you're thinking about grief and how we move forward, or how we look back and see what exactly happened.Staying Grounded and Emotionally Healthy Post-ElectionJonathan Walton: Yeah. So I think that one of the things I just have to acknowledge is that I'm tired of talking about it, and not okay talking about it. Like just the level of energy it takes to have regulated, like emotionally regulated healthy conversations is exhausting.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: And so, just naming that. So last week I think I was in a better place than this week recording. And so I'm recognizing I need to be able to take steps back and set boundaries so that I can be in a healthier place. And I just encourage everybody to do that. We all need rhythms and disciplines that keep us grounded. That is not like, oh, when I'm in this season, I need spiritual discipline. No. We actually are supposed to have them all the time. But I think in moments like these and seasons like this, we actually need them just in a more pointed way. It reminds us that we do. So those are things that I'm doubling down on, like starting to listen to worship music.If you check out last week's newsletter, I actually had a worship set from a worship leader in Columbus, Ohio, who basically said, if you can't sit across someone who has a different political perspective than you, then you probably can't worship with them. So let's start off with worship. And so they made a, I don't know, a six hour playlist of songs from different traditions and said like, play it without skipping it. Without skipping a song. Don't be like, “I don't like this song, I don't like this. I don't like…” This reminds me of them. Like, just listen to the whole album because somebody who is different from you meets Jesus through the words of the song. And he said, “You would never know that I don't like some of the songs that we sing [laughter], but I sing them. And I thought that was just a really honest thing.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. You said it was six hours long?Jonathan Walton: It's a lot. I haven't made it through a third of it.Sy Hoekstra: Okay [laughs].Jonathan Walton: It's long. And the sermon is also linked in the newsletter as well. It's just a great message from Pastor Joshua.Sy Hoekstra: This is a pastor in Ohio that you're familiar with?Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: How did you get connected to this?Jonathan Walton: Yeah. So someone on the political discipleship team for InterVarsity, shout out to Connie Anderson, who's written…Sy Hoekstra: Oh, great.Jonathan Walton: …a lot of our stuff. Our InterVarsity stuff.Sy Hoekstra: Yes. Not KTF stuff.Jonathan Walton: Yeah. She just, she said, “Hey, I really appreciated the sermon and I was able to listen to it, and I'm working my way through the songs. And if I skip a song, I'm gonna go back, because I'm not the only person on my Spotify. Shout out to all the Moana and Frozen tracks that get stuck in there.Sy Hoekstra: [laughs].Jonathan Walton: So all that to say, that's like the first big thing, is setting boundaries, trying to have healthier rhythms so that I can be fully present to my family and myself.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Having Difficult Conversations by Meeting People Where They AreJonathan Walton: Also, I think it's really important to remember, particularly when I'm frustrated, I have to remember to meet people where they're at the way that Jesus met me. I have not always known that Christian Nationalism was bad. I didn't always have another term for it that captures the racialized, patriarchal environmental hierarchy of it called White American folk religion. I didn't always know about police brutality and the rural urban divide. I didn't know about those things. And what I desperately needed and unfortunately had, was patient people who were willing to teach me. And so as we're having these conversations, there's a book called Disarming Leviathan, ministering to your Christian Nationalist neighbor. It's really, really good. We're doing an event that you will hear about in our newsletter as well with the author of that booked Caleb Campbell.Sy Hoekstra: And when you say we, in that case again, you mean InterVarsity?Jonathan Walton: Oh, shoot.Sy Hoekstra: It doesn't matter [laughs].Jonathan Walton: I do mean InterVarsity. There's a little bit of overlap here because the season is so fraught.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah [laughs]. Yeah, yeah, yeah.Jonathan Walton: Like [laughs], and so you're gonna hear about that in a newsletter as well. InterVarsity Press is promoting it, InterVarsity's promoting it. Pastors and teachers are promoting it because the reality is, we all need to figure out how to tackle difficult conversations.Sy Hoekstra: Yep.Jonathan Walton: And we use that verb specifically, like it's elusive. We have to go after it [laughs] to be able to…Sy Hoekstra: You have to go wrangle it.Jonathan Walton: Yes, because it's hard. It's really, really hard. We would rather run away. We would rather run away from difficult conversations. So meeting people where they're at, we do that because Jesus meets us where we are. Our compassion, our gentleness is in outpouring of the compassion and gentleness that we've meditated on and experienced for ourselves and are willing to embody with other people. So those would be my biggest things from the last week or last two weeks since we last talked about this stuff. What about you?Healthy Reactions to the Election Are Different for Different PeopleSy Hoekstra: Yeah, that's good. We actually had, speaking of people who have a, like a different rhythm or need to adjust something now to be emotionally healthy, we actually had a subscriber, I won't give any details, but write in who's overseas, who basically said, “I've got too much going on in the country that I live in. I can't deal with American stuff right now. I need to unsubscribe from you.” They're on the free list. And I was like, “Man, I understand [laughs].”Jonathan Walton: Yes, right. I would like to unsubscribe from this [laughter]. No, I'm just joking, just joking.Sy Hoekstra: I appreciate that he wrote in to explain why he was unsubscribing. That doesn't necessarily happen a lot…Jonathan Walton: Right. Right, right.Sy Hoekstra: But it's very understandable and it's really sad, but I totally get it. And I want people to take care of themselves in that way. And I think, I mean, the flip side of that is we had a ton of people in the last week or week and a half sign up for the free list because I think a lot of people are just looking for ways to process, right [laughs]?Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: They are looking for people who are having these conversations, which happens. We got started, this company got started during the 2020 election, putting together the anthology that we put together, and we had a lot of response at that point too, and people who are just like, “Yes, I need to hear more of this processing.” And the difference now is there are fortunately, like a lot of people doing this work from all kinds of different angles all around the country, which is a very good thing, I think. We could be tempted to think of it as competition or whatever, but the church [laughs] has to come at this from as many angles as possible. There need to be as many voices doing the work of trying to figure out how to follow Jesus and seek justice as there are people promoting Christian Nationalism, and we're… those numbers are nowhere close to parody [laughs].Jonathan Walton: No.Sy Hoekstra: Not remotely close.Jonathan Walton: Absolutely. No, they are not [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. Unfortunately, that's a reality of the American church. So, anyways, I appreciate all those thoughts very much, Jonathan.Mistakes People Are Making in Election AnalysisSy Hoekstra: I think when I'm thinking about the conversations that I've had, I have a couple thoughts that come to mind. I think a lot of the things that I think about in the conversations in the last week and a half are people trying to figure out what happened, like looking back and like playing the blame game [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: And the excuses that people are making, or the blame is shifting for why Trump matters now, because you can't say he lost the popular vote anymore. Obviously he won the electoral college the first time, but he lost popular vote, and then he lost the popular vote to Biden plus the electoral college. Now he's won it, and so people are not as able to, to the extent that people were still trying to paint him as an aberration from the norm.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: …that's getting harder. It's getting harder to say, “Oh, this is just a blip on the radar and we'll come back to our normal situation at some point, some undetermined point in the future. But so they're shifting blame to other people. It's like, oh, various non-White groups increased their votes for Trump. Or young people increased their votes for Trump or something.Which Party Wins Tells Us A Lot Less about America Than Who Is an Acceptable Candidate in the First PlaceSy Hoekstra: To me, a lot of that stuff, if you're trying to say that Donald Trump represents a problem with the whole country that you're trying to diagnose how it happened, all those conversations are a little bit silly, because the problem is that he's like a viable candidate who people voted for in the first place. But the people to blame for electing Donald Trump are the people who voted for Donald Trump, which is more than half of the voters in America. Not much more, but more.And the reason it's like a little bit silly to talk about what's different than the prior elections is, the prior elections were like Trump's gonna win this election, the popular vote. Trump's gonna win the popular vote by like two or three percent probably. It could be a little bit different than that, but basically Trump's gonna get slightly more than 50 percent, Kamala Harris is gonna get slightly less than 50 percent. And that's usually how it goes. That is the reality of this, how this country works. We have a winner take all system, and so typically speaking, it's a little over 50 and a little under 50. The swings between who gets elected in any given year, president, we're playing with marginal things. Democratic strategists, Republican strategists are trying to figure out how to fiddle with the margins to get what they want.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: It was only seven states in this country that actually mattered [laughs]. Like 86 percent of the states in this country were decided and then we're just playing with seven states. We're just playing with little numbers. And so all of these, like all Black people went slightly more for Trump. Young people went slightly more for Trump, whatever. It'll go back later. I don't know if you saw this, Jonathan, on Monday this week. So last week, if you're listening to this, John Stewart brought out the map of the 1984 election. Did you see this?Jonathan Walton: Oh yeah. Oh my gosh. It was so interesting [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: It's like it was completely one color.Sy Hoekstra: It's red, yeah.Jonathan Walton: And you're like, “What? Whoa, this looks like a candy cane without the White” [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Right, exactly.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: If you've never seen the Reagan-Mondale electoral map, literally the entire country, except for Minnesota is red. The whole country went for Ronald Reagan. So that's like, it's one of the biggest landslides in history, and the popular vote for Ronald Reagan, I decided to look that up, was less than 59 percent.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: Right?Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: You get the whole country. You have to get 270 electoral votes to win, he got like 520 something.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, yeah.Sy Hoekstra: He crushed Mondale. But eight years later, bill Clinton is in office and we're kind of back to normal. We're back to America's normal, right?Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: It's so small, these little things, and we just have to stay focused on, the problem here is that both of our parties in different ways, to different degrees are just infused with White supremacy and White American folk religion and patriarchy and everything else. And Donald Trump can be a viable candidate in the United States.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: That's the problem [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right, that is the problem.Sy Hoekstra: We have to stop talking about, I don't care what Gen Z did. Gen Z will change just like everybody else has changed. Election to election, things will be different. Anybody who thought that, “Oh, just a new generation of people in the United States of America growing up is gonna fundamentally change the United States of America.” How? Why did you think that [laughter]? Why? Why? Why would the children of the people, who were the children of the people, who were the children of the people who have been in the same country for years and years, generation after generation, why would that just be something fundamentally different? It's the same people, they're just a bit younger. I don't know. I never get those kinds of arguments.Jonathan Walton: [laughs].Facing the Reality of America's BrokennessSy Hoekstra: What I'm saying is, I think underlying a lot of those arguments though, is a desire to have some control over something. To have something that we can say is certain that we're changing, that we can be the good people that we thought Americans fundamentally were again, or something like that. It's about control and trying to wrap your mind around something. I think instead of just facing the reality that we live in a deeply flawed country.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: Which is, should be biblically speaking, unsurprising.Jonathan Walton: [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: But it is also difficult. It's unsurprising and it's difficult to deal with. Facing the reality of the brokenness of the world, not a fun thing to do. We've talked about this before.The People to Blame for the Election are the Mostly White and Male People Who Voted for TrumpJonathan Walton: Well, I think it would be helpful for people to remember, in all the things you're talking about, Trump did not win the popular vote last time, he won it this time. Trump won the electoral college, right? Let's actually just for a moment identify the voting population of the United States of America. So there are 336 million people in the United States per the population tracker today, right?Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: There are 169 million people who voted in the election in 2020. The numbers are not final for 2024.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. It's gonna be less, it'll be less than that though.Jonathan Walton: It's less. So let's say 165 million people voted in the election this time. And that's generous. Right?Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: So that's less than 50 percent of the country that actually voted. Then we take into the account that 70 percent of this country of the voting population is still White. Okay friends?Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. Roughly, I would say. Yeah, that's true.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: People give different estimates of that, but it doesn't get much lower than like 65 [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right. So let's even go with 65 percent.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. Yeah. Right. [laughs].Jonathan Walton: So let's say 65 percent of that voting population is White, and then half of that population is male. And Trump did an exceptional job at mobilizing White slash men in the United States to go and vote. An exceptional job. Looking at that population and saying, “We are gonna make sure that you feel invited, welcomed and empowered.” Joe Rogan's show [laughs], these other influencers, how he advertised. If you look at who was on stage in these different venues when he was campaigning, all men. And the women, I think it's very important to notice this. I think when he gave his acceptance speech, his now chief of staff that they called the Iron Lady or something like that. The Ice Lady, Iron Lady, something like that.Sy Hoekstra: [laughs].Jonathan Walton: That's what they called her. And then she declined the invitation to speak. And so I think that when we are sitting here saying, “Oh man, how could people vote this way?” We are not talking about the entire population of the United States.Sy Hoekstra: Yes.Jonathan Walton: We are talking about a little less than half of the voters in the United States, and then we are talking about 50 percent of that group. We're not talking about people under 18, generation alpha. We're not talking about the vast majority of Gen Z. We're talking about the same voters we've been talking about for the last 30 years [laughs]. The voting population of White adults in the United States. That's who we're talking about. We could blame, oh, this group or that group, but I agree with what you're saying. We have to face the reality that at some point we have to talk about race and we have to talk about gender. When we talk about identity politics, we don't name White and male as an identity.Sy Hoekstra: Right. Yeah.Jonathan Walton: We don't. We call it something else. We say, oh, like the working class or all these other things. But we need to just say, if we look at how White people are voting and we look at how men are voting, then we have the answer to I think, how Trump was elected. But those two things are third rails. Or like in New York City, you don't touch the third rail, it's electric because of the subway.Sy Hoekstra: [laughs].Jonathan Walton: So we don't talk about that. And I think, I don't say that because I wanna blame people, I'm just naming statistics. These are just numbers. The numbers of people who are voting, the demographics they represent, this is the group. So when Sy says, who is responsible for Trump's election, it is the majority of White Americans who vote, and men in this country of all races who lean towards hey, opting into patriarchy in ways that are unhelpful.Sy Hoekstra: It's not of all races [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Well, I will say that the increases of Black men, the increases of Latino men, Trump did grow his share of the Black male vote by double digits. Right?Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, but it's still a minority of the Black male vote.Jonathan Walton: It is. I'm just saying, I do not want to discount the reality that patriarchy is attractive to all races.Sy Hoekstra: Oh, yeah.Jonathan Walton: That's what I wanna name. And so when Fred Joseph, amazing author, talks about the attractiveness of patriarchy, I think that is something that all men need to say no to.Sy Hoekstra: This is an essay that we highlighted in our newsletter like a month or two ago.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: I'll put the link in the show notes.Jonathan Walton: We have to say no to patriarchy.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: And so anyway, that's my rant in response to this [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, no. That's good, and that actually gets into it, the other thing I wanted to talk about was, which even though I think some of these blame game conversations are such like nonsense, we are still able within those nonsense conversations to say a lot of things that are just demonstrably false [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Right.The Politics of Identity Will Never Die in AmericaSy Hoekstra: And what you just said is one of them. Like I've seen some people talking about, “Oh, the democrats lost because they ran on identity politics,” or, “Identity politics is over.” And I'm like, “What are you talking about [laughter]?” Donald Trump is all identity politics.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: It was all about White men and how they were gonna be comfortable and empowered how Christians are gonna be in powered again.Jonathan Walton: How women are gonna be taken care of, whether they like it or not.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah right. Men are gonna be back in power. How citizens are gonna have what they deserve, and then we're gonna stop giving it to the illegal immigrants, right?Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: Like everything Donald Trump does is about identity. And the bigger thing to say is identity politics in America is not a current or temporary trend. Identity politics is baked into the foundation of the country, and it was not Black people who did it [laughs]. It was the founding fathers who created a system where only White men could be naturalized and only rich White men could vote, and we enshrined racial slavery, all that stuff. Identity politics has been here from day one. It's not like a liberal thing. It was a thing that we baked in on purpose, and it's a thing that came from European culture and it's still fundamental to European culture to this day.Sy Hoekstra: And I, what I think what people mean when they talk about identity politics is, it's another one of the endless string of words that we use since racial slurs became impolite. We can't say the N word anymore. It's another way of saying it's Black people talking about Black people stuff. Right? When people talk about identity politics, they're saying the wrong identity politics, because everybody is talking about identity politics all the time. They're just, like you said, not calling it identity politics. They're talking about “real America” [laughs], right?Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: They're talking about, we know what they mean by real America. They're talking about White men and they're just saying this is the default culture. We're all just assuming this is the default culture, everything else is identity politics. Nonsense.Jonathan Walton: Right, right.Sy Hoekstra: So that's one of the nonsense things that shows up in the conversation as a result of a nonsense thing that we say that we think all the time on some subconscious level that we're not always talking about identity politics, even though we absolutely are. And it's because it's been forced upon us. It's not because somebody's trying to create divisions.Jonathan Walton: Right.The Democrats Are the Party the Non-White Working Class Voted ForSy Hoekstra: A similar thing is, I heard people talking about the Democrats are not the party of the working class anymore. The working class is not voting for the Democrats because, and then, obviously the White working class is voting for Trump, and then start to talk about the gains that Trump made among the non-White working class. Again, the majority of everybody in the non-White working class is not voting for Donald Trump. And assuming that voters have some idea of what's good for them and who better represents them, maybe not who best represents them, but who better represents them, the Democrats are still the party of the non-White work—we're talking about the White working class again, you know what I mean? We're trying to make it about economics and it's actually about race. That's a thing that we're doing all the time, constantly [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Well [laughs], the reality is that economics is about race.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: It's like, if we could just like get some daylight between them, then maybe we could make a separation. And so then it just becomes about keeping that separation in place, because if we bring them back together, the system falls apart. It literally crumbles if you call it out. And something that I'll just name, because I think in all these conversations, even as me and Sy are saying, oh, this Democrat about that Democrat, like this is the Republican or that race, when we call out differences, when we name things, our goal is not to dehumanize anybody, dismiss people's needs or grievances, or minimize the reality and perspectives that people have.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, absolutely.Jonathan Walton: The goal and hope is that we would actually grasp reality, name the idol and follow Jesus.Sy Hoekstra: Right. Yeah, exactly.Jonathan Walton: That is our goal and our hope and our aim, because if we can't say it as is, we will never be able to address and communicate with the most marginalized people. And we'll never be able to communicate a vision that draws people in power towards something even more loving and beautiful, unless we name the thing as it is. And so hopefully that is breaking through to folks who might come across this conversation.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, I agree. I can get very passionate about these facts and stats and whatever. And I'm not trying to say that anyone who doesn't…Jonathan Walton: No [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: …agree with me is somehow a bad person. I'm just, this is, it's important, like you said. It's an important goal that I'm trying to move us toward.Jonathan, we got a great question from a listener that I wanted to talk about. You cool moving on, or do you have more thoughts?Jonathan Walton: No, no. Let's do it.What Can the Church Do about Continuing Anti-Blackness?Sy Hoekstra: Alright. So what can the church, practically speaking, do about ongoing anti-Blackness in the country? And not just correct disinformation or post on social media, what can the church practically speaking do? That was the question. Jonathan, solve anti-Blackness. Go.Support Black Spaces, No Strings AttachedJonathan Walton: There's a reason that enrollment at HBCUs is surging right now.Sy Hoekstra: Ah, okay.Jonathan Walton: And that is because when the world is unsafe or feels unsafe, or the reality that, “Oh, trying to get to the master's table and eat is actually not that great,” we're gonna recede back into our communities. And so I think one thing that the church can do is support Black spaces. So financially support Black spaces, empower Black spaces. I did not say create Black spaces moderated by you, that you will then curate for, andSy Hoekstra: Control.Jonathan Walton: Yes, control would be the right word, for an experience that other people can observe. Like, “Oh, this is what Black people really think.” Like no, just support Black spaces. Black, sacred, safe spaces that help and care for us in this moment. The number of Black women that are being harassed online, like showing up to their jobs, walking down the streets in different cities, is radically disturbing to me.And if we wanna get into the intersectionality of it, like when we talk about like Black, queer people, the numbers that the Trevor Project is recording, it's like the Trevor Project is a alphabet community support organization, particularly to prevent suicide. And so their phone calls are up in the last two weeks. So I think we as a church, as followers of Jesus need to create and then sustain spaces for Black folks to hang out in and feel a part of that we control. Kathy Khang, the author of Raise Your Voice said in a workshop that I was in one time, “Spaces that marginalized communities are in, we feel like renters, we don't feel like owners.” So we can't move the furniture. We're not really responsible for anything, but we're just, we could exist there and do what we need to do.Sy Hoekstra: But it's not a home.Jonathan Walton: It's not a home. And so I would want to encourage churches, small groups, bible studies, community groups, parachurch organizations to create spaces for Black folks by Black folks to be able to thrive in and feel a sense of community in. The other thing that I would say is that the church could educate itself around the complexities of Blackness. And so there's the Black, racially assigned Black Americans in the United States that are the descendants of enslaved people. Then there's Caribbean folks that are the descendants of enslaved Africans and the colonizers there. And then there's Central and South American and Mexican. There's a lot of beauty and complexity in Blackness.And so obviously, Ta-Nehisi Coates's book The Message, talks about that in ways that are exceptionally helpful and complex. So that would be a great book to dive into. And again, create educational, engaging spaces around. This education, quote- unquote, educating yourself, not asking Black folks to spend their time educating you. Doing that work, creating those spaces, supporting those spaces financially, time, resources, et cetera, and creating spaces for Black folks to feel and be safe, I think would be just exceptionally helpful in this season. Yes, share on social media. Yes, send messages to your friends. Yes, do all those things on your own time and on your own dime. But I think these are two things that could be helpful because it's not gonna go away the next four years. It's probably gonna be more intense. And so I think creating and sustaining of those places would be helpful.Sy Hoekstra: At least sustaining, you don't have to create.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, that's true. There are some that are already there. That's true. Find a place, donate, support, host. Hey, provide the space. Buy food, yeah.Sy Hoekstra: And the reason I say that is you could end up with people who just go to Black people and are like, “Hey, we'll give you money and you get to do a bunch of work to create a space or,” you know what I mean? And there's also the instinct to say, if we're gonna support something, we have to create it.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: We don't. We can support things that other people are already doing. There might be people in your congregation who are already doing that as their job. Just give them money. You know what I mean?Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: The more you're not in charge, the fewer strings are attached. Jonathan already talked about that. Even if those strings are implicit or not even there, but they're just perceived to be there, and that could be a problem too. So it's good to just give money to stuff that already exists or give support. Give volunteer work, whatever. Good, I appreciate that. Thank you for having practical answers.Jonathan Walton: Yeah. No worries. I'm glad you sent it to me earlier so I could think about it.Educating Ourselves on Fighting Racism Works (Sometimes)Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. Yeah [laughs]. Continuing to educate ourselves is a good thing too. And I think I've actually seen some of the difference in that. I know this is, there is so far to go and there's so much to do in terms of educating ourselves, but I can personally tell you from having watched a lot of Christians go through the Trayvon Martin case and Ferguson and everything. And I'm saying Christians who want to be supportive of Black people, who want to be helpful, who want to be anti-racist, all that stuff. I saw a lot of people who in 2012, ‘13, ‘14 were just like babies. Just starting out, didn't know what to say. Didn't know whether they could go protest, didn't know why All Lives Matter wasn't appropriate. Like, “Don't all lives matter though?” All that kind of stuff.Jonathan Walton: [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: Even when you're trying to be helpful, you know what I mean?Jonathan Walton: Right, right, right.Sy Hoekstra: And then 2020 comes around and I saw a bunch of those exact same people being like, “I'm gonna go march! Black Lives Matter, let's go.” You know what I mean? So people really can learn and they really can change. And the problem is that you just have to keep doing it to every new generation of people that comes up, and it takes years to do. It's not something that you can do in a couple of sermons or one course that you take or whatever. And again, I know they're so far to go, I'm not trying to say… I understand that you can work for years. A White person can work for years, and the differences can be trivial and frustrating and like enraging. But it's also true that people can learn [laughs]. And talking about meeting people where they are, that's kind of what I'm saying to White people as we're trying to educate ourselves and others.Educating Each Other about Race Is a Long, Continuous ProcessJonathan Walton: Yeah, and to build off of something that you said before too, it's like Donald Trump was elected eight years ago, and some people were not alive eight years ago. And some people were 10 years old, eight years ago. So they didn't even…Sy Hoekstra: And now they're voting.Jonathan Walton: And now they're voting. So like Trayvon Martin was killed 12 years ago. They may not have the same knowledge as you, the same awareness as you. So yes, the education and the engagement is ongoing because there's always people that are coming up that had no idea. And I think just going back to what we said in the first part, like you were just saying again, meeting people where they're at because maybe they were too young and they just don't know. Like I was having a conversation this past week and someone said, “Yeah, my mom and dad have been sick. I've made 10 trips to another city the last two years to try and take care of them.” Maybe their world is just small because they've been engaged in loving the people closest to them through illness.We must meet people as best as we possibly can where they're at. And I confess, I have not always done that. And so being able to not be prideful and not be dismissive, and not look down on someone from being ignorant to simply not knowing. And even loving someone who's exceptionally misinformed. As we're doing this recording, one of my friends is meeting with a Christian nationalist right now. Like they're going there. They said, “Alright, can you pray for me, I'm going to have this conversation.” Because it is one conversation at a time that these things change.Sy Hoekstra: I appreciate that. You just reminded me of another story I had, and I won't give details about the individual, but there's someone in my life who is a White person who's from the south, who lives in New York City, who's just one of those people that makes Black people uncomfortable, Jonathan. Just like the moment you meet him, you're like, “something… hmm, I don't know.” And I've heard other Black people talk about him this way. I've heard stuff that's made me uncomfortable. And he was just an easy person to kind of like shun or avoid.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, for sure.Sy Hoekstra: Until I ran into another extremely kind Black person who told me… we ended up not because of me, because of someone else, in a conversation about this guy, and how he sort of makes people uncomfortable. And he was like, yeah, but he just said in not so many words, I kind of tolerate him because he lost his entire family in Hurricane Katrina, and he lives in New York City and basically has nobody and just works this kind of dead-end job and is not a very happy person. Actually, he is kind of a happy person. He's sort of trying to make the best of it, and he doesn't know what he is doing. You know what I mean? It's just like, you have one of those moments with someone where you're like, “Boy, that changes my view of this person.”Jonathan Walton: Right [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: I still don't think any of the things that you're saying to make people uncomfortable are okay, and I'll try and interfere in whatever limited way I can or whatever. But you hear something like that, your heart changes a little bit. You know what I mean?Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: Your attitude changes and like, you just, we gotta get to know each other better. We gotta listen better.We Need Endurance and Truly Practical WisdomSy Hoekstra: I think this question about what can the church do about anti-Blackness, for people who are like kind of our age or older, or people who have been through the 2010s and everything that happened up till now. It's just, it's a question of resilience. And whenever you're engaged in anti-Blackness work or any sort of activist work, you're gonna have these questions of resilience of like, what can we do, because this problem is just still going. And then there's another question of the practicality of it when you're asking that question in the church. I'm gonna define the question a little bit or reframe the question a little bit and then give answers.When you ask the question of something like, what can we practically do about a problem in a Christian context, the question is a little bit strange sometimes, and I think you just gave some good practical answers, but we have both noticed, we talked about this recently. In the Christian world, the word “Practical” often means something different than it does to the rest of the world [laughs].Jonathan Walton: That's true. That's true. Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: The phrase practical application just seems to have a different meaning to pastors than it does to everybody else [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Yeah, yeah.Sy Hoekstra: And what it tends to mean to professional Christians is, when you're talking about practical application, you're talking about a new way of thinking or a new goal for how you should feel about something.Jonathan Walton: [laughs] Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.Sy Hoekstra: Or like a new “heart posture” or something like that.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: It's a new attitude, but it's not practical. You actually said recently, you came out of a sermon going, “Okay, I kind of know how to think, I don't know what to do with my body. Now, after listening to this sermon.” You know what I mean?Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Right, right [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: I know what to do with my heart and my head. I don't know what to do with my hands and my feet. And we're supposed to be the hands and feet of Jesus, not the heart and the brain.Jonathan Walton: Right [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: And I think, actually, I don't wanna sound like a conspiracy theorist here, but I think that problem, it at least promotes racism [laughter]. It promotes institutions remaining as they are. You know what I mean? It promotes, like when we talk about practicality and we're just talking about how we kind of think about things, like the world of ideas and emotions and not what we do politically or whatever, that is a subtle way to reinforce status quo institutions.Jonathan Walton: Yes, absolutely. Absolutely, it is.Sy Hoekstra: And it's not anything to do with the person who asked the question. I'm just acknowledging the reality of how that question lands to Christian ears.Jonathan Walton: Yes. Yes. Especially institutionalized Christians. Yes, absolutely.The Church Isn't Necessarily the Best Place to Go to Fight RacismSy Hoekstra: And another thing is, I will say, we're talking about the church, the whole wide capital C church. The Black church, is gonna keep doing what it's always done. Black church is gonna do anti-racist work. Obviously, there are problems and questions and whatever that Black people have in their conversations among themselves within the Black church about how to do that best, or what things may be getting in the way of that or whatever. But if you're talking about big picture here, Black church is always fighting racism. I think we're kind of asking questions about the rest of the church. The White church in particular, and then some other churches as well. If we're just talking about the American church in general and what it can do to fight anti-Blackness, if you look at the history of just big picture American church, there are Christians in the United States on both sides of this past election.There are Christians in the United States in history on both sides of the Civil War. There are Christians in the United States on both sides of segregation versus civil rights. There are Christians in the abolition movement, there are obviously Christians in the pro-slavery movement. Christians set up the system of racism and slavery. European Christians did.Jonathan Walton: Right.Sy Hoekstra: The American church, if you just look at history, is a weird place, is a weird institution to look to, to end anti-Blackness. We have been consistently ambivalent about it for centuries. Do you know what I mean? I understand…Jonathan Walton: No, listen. It's true, and that's sad.Sy Hoekstra: Yes, yes.Jonathan Walton: That reality is depressing, right.Good Things Come from God, Not the ChurchSy Hoekstra: Horribly depressing. And so I understand, one, you just don't want that to be real. So you say, “Hey, what can we do?” Or, you want, and when I say you, again, I don't mean the question asker because I haven't had a conversation or back-and-forth. I'm just saying this is what people could be asking when they ask this question. It could also be the instinct of a lot of White evangelicals, which I can tell you this question asker is not, have the instinct when we say, what can the church do, of kind of thinking that if there's anything good is going to happen in the world, it has to come from the church, and that is so wrong. It is not biblically accurate. You can't look at scripture and go, “Yeah, everything good has to come from the church.” Goodness comes from God. God is the source of goodness, and God sends the rain on the righteous and the unrighteous, and we are very much among the unrighteous. God is the source of goodness, and so we need to acknowledge that we can find goodness outside of the church.Jonathan Walton: Yeah, that's a point worth repeating.Sy Hoekstra: Right [laughs]. We can find goodness outside of the church. I will repeat it [laughter]. We can in our congregations have fights that can go on for years and years about how we can just try and move anyone toward anti-Blackness work, and you can work for forever and you can see no fruit. And you could have spent all that time taking the few Christians, because there's always a handful, even in a [laughs], in any church, there's a few people who are sympathetic to whatever you're trying to do.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: You can just take them and you are the church, you and your Christians, and go do work with somebody else. You can go to your local mutual aid organization. You can go to your local Black Lives Matter chapter. You can go to whoever. You can go find the people who are doing the work and work with them, and that's fine, because it's still good and it therefore still comes from God. And we don't have to subtly participate or subconsciously participate in the idea that everything good has to come from the church, which is ultimately a colonial and colonizing idea. That is what a church that is going into a country trying to colonize it wants you to think, “Everything good comes from us, so you gotta come here [laughs] for the good stuff. And all those people out there, those are the bad people.”Jonathan Walton: [inhales deeply and sighs] Right. No, I mean, yeah, everything you're saying is true. That was my big sigh there [laughter].All Justice Work Requires Real, Local CommunitySy Hoekstra: So I read a thing this week from Camille Hernandez who wrote a really great book called The Hero and the W***e, which is a look through a womanist theological lens at what we can learn from what the Bible says about basically sexual violence. Fascinating book. Anyways, she was talking about her reading of Mariame Kaba, who I've cited before in this show, who is a famous abolitionist organizer, who basically said a lot of people who have a lot of influence, activists who have a lot of influence, can be sort of confused and unmoored at times like this because they have a lot of influence. They have a lot of people that they can call to go do a march or whatever. But what they don't have is a local community. So like what I was just talking about, taking the few people in your church, if you have a few people in your church and going and doing the work somewhere else, that's your small community.You need people who are on the same page as you, who you love, and they love you and you're there to support each other, and they will ground you in times like this, doing that work together. We'll ground you in times like this and it will give you a way to move forward. It will give you a sense of purpose, it will give you accountability. That's also a fraught word if you grew up in the church [laughter]. But it will give you the good kind of accountability to be able to do the work of anti-Blackness or fight any other kind of injustice, frankly. So that's one important thing.KTF's PACE Guide Will Help You Engage Practically with InjusticeSy Hoekstra: I also think if you want a good framework for how to do things practically when you are fighting anti-Blackness or other forms of injustice, go get our PACE guide [laughs]. We have a guide that we produced a few months ago.If you have signed up recently on our newsletter, or if you want to sign up for our free mailing list, you get it in the welcome email. If you were on our list before a few months ago, you have it in one of your old emails. It's basically a guide for when you encounter issues of injustice in the news or in your everyday life or wherever, how to process it and do something about it in a way that is, actually takes into account your limitations and your strengths, and helps you think through those things and help you kind of grow as you run through this cycle of steps and questions and prayers that we have for you to go through as you are thinking through these things. So PACE is the acronym. You can find out what it stands for and how to go through it if you go get that guide, sign up for our free emailing list if you don't have it. And that will give you a good sense of how to think through you personally in your context, how you can fight anti-Blackness.Jonathan Walton: Exactly.Sy Hoekstra: But yeah, on a bigger scale, the reason I'm talking about small things like community and how you personally can work, is I'm not thinking on as grand a scale as what can the church do to end anti-Blackness. Because we're not God, we are not saviors. We are not here to fix everything. God is here to do all those things. So I'm more asking, how do I join in with stuff that's already happening? And again, that's not like a correction to the question asker. It's just where I'm at [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Well no, it's a reorientation.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: I think something that, and I don't know if this is a generational thing, and I think that me being 38 years old, I have been shaped in a certain way to believe and want institutions to answer big questions as opposed to gathering a group of people and having a community instead of an institution. There's still work that God is doing in me around that, in that communities are vehicles for transformation in the kingdom and institutions it seems are vehicles for power in the world. That's something I'm wrestling with myself because I do think that one of the answers to anti-Blackness is beloved community, not as a concept, but like a practical thing. Like we are checking in on each other, we are going out to dinner, we are sharing recipes.Sy Hoekstra: Yes.Jonathan Walton: We are sending memes and funny videos like that. That is actually some aid that can lift our spirits each day amidst an empire that desires to destroy us.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. I think a lot of my journey trying to figure out how to do more justice work and follow Jesus, has been asking those smaller questions about what can I do in my own community? Just because I have, you and I, we have limited influence, and we have a church institution that has supported anti-Blackness in a lot of ways and those are just realities. And they're really sad, and the idea that a lot of the church is kind of useless and sort of opposed to the things of God, a lot of people don't wanna accept that. But I think if you don't accept that, you're gonna be running into these frustrations a lot. Like why is the church not doing this? And then trying to find probably solace in just really small things. Like okay, is my church's theology better than yours, or is my… You know, like in things that are not making a difference in the world [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Right. Right.The Church Has to Trust in Grace, Not Save the WorldSy Hoekstra: So, I don't know, man. Look, the beauty of the church is not in how good it is. The church is beautiful in the light of Christ, not in the light of its own good work in goodness. The church is beautiful because… the church is beautiful when, not because, when [laughs] it is people collectively trying to put their faith in the grace that governs the universe, and not put their faith in their own ability to bring the kingdom of God into this world. And that's such a hard thing to do. We so wanna make an institution that is good, that is fundamentally good and that we're a part of it [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. Well, it's a hard thing to do and accept.Sy Hoekstra: Yes.Jonathan Walton: Because in how we have been cultured downstream of colonization, if there is no effort, then I don't get a gold star, then I'm not included. Like, what do you mean? What do you mean that I'm supposed to play a small part? No, no. I'm supposed to be a star.Sy Hoekstra: I'm supposed to change the world.Jonathan Walton: I'm supposed to change the world, and I'm supposed to build something. I'm supposed to make something. Like we're an entrepreneurial event, we're supposed to do that. And Jesus hung out for 30 years, and then went and got 12 seemingly disqualified people [laughs] to go and do this thing, and then drafted Paul who was woefully unhelpful, the majority of Jesus' journey to then go and take his stuff to the rest of the world. Come on man. This is [laughs]… it's really hard to say yes to that.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: But when you experience it like you were saying, to live in the grace that governs the universe changes your life.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah. People who are free of the need to prove themselves by defeating evil, right [laughs]?Jonathan Walton: Lord have mercy [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: That—look, to me that is a beautiful thing. That is one of the things that animates me, that motivates me. That makes me want to get out there and do more. Which is, I don't know, it's counterintuitive. It's counterintuitive to me, but it also works on me. So [laughs] I'm gonna keep focusing on it.Jonathan Walton: Amen.Season Wrap-Up Thoughts, Outro, and OuttakeSy Hoekstra: Do you have more thought—I think that's a good place to end it, Jonathan. I don't know if you have more thoughts.Jonathan Walton: No, I don't have more thoughts.Sy Hoekstra: Okay, great.Jonathan Walton: I appreciate that you as a White person, or racially assigned White person who's aware of their heritage and trying to engage as best you possibly can across this difference, have so many thoughts. I think that is helpful actually.Sy Hoekstra: Oh, good. Thanks. I appreciate that [laughter].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. And I say that because there's a pastor that I follow, Ben Cremer, he's in Idaho, and experiences that I've had with different leaders, it is exceptionally empowering and feels like a burden is lifted off of my shoulders when people who don't have to carry the burden of Blackness are trying to be thoughtful around how to stop anti-Blackness.Sy Hoekstra: Oh, I mean, ditto ableism man.Jonathan Walton: [laughs].Sy Hoekstra: If this is your first episode, I'm blind and Jonathan does the same thing to me on those grounds. And I think that's a lot of why our thoughts in relationship works. I'm not good at taking compliments, so I'm just throwing it back on you [laughs].Jonathan Walton: Yeah. No worries. It's all good. If you haven't seen it, somebody should google “Christian Affirmation Rap Battle” where they just try to compliment battle each other. It is amazing. [laughter].Sy Hoekstra: I'm absolutely gonna do that because that sounds like brilliant and pointed satire.Jonathan Walton: Yes.Sy Hoekstra: Alright. Thank you all so much for listening. This has been an incredible season, man. I've had a lot of fun. Fun is a relative word [laughter] when we're talking about the things that we're doing. I've had, I don't know, a very motivating and helpful and stimulating time talking to a lot of the people that we talked to four years ago when we started this, who wrote for us.Jonathan Walton: Yeah.Sy Hoekstra: If you haven't listened to those interviews, go back in the season, they're really, really helpful. I feel like they're probably even more helpful in light of how the election turned out. And I don't know, I just appreciate this. I feel like it's been fun. We didn't do it this time, but when we're doing Which Tab Is Still Open and adding, talking about some of our newsletter highlights, I've really appreciated that. I feel like it makes the episode very meaty when we have an interview and some other conversation in there too, and I've just liked what we've put out this season. So thank you, Jonathan for participating in that. Thank you everybody so much for listening.Jonathan Walton: Yep. Yep. And I'm deeply appreciative. I think a brief Which Tab is Still Open that I thought was gonna close was our anthology.Sy Hoekstra: Oh, alright.Jonathan Walton: [laughs] I will say we started this four years ago with the anthology and as we're ending this season, the anthology is probably one of the most relevant things.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah.Jonathan Walton: The leaders that wrote in it, the contributors to it, that work and those essays, I hate and love that they are still relevant.Sy Hoekstra: Yeah, right. Same.Jonathan Walton: …and helpful. If you don't have a copy, you should go get one.Sy Hoekstra: Keepingthefaithbook.com, that's where you can find it.Jonathan Walton: Yep.Sy Hoekstra: Thank you all so much for listening. Remember, get the Substack app to listen to our monthly recordings of the, the live recordings of our bonus episodes. And if you want to get the recordings of those bonus episodes after the fact, or join our monthly subscriber Zoom calls, become a paid subscriber @ktfpress.com. Or get a discounted or free subscription by just writing into us if money is an obstacle. Make sure you add us to your contacts or drag and drop our emails to your inbox if they're in your promotions folder, just so that you can get everything from us that you need. That's how you're gonna get notified if you don't have the app. That's how you'll get notified when our Substack Lives start.Our theme song is Citizens by Jon Guerra. Our podcast Art is by Robin Burgess. Transcripts by Joyce Ambale, and our editing for a lot of this season was done by Multitude Productions. We are so incredibly grateful for them, they have been friendly and fantastic. Thank you, Brandon, our editor.Jonathan Walton: Appreciate you.Sy Hoekstra: I produced this show along with our incredible paid subscribers. Thank you so much. If you are one of those paid subscribers, we will see you next month. Otherwise, we will see you for season five.Jonathan Walton: See y'all.[The song “Citizens” by Jon Guerra fades in. Lyrics: “And that you're building a city/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home/ Where we arrive as immigrants/ And you call us citizens/ And you welcome us as children home.” The song fades out.]Sy Hoekstra: A multi disc Encyclopedia Britannica.Jonathan Walton: Basically.Sy Hoekstra: Do you remember those? Did you have that when you were a kid?Jonathan Walton: I, we definitely bought, my mama definitely bought them. You are absolutely right.Sy Hoekstra: [laughs].Jonathan Walton: She did. That man showed up with that suitcase and he left empty handed. That was his goal, he made it.Sy Hoekstra: Oh no [laughs]. Oh no.Jonathan Walton: And you best believe we read all them books.Sy Hoekstra: [laughs]. This is a public episode. If you'd like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit www.ktfpress.com/subscribe

Kevin interviews Pastor Andre Bay about the state of Christianity in New Zealand. While the U.S. apostatizes, New Zealand is one step ahead. Christians have a responsibility to stand against the world and continue to bring the Gospel, despite the push-back. This program includes: 1. The World View in 5 Minutes with Adam McManus (Abortion Pill Reversal has saved 6,000 babies, Court orders Colorado to pay Christian $1.5 million, European Christians faced 2,444 discriminatory incidents in 2024) 2. Generations with Kevin Swanson

It's Thursday, November 21st, A.D. 2024. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard on 125 radio stations and at www.TheWorldview.com.  I'm Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com) By Jonathan Clark European Christians faced 2,444 discriminatory incidents in 2024 Observatory on Intolerance Against Christians in Europe released a study this month entitled, “Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe Report 2024.” Christians faced 2,444 discriminatory incidents last year across 35 European countries. Those included 232 personal attacks like harassment and physical violence. The number of incidents is up from 1,029 in 2022. France, Germany, and the United Kingdom were hotbeds for discrimination.   The report noted, “A number of restrictions on religious freedom affecting Christians in Europe have been identified, concerning public prayer, religious manifestations, public expression of religious beliefs, religious autonomy, parental rights, and conscientious objection to military service and certain medical procedures.” 2 Timothy 3:12-13 says, “Indeed, all who desire to live a godly life in Christ Jesus will be persecuted, while evil people and impostors will go on from bad to worse, deceiving and being deceived.” Poland decriminalized abortion Poland's parliament voted in favor of decriminalizing abortion on November 8. The left-liberal coalition of Prime Minister Donald Tusk supports the bill. He assumed the office last year. Tusk has already pushed for doctors to allow abortions whenever pregnancy is deemed a danger to woman's health, even mental health.  Hospitals in Poland are already facing fines for not performing abortions in such cases. Court orders Colorado to pay Christian $1.5 million In the United States, the state of Colorado agreed to a $1.5 million settlement in a religious freedom case. Alliance Defending Freedom helped Lorie Smith in the case. She is a Christian graphic artist and owner of 303 Creative. For nearly seven years, the state tried to force her to promote messages through her work that go against her religious beliefs.  Alliance Defending Freedom President Kristen Waggoner said, “The government cannot force Americans to say things they do not believe, and Colorado officials have paid and will continue to pay a high price when they violate this foundational freedom.” Johnson won't let Congressman pretending to be woman in women's restrooms Congressional Republicans are standing against transgenderism. House Speaker Mike Johnson announced a new policy Wednesday, banning men, pretending to be women, from using women's bathrooms. The rule applies to the House section of the Capitol building. Listen to Johnson's comments to reporters. JOHNSON: “A man is a man, and a woman is a woman, and a man cannot become a woman. That's what Scripture teaches. “But I also believe that we treat everybody with dignity. So, we can do and believe all those things at the same time.” The policy comes as Delaware recently elected the first openly transgender member of Congress. The Democrat seat will be held by a man who was born Tim McBride, who served as American University student body president, but now calls himself Sarah McBride. In Mark 10:6, Jesus said, “From the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.'” Texas Board of Education approves lessons on Christianity The Texas State Board of Education voted in favor of Christian curriculum on Tuesday. Board members voted 8-7 in the preliminary decision with an official vote scheduled for Friday. The curriculum in question is called Bluebonnet Learning. It includes lessons on the history of Christianity and sections from the New Testament.  Schools would have the option to adopt the curriculum with a financial incentive if they do. Texas Republican Governor Greg Abbott said the lessons will “allow our students to better understand the connection of history, art, community, literature, and religion on pivotal events.”  Abortion Pill Reversal has saved 6,000 babies And finally, Heartbeat International reports the Abortion Pill Rescue® Network has saved the lives of 6,000 babies as of yesterday. Abortion Pill Reversal allows many mothers to save their pregnancy after starting down the path of a chemical abortion.  After taking the first pill, some women regret their choice and want to reverse it. That's where abortion pill reversal comes in. Using the natural hormone progesterone, medical professionals have been able to save 64-68% of pregnancies through abortion pill reversal. Jor-El Godsey, president of Heartbeat International, said, “Each life is precious and filled with promise and potential that, if not for tireless work of the [Abortion Pill Rescue® Network], might not have had that second chance. What a joy to celebrate this milestone of so many lives saved that they would overflow a concert hall!” Job 29:15-17 says, “I was eyes to the blind and feet to the lame. I was a father to the needy, and I searched out the cause of him whom I did not know. I broke the fangs of the unrighteous and made him drop his prey from his teeth.” Close And that's The Worldview on this Thursday, November 21st, in the year of our Lord 2024. Subscribe by Amazon Music or by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldview.com. Or get the Generations app through Google Play or The App Store. I'm Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldview.com). Seize the day for Jesus Christ.

Kevin interviews Pastor Andre Bay about the state of Christianity in New Zealand. While the U.S. apostatizes, New Zealand is one step ahead. Christians have a responsibility to stand against the world and continue to bring the Gospel, despite the push-back. This program includes:1. The World View in 5 Minutes with Adam McManus (Abortion Pill Reversal has saved 6,000 babies, Court orders Colorado to pay Christian $1.5 million, European Christians faced 2,444 discriminatory incidents in 2024)2. Generations with Kevin Swanson

This is our unabridged interview with Kathryn Gin Lum. When is the last time you heard the word “heathen”? The word was originally used to delineate between European Christians who tended to be in urban centers and pagans in rural areas.  “Heathen exists in the mind of the person doing the labeling, right? It's a label that one people foists onto another.” Our guest today, Kathryn Gin Lum, walks us through the history of the term heathen and how it has utterly shaped the world. We discuss her book Heathen: Religion and Race in American History. The idea behind the term was wielded as a weapon to justify colonization and enslavement, and though the term has fallen out of use, she says the mental map of the world it has created has not. Show Notes Resources mentioned this episode: "Heathen: Religion and Race in American History" by Kathryn Gin Lum "The Origin of Others (The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures)" by Toni Morrison Similar NSE episodes: Willie James Jennings: The Christian Imagination Eugene Cho Karen Korematsu: Fear, Home and the Asian-American Experience  PDF of Lee's Interview Notes Transcript of Abridged Interview  Want more NSE? JOIN NSE+ Today! Our subscriber only community with bonus episodes designed specifically to help you live a good life, ad-free listening, and discounts on live shows Subscribe to episodes: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | YouTubeFollow Us: Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | YouTubeFollow Lee: Instagram | TwitterJoin our Email List: nosmallendeavor.com See Privacy Policy: Privacy Policy Amazon Affiliate Disclosure: Tokens Media, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

When is the last time you heard the word “heathen”? The word was originally used to delineate between European Christians who tended to be in urban centers and pagans in rural areas.  “Heathen exists in the mind of the person doing the labeling, right? It's a label that one people foists onto another.” Our guest today, Kathryn Gin Lum, walks us through the history of the term heathen and how it has utterly shaped the world. We discuss her book Heathen: Religion and Race in American History. The idea behind the term was wielded as a weapon to justify colonization and enslavement, and though the term has fallen out of use, she says the mental map of the world it has created has not. Show Notes Resources mentioned this episode: "Heathen: Religion and Race in American History" by Kathryn Gin Lum "The Origin of Others (The Charles Eliot Norton Lectures)" by Toni Morrison Similar NSE episodes: Willie James Jennings: The Christian Imagination Eugene Cho and Karen Korematsu: Fear, Home and the Asian-American Experience  PDF of Lee's Interview Notes Transcription Link  Want more NSE? JOIN NSE+ Today! Our subscriber only community with bonus episodes designed specifically to help you live a good life, ad-free listening, and discounts on live shows Subscribe to episodes: Apple | Spotify | Amazon | Google | YouTubeFollow Us: Instagram | Twitter | Facebook | YouTubeFollow Lee: Instagram | TwitterJoin our Email List: nosmallendeavor.com See Privacy Policy: Privacy Policy Amazon Affiliate Disclosure: Tokens Media, LLC is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

Today, the city of Jerusalem is seen as so important that people are willing to kill and die to control it. And that struggle goes back centuries. Nearly a thousand years ago, European Christians embarked on what became known as the First Crusade: an unprecedented, massive military campaign to take Jerusalem from Muslims and claim the holy city for themselves. They won a shocking victory – but it didn't last. A Muslim leader named Saladin raised an army to take the city back. What happened next was one of the most consequential battles of the Middle Ages: A battle that would forever change the course of relations between the Islamic and Christian worlds, Europe and The Middle East.In this episode, we travel back to the front lines of that battle to explore a simple question: What is Jerusalem worth?Love Throughline? Please help us out by taking this quick survey! npr.org/throughlinesurveyTo access bonus episodes and listen to Throughline sponsor-free, subscribe to Throughline+ via Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/throughline.Learn more about sponsor message choices: podcastchoices.com/adchoicesNPR Privacy Policy

Ships of the Crusades Joining me for this episode is Dr. Nicholas Morton, Associate Professor with the School of Arts and Humanities at Nottingham Trent University. Dr. Morton has written many books, including The Mongol Storm: Making and Breaking Empires in the Medieval Near East. The Crusades were a series of religious wars initiated by European Christians between the 11th and 13th centuries, aimed at reclaiming the Holy Land from Muslim control. These campaigns involved significant military efforts that spanned several decades, resulting in ongoing conflicts between European powers and Muslim territories in the Middle East. The Crusaders relied heavily on reinforcements, supplies, and communication from Europe, making maritime logistics essential for their campaigns. As many of the Crusades targeted areas like the Levant, which bordered the Mediterranean, control of sea routes became crucial for maintaining the flow of troops, weapons, food, and other supplies. Ships played a vital role in transporting Crusaders, their horses, and their supplies across the Mediterranean. These vessels were typically galleys and large sailing ships equipped for both war and transport. Galleys, in particular, were favored for their speed and maneuverability, often being rowed when winds were unfavorable. Large Byzantine warships were used extensively by both Crusaders and their allies. Merchant ships were also repurposed to carry heavy equipment and reinforcements. Maritime supply lines were vulnerable to enemy attacks, and naval battles were frequent, with Crusaders often needing the protection of fleets from Venetian or Genoese navies, who provided expertise in shipbuilding and navigation. These fleets were essential in maintaining the Crusaders' foothold in the Holy Land. https://shipwrecksandseadogs.com/blog/2024/09/08/ships-of-crusades/ For ad-free listening to Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs and many other fantastic history podcasts, subscribe to Into History, at IntoHistory.com/shipwreckspod. You can support the podcast in multiple ways! Make a one-time donation at buymeacoffee.com/shipwreckspod Subscribe to Into History at IntoHistory.com/shipwreckspod Buy some Merch! Follow on Social Media @shipwreckspod Tell a friend! Shipwrecks and Sea Dogs is written, edited, and produced by Rich Napolitano. Original theme music by Sean Sigfried. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

There is a push for government funding for homeschools in the US right now. In this edition of Generations, Kevin Swanson interviews Brian Ray, regarding the importance of keeping homeschooling private and out of reach of enforced government rules and regulations. This program includes: 1. The World View in 5 Minutes with Adam McManus (Hunter Biden found guilty, What prompted homeschool mom of 8 to give $1,000 to The Worldview, European Christians who take a stand for Biblical morality are despised) 2. Generations with Kevin Swanson

It's Wednesday, June 12th, A.D. 2024. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard at www.TheWorldview.com. I'm Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com) By Jonathan Clark 10 years since 13,000 Christian families fled Mosul, Iraq This month marks 10 years since the Islamic State seized control of the city of Mosul and the Nineveh Plains in northern Iraq. Over 13,000 Christian families fled the area. Iraqi forces finally liberated Mosul from ISIS in 2017. But the conflict left the city in ruins. Since then, about 9,000 families have returned. Archbishop Bashar Warda of Erbil told Christian Today, “Churches are being filled again. … All those sad and terrifying memories are still there, but at least [the Christian families] could start building and showing that the future is in [their] hands.”  Please pray for our brothers and sisters in Christ in Iraq, ranked 16th on the Open Doors' World Watch List of nations where it is most difficult to be a Christian.  Psalm 147:2-3 says, “The LORD builds up Jerusalem; He gathers together the outcasts of Israel. He heals the brokenhearted and binds up their wounds.” Right-wing parties picked up seats in European Union The European Union held elections over the last week for membership in the European Parliament. Centrist parties retained dominance in the parliament. However, right-wing parties picked up seats at the expense of left-wing parties. If the conservative parties united, they would form the second largest bloc in the parliament.  Nile Gardiner, a British conservative commentator, told Fox News the elections were “a massive rejection of open borders, mass migration, the far left, green agenda that is being pushed by many European governments. … This was one of the most significant electoral outcomes in recent European history.” Gardiner also said this. GARDINER: “In continental Europe, I think there are real sweeping ideological political changes that are taking place whereby European electorates have really had enough of ruling left wing elites that have been in power for such a long time. They want to see change. They want to see secure borders. They want to see an end to mass migration.” European Christians who take a stand for Biblical morality are despised Christians in the United Kingdom are facing marginalization for their beliefs. A report by Voice for Justice UK found those who oppose sexually perverted lifestyles are the most likely to face attack.  Fifty-six percent of the Christian respondents reported experiencing hostility for sharing their religious beliefs. That number rose to 61% for those under 35. The report noted, “Often respondents felt that discrimination against other religions was given attention; what was ignored was discrimination against the Christian faith.” In Matthew 10:32, Jesus said, “Whoever confesses Me before men, him I will also confess before My Father who is in Heaven.” U.S. doctors' group: Stop puberty blockers and surgeries for confused kids In the United States, the American College of Pediatricians issued the Doctors Protecting Children Declaration last Thursday.  The declaration calls on U.S. medical organizations to "follow the science and their European professional colleagues and immediately stop the promotion of social affirmation, puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and surgeries for children and adolescents who experience distress over their biological sex.”  Eighteen medical groups and nearly 100 healthcare professionals have signed the statement.  Nvidia worth $3 trillion American tech company Nvidia  surpassed $3 trillion in market capitalization last Wednesday. Nvidia produces most of the semiconductor chips used by Artificial Intelligence technology. The company's stock surged nearly 150% this year. It's now the second most valuable company in the world, outpacing Apple but still behind Microsoft.  Hunter Biden found guilty On Tuesday, a federal jury found Hunter Biden, the son of President Joe Biden, guilty of three felony charges. Prosecutors accused Hunter of lying about his drug use history in order to purchase a revolver in 2018. Dept. of Justice Special Counsel David Weiss  commented on Hunter Biden having been found guilty. WEISS: “Earlier today, Hunter Biden was convicted of two counts of lying on a form submitted to a federal firearms dealer about his addiction, or use of crack cocaine, and possessing a firearm while a user or addict. “There have been two overarching themes emphasized by the prosecution during trial: this defendants illegal choices and the rule of law. “First, while there has been much testimony about the defendant's abuse of drugs and alcohol, ultimately, this case was not just about addiction. This case was about the illegal choices defendant made while in the throes of addiction, his choice to lie on a government form when he bought a gun, and the choice to then possess that gun. It was these choices, and the combination of guns and drugs, that made his conduct dangerous. “Second, no one in this country is above the law. Everyone must be accountable for their actions, even this defendant.” Hunter Biden could face up to 25 years in prison. The incident predates Joe Biden's move to the White House. But CNN notes, “The conviction marks the first time a president's immediate family member has been found guilty of a crime during their father's term in office.”  America's political divide Pew Research released a new survey on Americans' views on cultural issues ahead of the 2024 presidential election.  Voters are deeply divided generally based on whether they support President Joe Biden or former President Donald Trump. Ninety percent of Trump supporters say gender is determined by sex at birth, while only 39% of Biden voters say the same. Eighty-eight percent of Biden voters support legalizing abortion in all or most cases. Only 38% of Trump voters agree. Trump supporters were also more likely than Biden voters to say the Bible should influence U.S. laws.  Arkansas' abortions dropped from 1,600 to 0 For the year 2023, Arkansas reported no abortions in the state. The state's abortion ban went into effect in June 2022, outlawing nearly all abortions. Arkansas reported over 3,000 abortions in 2021 and 1,600 abortions in 2022.  The Arkansas Family Council celebrated the news but also warned against a ballot initiative to make abortion a right in the state's constitution. The group's president, Jerry Cox, said the state's laws are “protecting women, and they are saving unborn children. That is something to celebrate.” What prompted homeschool mom of 8 to give $1,000 to The Worldview Last night, I called Meggan in Register, Georgia who recently donated $1,000 toward The Worldview's annual fundraiser. A homeschool mother of eight between the ages of 2 and 16, she told me what she likes about the newscast. MEGGAN: “It just helps us, as believers, to see modern day events from the Biblical perspective and not to get so anxious about the things that we see in the news, but to always be mindful that everything is in God's hands.” She especially liked our occasional inclusion of uplifting and positive stories. MEGGAN: “You don't always just have the doom and gloom. There's always something positive in there. Some child did some personal business that was super successful and the community supporting them. So, I love how it's not just negative news, but positive news.” I asked Meggan what prompted her to sacrificially give a $1,000 gift. MEGGAN: “My mother passed away last year and she left me an inheritance in an IRA. I like to give a tithe from there. And so, I like to support these different ministries that I've enjoyed the fruits of all of your labor, behind the scenes, to produce these things that I haven't been able to give near as much before that now, thanks to my mother, I'm able to, kind of, spread the wealth.” She challenged other Worldview listeners to make a donation no matter how small. MEGGAN: “Well, there's no time like the present to give because tomorrow is not promised. Oftentimes, it's very easy to procrastinate and let the day to day things bog us down, and we forget about things that we want to do sometimes. “Twenty-five dollars, $10, $5 are still very important contributions. A little bit can go a long way. I know that y'all are very good stewards financially. It is a very difficult economy. So, even the $5 or $10 or $25 can still be put to good use for the Kingdom.” 5 Worldview listeners gave $650 Toward our $57,100 mid-point goal this Friday, June 14th, five Worldview listeners made a donation yesterday online. Our thanks to Lisa in Grand Rapids, Michigan and Bonnie in Happy Valley, Oregon – both of whom gave $25. And we appreciate the generosity of Jessica in Manhattan, Illinois who gave $100, Donald in Spring Branch, Texas who gave $200, and Tonnie in Castle Rock, Colorado who pledged $25 per month for 12 months for a gift of $300. Those 5 donors gave $650.  Ready for our new grand total? Drum roll please. (sound effect of drum roll) $20,578 (audience cheering) We need to raise $36,522 in just three days to hit our mid-point goal by Friday, June 14th.  I wonder if you might choose to be one of 40 Worldview listeners to make a donation.  Whether it's $5, $50, $500, or $5,000, if this unique Christian newscast has blessed you, like it has Meggan, the homeschool mother of eight children in Register, Georgia, please prayerfully make a donation online today. Go to TheWorldview.com, click on “Give,” select the dollar amount you'd like to donate, and click on the recurring monthly tab if that's your wish. Become one of 40 listeners out of the thousands online and 125 radio stations to step up to the plate right now.  Help us shine the light of God's Truth in the world of news. Close And that's The Worldview on this Wednesday, June 12th, in the year of our Lord 2024. Subscribe by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldview.com. Or get the Generations app through Google Play or The App Store. I'm Adam McManus (Adam@TheWorldview.com). Seize the day for Jesus Christ.

There is a push for government funding for homeschools in the US right now. In this edition of Generations, Kevin Swanson interviews Brian Ray, regarding the importance of keeping homeschooling private and out of reach of enforced government rules and regulations.--This program includes---1. The World View in 5 Minutes with Adam McManus -Hunter Biden found guilty, What prompted homeschool mom of 8 to give -1,000 to The Worldview, European Christians who take a stand for Biblical morality are despised---2. Generations with Kevin Swanson

In this episode, Dr. Alan Strange explores the complex relationship between Christianity and Islam, examining whether the Islamic faith served as a "check" on defective Christian practice in the medieval era. He then dives into the Crusades - the series of religious wars waged by European Christians against Muslims in the medieval period, providing an overview of the reasons, motivations, and tremendous bloodshed that occurred. He then relates church/state entanglements of that era to the same tensions that still exist today, discussing how faith and politics can function properly.

In this episode, Dr. Alan Strange explores the complex relationship between Christianity and Islam, examining whether the Islamic faith served as a -check- on defective Christian practice in the medieval era. He then dives into the Crusades - the series of religious wars waged by European Christians against Muslims in the medieval period, providing an overview of the reasons, motivations, and tremendous bloodshed that occurred. He then relates church-state entanglements of that era to the same tensions that still exist today, discussing how faith and politics can function properly.

In this episode, Dr. Alan Strange explores the complex relationship between Christianity and Islam, examining whether the Islamic faith served as a "check" on defective Christian practice in the medieval era. He then dives into the Crusades - the series of religious wars waged by European Christians against Muslims in the medieval period, providing an overview of the reasons, motivations, and tremendous bloodshed that occurred. He then relates church/state entanglements of that era to the same tensions that still exist today, discussing how faith and politics can function properly.

In this episode, Dr. Alan Strange explores the complex relationship between Christianity and Islam, examining whether the Islamic faith served as a -check- on defective Christian practice in the medieval era. He then dives into the Crusades - the series of religious wars waged by European Christians against Muslims in the medieval period, providing an overview of the reasons, motivations, and tremendous bloodshed that occurred. He then relates church-state entanglements of that era to the same tensions that still exist today, discussing how faith and politics can function properly.

The Threat of Christian Nationalism in All 50 States, Illustrated in Eight ChartsPRRI , By ROBERT P. JONES, on February 28, 2024https://www.whitetoolong.net/p/the-threat-of-christian-nationalism?utm_source=share&utm_medium=android&r=oa4eg&triedRedirect=true The conversation delves into the findings of a PRRI survey on the prevalence of Christian nationalism in the United States. It reveals that approximately three in 10 Americans can be classified as Christian nationalism adherents or sympathizers, with notable influence within the MAGA movement and the Republican Party. Participants express concern over the implications of Christian nationalism, which perpetuates the idea of America as a promised land for European Christians, potentially undermining democracy and fostering political polarization.The dialogue explores the complex dynamics behind Christian nationalism, including its roots in Protestantism and its appeal to certain demographics. There's a recognition of the diverse perspectives within Christian communities and the role of emotion and fear in driving support for such ideologies. Concerns are raised about the potential erosion of democratic principles and the need to address the influence of Christian nationalism in shaping public policy.The participants also emphasize the importance of critical thinking, education, and vigilance in countering the spread of harmful ideologies. They condemn Christian nationalism as unpatriotic and treasonous, urging a commitment to upholding the principles of the Constitution and defending against threats to democracy. Overall, the conversation highlights the urgent need to address the rise of Christian nationalism and its potential impact on American society.The Non-Prophets, Episode 23.11.3 featuring Cynthia , Eli, Helen Greene and Jonathan Roudabush

In the 3rd hour of the Marc Cox Morning Show: Michael Moore is back and blames the white European Christians for the war on Palestine Todd Piro, host of FOX and Friend, joins Marc & Kim to talk about Super Tuesday, the Supreme Courts 9-0 decision, and the Southern Border and how it's affecting the races in Texas. 2A Tuesday with Mark Walters, host of Armed American Radio. Marc & Mark talks about what happened to Laken Riley. They also get into the arguments in court on the bump stock situation and Mark gives his thought on how that case may go. Take part in our Republican Rockstar Bracket Challenge Coming Up: Chad Pergram and Gregg Jarrett

In the latest episode of our podcast, our speaker Fritz Berggren unfolds a compelling narrative about what he outlines as an unaddressed crisis - a genocide against white Christian races. Through a vivid exploration of historical events, Berggren suggests a systematic plot to wipe out white Christians from their homeland, which he believes started with the Muslim and African invasions in Southern Europe around 700 AD. He delves into mob politics, demystifying what he identifies as a coterie of powerful bodies manipulating global systems while playing the victim card. Berger criticizes governments for their alleged role in supporting this inequity and labels significant political figures within America and Europe as 'traitors' to their nations. The Bible and history forms the bedrock of Berggren discourse. Drawing upon the Scriptures, he seeks to elucidate his interpretations about the modern Jews - a notion that they are impostors and part of an anti-Christian alliance supportive of an alleged genocidal agenda. By injecting strong emotions amid the charged racial tensions, Berggren administers a rallying cry to the White Christian community for vigilance and action. He dares to cross controversial lines, particularly involving his denunciation of Jewish Christians, whom he challenges to align with his scriptural perspectives. The final tone of the episode is a passionate call to arms. Berggren, foreseeing a state of civil war, insists on defending and repossessing the Christian heritage and values against what he believes is a massive onslaught against European Christians. (PS: The above was 99% written by AI after listening to the podcast.  Very interesting!) Fritz Berggren, PHD www.bloodandfaith.com

Full Text of ReadingsMonday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time Lectionary: 311The Saint of the day is Saint Devasahayam PillaiSaint Devasahayam Pillai's Story Neelakandan Pillai was born into an affluent Hindu family in 1712. As a young man he went into the service of the royal household in India's Travancore province. Eventually put in charge of state affairs, Pillai became acquainted with Captain Eustachius De Lannoy, the Dutch naval commander who trained the king of Travancore's forces. Their relationship awakened Pillai's interest in the captain's Christian faith. At his baptism in 1745, Pillai chose the name Lazarus, or Devasahayam in the Malayalam language. His wife and other members of his family were baptized at the same time. Soon after, Pillai's enemies convinced the royal court that he was using his position to force others to convert, leading to his imprisonment. European Christians in Travancore came to Pillai's defense, urging the king to release him. After three years the king complied under condition that Pillai go into exile to a hostile territory. Though beaten and tortured almost daily, Pillai consistently responded with kindness, openly praying for his captors. Shot to death by local soldiers in 1752, Pillai's body was transported to St. Xavier Church in Kottar. Later when his remains were interred beneath the altar, the site became a popular pilgrimage destination. In 2012, Devasahayam Pillai became the first Indian layman not connected to any religious institute to be beatified. Ten years later he was canonized in Rome. His liturgical feast is celebrated on January 14. Reflection At the May 15, 2022, canonization Mass, Pope Francis said that the lives of the saints prove that holiness is not an unreachable goal accomplished by a select few but comes from acknowledging and sharing God's love. Pillai, he said, exemplified the Christian call “to serve the Gospel and our brothers and sisters, to offer our lives without expecting anything in return, or any worldly glory.” Saint of the Day, Copyright Franciscan Media

Hello Interactors,Part 2 talks about the failures of borders, some recent alarming and revealing data about America's ‘shared identity', and some potential paths toward embracing the shaky state of states.Let's get into it…NEWLY PROMISED LANDSPart 1 left us at the Paris Peace Conference and Western-style cartographic geo-political mandates. Amidst these mandates was an admission by one leader that these arrangements would need subsequent alterations. Take this quote, for example:“There are many complicated questions connected with the present settlements which perhaps can not be successfully worked out to an ultimate issue by the decisions we shall arrive at here. I can easily conceive that many of these settlements will need subsequent reconsideration, that many of the decisions we make shall need subsequent alteration in some degree; for, if I may judge by my own study of some of these questions, they are not susceptible of confident judgments at present.”These are the words of U.S. President Woodrow Wilson in January of 1919 at the Paris Peace Conference. Sadly, ‘subsequent alterations' over the last century have proven a tougher challenge than Wilson may have fully appreciated. Whether his intentions were noble or not, rigidly draw borders on maps are obviously failing to truly encapsulate and represent the diverse and multifaceted spectrum of human communities — especially in a world where the negative effects of climate change know no such borders. Could it be that identities and experiences resist being neatly delineated by Cartesian maps inherently based on political philosophies steeped in Cartesian dualities? Is it conceivable that nations and nation-states should not be confined to a singular, homogeneous identity? Perhaps they are incapable of such definition. It may be these concepts have reached their limits. A suggestion that can compound feelings of uncertainty about what lies ahead in tumultuous times. This discomfort drives many to search for past eras that seemed more safe and certain — a time when there appeared to be a common shared national identity. The Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) seeks such shared identities among those living in the United States in their annual ‘American Values Survey.' It's one of the more respected surveys offering a pulse on American views of religion, culture, and politics. They recently released their 2023 results which can serve as one pulse on national identity. They project, based on their statistically valid sample, that“Three in ten Americans (31%) agree that ‘God intended America to be a new promised land where European Christians could create a society that could be an example to the rest of the world. Just less than half of Republicans (49%) agree with this, compared with 26% of independents and only 18% of Democrats.”PRRI data also reveals,“Those who most trust conservative media (66%) and Fox News (54%) among television news sources are much more likely than those who choose no television source (29%) or mainstream media sources (24%) to agree that God intended America to be a new promised land.” “Two-thirds of Republicans (66%) believe things have changed for the worse since the 1950s, compared with half of independents (50%) and only 30% of Democrats.”The 1950s are often remembered as a time of economic prosperity, cultural growth, and the rise of the middle class in America. This era is seen as the embodiment of the 'American Dream,' with a booming post-World War II economy, expanding consumer culture, and significant advancements in technology and suburban living. The period is characterized by strong family values, community cohesion, and distinct gender roles, often contrasted with the rapid social changes and complexities of modern life. Television, automobiles, and household appliances symbolize this era's progress and American ingenuity, reflecting a sense of unity and optimism about the United States' role in the world.However, this romanticized view of the 1950s overlooks many critical social and political issues of the time, including racial segregation, gender inequality, and the fear and paranoia of McCarthyism. The decade, while remembered for its strong leadership and perceived lack of political division, also faced significant challenges. The popular nostalgia for this era often represents a simplified and selective interpretation, failing to fully recognize the complexities and struggles that defined the 1950s, and inadvertently promoting a cartoonish, oversimplified version of history.This difference in opinion is increasingly leading more Americans to embrace violence as a means of establishing a ‘shared identity.'“Americans who believe that the country has changed for the worse since the 1950s are more than twice as likely as those who say that it has changed for the better to agree that true American patriots may have to resort to violence to save the country (30% vs. 14%).”MAPPING THE AMORPHOUSThe idea “that God intended America to be a new promised land” is what many believe is the ‘shared identity' representing the nation-state of America. It's derivative of visions across centuries of European expansionism and colonialism prior to dominance of the United States of America as a nation and economic juggernaut.Just as feudalism marked the beginning of a new social order and the political-economic apparatus of the nation-state, I wonder if our modern-day lords of geopolitical economic power are similarly controlling the toiling vassals and serfs — especially in regions with particularly low-wage labor. The modern-day dynamics between the economically dominant Western and Northern Hemispheres offer metaphors to feudalism. Much like the concentration of wealth among feudal lords, powerful nations hold a significant portion of global wealth and resources, leading to pronounced economic disparities with less developed areas. This situation mirrors the decentralized power structure of feudal times, where today's global landscape is fragmented, with Western and Northern countries wielding substantial influence, creating varying levels of power and development worldwide.The strong economic and political alliances within these hemispheres, akin to feudal loyalties to local lords, often exacerbate global divisions leading to patterns of regional allegiances and wider communal divides.Furthermore, the influence exerted by these dominant regions over global policies, economic trends, and cultural norms is reminiscent of the control feudal lords had over their territories. They shape international trade, governance, and cultural exchanges in ways that echo the hierarchical and power-centric nature of feudal societies. This power and dominance, under the guise of a ‘shared identity' is then used as leverage in exchange for military and monetary protection for survival.Survival was very much on the minds of those living through the 15th-17th centuries. Generation after generation witnessed catastrophic meteorological events brought on by the Little Ice Age. This had devastating impacts on people around the world and played a significant role in shaping the social, political, and economic structures that followed. Might we be on the verge of a new world order?Survival is also on the minds of those suffering the travesties of wars nation-state border disputes create. Including those living the through the lead up to and aftermath of World War I and World War II. I wonder how those feelings of uncertainty compare to feelings of uncertainty today. Scholar, podcaster, and fellow Substack writer Christopher Hobson recently reflected on quotes from intellectuals struggling to make sense of the aftermath of World War I and II. Here's a quote from the 1922 Austrian writer, Robert Musil, in his book ‘Helpless Europe: A Digressive Journey' that could just as easily be written today.“And so we arrive at the present day. The life that surrounds us is devoid of ordering concepts.”Cartesian maps of nation-states are politically charged, legally binding ordering concepts, but their certainty is imagined. When Woodrow Wilson cautioned the agreements at the Paris Peace Conference are "not susceptible of confident judgments" he was suggesting the matters in question were too intricate, uncertain, or evolving to allow for definitive, confident decisions. Wilson is indicating that, due to the complexity and fluidity of the issues, any judgments or decisions made during the conference might be provisional and subject to change.Let's consider some alternatives traditional mapping of nation-states.* Could psychogeographic maps, reflecting the emotional landscapes of diverse groups, provide a more nuanced understanding of human geography? * Perhaps powerful nations and states should be leading exercises in participatory mapping offering communities themselves more accurate and meaningful representations of their own spaces and identities. * Maybe counter-mapping or decolonial mapping practices that challenge the established narratives and power structures inherent in traditional cartography could offer new perspectives to those so sure of a ‘shared identity'? * Critical Geographic Information Science can reveal underlying patterns of inequality and socio-political dynamics commonly overlooked, shifting conceptions of what could be? * And in a world increasingly influenced by feminist perspectives, how might feminist cartography reshape our understanding of spaces and places, especially in relation to gender dynamics?These questions, rooted in the alternatives to Cartesian cartography, invite us to consider new paradigms in mapping and understanding of human geography. They are emerging as new tools just as anthropography was emerging at the time of the Paris Peace Agreements.We are clearly in need of a new shared understanding that could offer new directions in our politics, economics, and global societies, but we should heed the advice of Woodrow Wilson and be cautious of our confidence.Christopher Hobson encourages mindfulness and carefulness as we attempt to make sense of what comes next. He suggests we “…resist the lure of comfortable frames and easy explanations, and instead to fully reckon with ‘the brittleness of the world' and what potentialities might be present in these conditions.”Perhaps it's best to embrace the shaky state of states and the ambiguity of the unknown as we try to make sense of the state of our world. As Hobson offers,“The post-Cold War era has passed, (hyper)globalization has peaked, the unipolar moment has finished, neoliberalism has perhaps entered its zombie phase.”We live in…“A time defined by what it is no longer, what is ‘not quite here, but yet at hand'.” This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit interplace.io

“Is America a divinely ordained promised land for European Christians, or is America a pluralistic democracy where all stand on equal footing before the law?” Dr. Robert P. Jones, president and founder of PRRI, grapples with this central question in his new book, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future. As Dr. Jones says, “At its heart, this book sets out to expose the deep, hidden roots of America's current identity crisis.” This landmark work examines the genocide and removal of Native Americans and White racial violence against African Americans that occurred in three distinct regions of our country: Tulsa, OK; the Mississippi Delta; and Duluth, MN. Tragically, these accounts are not unique to these areas. Similar atrocities have occurred in virtually all 50 states. And yet, this is a story of hope. The heart of the project is that “Authentic healing flows from, and true repentance is built on, the twin pillars of truth-telling and repair.”   Dr. Robert P. Jones is the president and founder of Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). Dr. Jones is also the author of the forthcoming book, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future as well as the award-winning books White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity and The End of White Christian America. Robby writes regularly on politics, culture, and religion for The Atlantic, TIME, Religion News Service, and other outlets. And you might recognize him from his appearances on CNN, MSNBC and NPR. He also writes weekly at robertpjones on substack, a newsletter for those dedicated to the work of truth-telling, repair, and healing from the legacy of white supremacy in American Christianity. Dr. Jones holds a Ph.D. in religion from Emory University, an M.Div. from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and an undergrad degree in computing science and mathematics from Mississippi College.   Talkin' Politics & Religion Without Killin' Each Other is part of The Democracy Group, a network of podcasts that examines what's broken in our democracy and how we can work together to fix it.   www.democracygroup.org/shows/talkin-politics-religion   www.threads.net/@coreysnathan   www.prri.org   www.amazon.com/Hidden-Roots-White-Supremacy-American/dp/166800951X/   robertpjones.substack.com   And please support our friends at BEST OF THE LEFT - www.bestoftheleft.com

“Is America a divinely ordained promised land for European Christians, or is America a pluralistic democracy where all stand on equal footing before the law?” Dr. Robert P. Jones, president and founder of PRRI, grapples with this central question in his new book, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future. As Dr. Jones says, “At its heart, this book sets out to expose the deep, hidden roots of America's current identity crisis.” This landmark work examines the genocide and removal of Native Americans and White racial violence against African Americans that occurred in three distinct regions of our country: Tulsa, OK; the Mississippi Delta; and Duluth, MN. Tragically, these accounts are not unique to these areas. Similar atrocities have occurred in virtually all 50 states. And yet, this is a story of hope. The heart of the project is that “Authentic healing flows from, and true repentance is built on, the twin pillars of truth-telling and repair.”   Dr. Robert P. Jones is the president and founder of Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI). Dr. Jones is also the author of the forthcoming book, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy and the Path to a Shared American Future as well as the award-winning books White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity and The End of White Christian America. Robby writes regularly on politics, culture, and religion for The Atlantic, TIME, Religion News Service, and other outlets. And you might recognize him from his appearances on CNN, MSNBC and NPR. He also writes weekly at robertpjones on substack, a newsletter for those dedicated to the work of truth-telling, repair, and healing from the legacy of white supremacy in American Christianity. Dr. Jones holds a Ph.D. in religion from Emory University, an M.Div. from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and an undergrad degree in computing science and mathematics from Mississippi College.   Talkin' Politics & Religion Without Killin' Each Other is part of The Democracy Group, a network of podcasts that examines what's broken in our democracy and how we can work together to fix it.   www.democracygroup.org/shows/talkin-politics-religion   www.threads.net/@coreysnathan   www.prri.org   www.amazon.com/Hidden-Roots-White-Supremacy-American/dp/166800951X/   robertpjones.substack.com   And please support our friends at BEST OF THE LEFT - www.bestoftheleft.com

Brad speaks with Dr. Robert P. Jones, President of PRRI and author of the new book The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy: And the Path to a Shared American Future. Beginning with contemporary efforts to reckon with the legacy of white supremacy in America, Jones returns to the fateful year when a little-known church doctrine emerged that shaped the way five centuries of European Christians would understand the “discovered” world and the people who populated it. Along the way, he shows us the connections between Emmett Till and the Spanish conquistador Hernando De Soto in the Mississippi Delta, between the lynching of three Black circus workers in Duluth and the mass execution of thirty-eight Dakota men in Mankato, and between the murder of 300 African Americans during the burning of Black Wall Street in Tulsa and the Trail of Tears. Buy the book here in order to support the show: https://bookshop.org/lists/swaj-recommends-september-2023 To Donate: venmo - @straightwhitejc Paypal: https://www.paypal.com/paypalme/BradleyOnishi Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/straightwhiteamericanjesus Linktree: https://linktr.ee/StraightWhiteJC Order Brad's new book: https://www.amazon.com/Preparing-War-Extremist-Christian-Nationalism/dp/1506482163 For access to the full Orange Wave series, click here: https://irreverent.supportingcast.fm/products/the-orange-wave-a-history-of-the-religious-right-since-1960 Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://swaj.supportingcast.fm

Stand Up is a daily podcast. I book,host,edit, post and promote new episodes with brilliant guests every day. Please subscribe now for as little as 5$ and gain access to a community of over 700 awesome, curious, kind, funny, brilliant, generous souls Check out StandUpwithPete.com to learn more On today's show I quickly recapped the first GOP debate without the guy likely to be the nominee and our watch party that we had so much fun at - then I got to my guest Robbie Jones to talk about his amazing and very important new book  The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy: and the Path to a Shared American Future  Taking the story of white supremacy in America back to 1493, and examining contemporary communities in Mississippi, Minnesota, and Oklahoma for models of racial repair, The Hidden Roots of White Supremacy helps chart a new course toward a genuinely pluralistic democracy. Beginning with contemporary efforts to reckon with the legacy of white supremacy in America, Jones returns to the fateful year when a little-known church doctrine emerged that shaped the way five centuries of European Christians would understand the “discovered” world and the people who populated it. Along the way, he shows us the connections between Emmett Till and the Spanish conquistador Hernando De Soto in the Mississippi Delta, between the lynching of three Black circus workers in Duluth and the mass execution of thirty-eight Dakota men in Mankato, and between the murder of 300 African Americans during the burning of Black Wall Street in Tulsa and the Trail of Tears. From this vantage point, Jones shows how the enslavement of Africans was not America's original sin but, rather, the continuation of acts of genocide and dispossession flowing from the first European contact with Native Americans. These deeds were justified by people who embraced the 15th century Doctrine of Discovery: the belief that God had designated all territory not inhabited or controlled by Christians as their new promised land. This reframing of American origins explains how the founders of the United States could build the philosophical framework for a democratic society on a foundation of mass racial violence—and why this paradox survives today in the form of white Christian nationalism. Through stories of people navigating these contradictions in three communities, Jones illuminates the possibility of a new American future in which we finally fulfill the promise of a pluralistic democracy. Robert P. Jones  is the CEO and Founder of PRRI and a leading scholar and commentator on religion, culture, and politics. Robert P. Jones is the CEO and founder of Public Religion Research Institute (PRRI) and the author of White Too Long: The Legacy of White Supremacy in American Christianity, which won a 2021 American Book Award. Jones writes regularly on politics, culture, and religion for The Atlantic online, NBC Think, and other outlets. He is frequently featured in major national media, such as CNN, MSNBC, NPR, The New York Times, The Washington Post, and others. He is also the author of The End of White Christian America, which won the 2019 Grawemeyer Award in Religion. Jones writes weekly at https://robertpjones.substack.com, a newsletter for those dedicated to the work of truth-telling, repair, and healing from the legacy of white supremacy in American Christianity. He holds a Ph.D. in religion from Emory University, an M.Div. from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary, and a B.S. in computing science and mathematics from Mississippi College. Jones was selected by Emory University's Graduate Division of Religion as Distinguished Alumnus of the Year in 2013, and by Mississippi College's Mathematics Department as Alumnus of the Year in 2016. Jones serves on the national program committee for the American Academy of Religion and is a past member of the editorial boards for the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, and Politics and Religion, a journal of the American Political Science Association.   Pete on Tik Tok Pete on YouTube Pete on Twitter Pete On Instagram Pete Personal FB page Stand Up with Pete FB page All things Jon Carroll  Follow and Support Pete Coe

In the middle ages, a legend persisted among Europeans that there was a Christian ruler in Asia, or Africa, who would come to join with European Christians to help fight Muslims in the Crusades. The only problem was that this distant Christian ruler didn't exist. Yet, while the ruler was a fable, the story was actually based on some facts.  Learn more about the legendary Prester John and how Europeans pinned their hopes on him on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Sponsors Noom  Noom is not just another diet or fitness app. It's a comprehensive lifestyle program designed to empower you to make lasting changes and achieve your health goals. With Noom, you'll embark on a personalized journey that considers your unique needs, preferences, and challenges. Their innovative approach combines cutting-edge technology with the support of a dedicated team of experts, including registered dietitians, nutritionists, and behavior change specialists. Noom's changing how the world thinks about weight loss. Go to noom.com to sign up for your trial today!   Rocket Money  Rocket Money is a personal finance app that finds and cancels your unwanted subscriptions, monitors your spending, and helps you lower your bills—all in one place. It will quickly and easily find your subscriptions for you –and for any you don't want to pay for anymore, just hit “cancel,” and Rocket Money will cancel it for you. It's that easy. Stop throwing your money away. Cancel unwanted subscriptions – and manage your expenses the easy way – by going to RocketMoney.com/daily Subscribe to the podcast!  https://link.chtbl.com/EverythingEverywhere?sid=ShowNotes -------------------------------- Executive Producer: Charles Daniel Associate Producers: Peter Bennett & Thor Thomsen   Become a supporter on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/everythingeverywhere Update your podcast app at newpodcastapps.com Discord Server: https://discord.gg/UkRUJFh Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everythingeverywhere/ Facebook Group: https://www.facebook.com/groups/everythingeverywheredaily Twitter: https://twitter.com/everywheretrip Website: https://everything-everywhere.com/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

April 28: Saint Peter Chanel, Priest and Martyr 1803–1841 Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: Red Patron Saint of Oceania Musumusu axed him to death for no reason at all In Paris, just a few blocks down the Rue du Bac from the shrine of the Miraculous Medal, is a fine, imposing stone building. There are a lot of fine, imposing stone buildings in Paris, so from the outside this one is not exceptional. But once the visitor passes inside the complex of chapel, museum, dormitories, and garden, he understands what a venerable institution he is visiting—The Paris Foreign Mission Society. Approximately 4,500 missionaries went forth from this unique Society, mostly to Southeast Asia, to build the Church and preach the Gospel. From its beginnings in the seventeenth century until today, but most conspicuously in the nineteenth century, hundreds of priests and bishops from the Society were martyred, died violent deaths, or fell victim to tropical diseases. Of these, twenty-three Paris Foreign Missionaries are canonized saints.  Other non-martyr French saints of the same era—Saint John Vianney, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, Saint Catherine Laboure—together with the missionary martyrs, sparkle as the jewels in the crown of the vibrant Church of nineteenth-century France. Today's saint, Peter Chanel, was just one such Frenchman who left the comfort and familiarity of home to become a daring and rugged missionary priest. Peter Chanel grew up in rural France working as a shepherd. While in school, he loved to read about French foreign missionaries and wanted to emulate them. So he decided, “I will become a missionary priest!” After seminary studies, Peter was ordained a diocesan priest and served in parishes. But a few years later, he became one of the founding members of the Society of Mary, the Marists. And as a Marist father, he voyaged on the high seas to at last fulfill his missionary dreams. He sailed to one of the most tiny, remote, and unknown islands in the South Pacific. In 1837 Father Peter Chanel stepped ashore the speck of volcanic rock called Futuna to preach there, for the very first time, the name of Jesus Christ. On unknown Futuna, Father Chanel gave his all, at first drip by drip and then all at once. A lay brother who was with him later said of Father Chanel, “Because of his labors, he was often burned by the heat of the sun and famished with hunger, and he would return home wet with perspiration and completely exhausted. Yet he always remained in good spirits, courageous and energetic…” His apostolic labors generated few converts, but there was some progress nonetheless. Like so many missionaries, Peter had to overcome the counter-witness given by fellow European Christians trading in the area who cared little about their religion. In 1841 when the local Chieftain's son asked to be baptized, the Chieftain sent his son-in-law, Musumusu, to stop the conversion. A fight within the family ensued. Musumusu then went to Father Chanel's home and clubbed the priest with an axe until his blood puddled in the dirt. Father Peter was not yet forty years old when his missionary dream was fulfilled in martyrdom, giving Oceania its patron saint. The island of Futuna, in which our saint had such mixed success, converted completely and totally a few years after Saint Peter's martyrdom. Musumusu himself repented of his crime and was baptized. The island is, even in modern times, almost one hundred percent Catholic. An impressive church is the heart and center of every small town. Saint Peter Chanel's body now rests in a large Basilica in the city of Poi. The beauty and smell of tropical flowers always adorn the church. And on the night of April 27, the vigil of his Feast Day, hundreds of Futunians sleep outside the Basilica waiting for the festivities of their saint's feast day to begin the next morning. The brief life and sudden death of Saint Peter Chanel is powerful proof of how the blood of the martyrs waters the seeds of the Church. One sows, another reaps, and still another enjoys the harvest. Saint Peter Chanel, by your suffering and death, you converted a people. You were fearless in adventuring far from home to preach the Gospel. May your blood, spilled so long ago, continue to infuse all missionaries with courage and perseverance in their labors.

Quiz #163 - We have 10 new questions for you this week including "Which series of medieval wars saw European Christians invading the middle east to take the Holy Land?" and "What is the world's second-highest mountain after Everest?" It's going to be a great one. Send me a message on Twitter if you want a shout out or you have a question you think I should ask. Cheers! Pete

This is The Briefing, a daily analysis of news and events from a Christian worldview.Part I (00:13 - 16:19) Friendly Fire? How Big Business Is Subverting the FamilyChild care crisis: What costly daycare and fewer workers mean for US economy and taxpayers by USA Today (Alia Wong)Part II (16:19 - 19:32) Are the Pizzas Here Yet?: 6-Year-Old Uses Dad's Phone to Order $1000 Worth of Food from GrubhubA 6-year-old ordered $1,000 in takeout. The reason: He was hungry. by Washington Post (Andrea Salcedo)Part III (19:32 - 22:23) Our 6-Year-Old Daughter Wants to Be a Boy When She Plays Pretend. Is This a Cause for Concern? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters from Listeners of The BriefingPart IV (22:23 - 23:52) How Can Christians or Conservatives Argue Consistently for Freedom of Religion While Also Condemning Satanism? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters from Listeners of The BriefingPart V (23:52 - 27:00) Should European Muslims Make a Common Alliance with European Christians to Defend Conservative, Family-Oriented, Sexual Mores? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters from Listeners of The BriefingPart VI (27:00 - 28:25) How Do We Fight CRT Depicted in Children's Entertainment? — Dr. Mohler Responds to Letters from Listeners of The BriefingPart VII (28:25 - 30:44) Since Jesus Was Born as a Man, Does This Mean God's Gender is Male? — Dr. Mohler Responds to a Letter from a 9-Year-Old Listener of The BriefingSign up to receive The Briefing in your inbox every weekday morning.Follow Dr. Mohler:Twitter | Instagram | Facebook | YouTubeFor more information on The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary, go to sbts.edu.For more information on Boyce College, just go to BoyceCollege.com.To write Dr. Mohler or submit a question for The Mailbox, go here.

Full Text of ReadingsSecond Sunday in Ordinary Time Lectionary: 64The Saint of the day is Saint Devasahayam PillaiSaint Devasahayam Pillai's Story Neelakandan Pillai was born into an affluent Hindu family in 1712. As a young man he went into the service of the royal household in India's Travancore province. Eventually put in charge of state affairs, Pillai became acquainted with Captain Eustachius De Lannoy, the Dutch naval commander who trained the king of Travancore's forces. Their relationship awakened Pillai's interest in the captain's Christian faith. At his baptism in 1745, Pillai chose the name Lazarus, or Devasahayam in the Malayalam language. His wife and other members of his family were baptized at the same time. Soon after, Pillai's enemies convinced the royal court that he was using his position to force others to convert, leading to his imprisonment. European Christians in Travancore came to Pillai's defense, urging the king to release him. After three years the king complied under condition that Pillai go into exile to a hostile territory. Though beaten and tortured almost daily, Pillai consistently responded with kindness, openly praying for his captors. Shot to death by local soldiers in 1752, Pillai's body was transported to St. Xavier Church in Kottar. Later when his remains were interred beneath the altar, the site became a popular pilgrimage destination. In 2012, Devasahayam Pillai became the first Indian layman not connected to any religious institute to be beatified. Ten years later he was canonized in Rome. His liturgical feast is celebrated on January 14. Reflection At the May 15, 2022, canonization Mass, Pope Francis said that the lives of the saints prove that holiness is not an unreachable goal accomplished by a select few but comes from acknowledging and sharing God's love. Pillai, he said, exemplified the Christian call “to serve the Gospel and our brothers and sisters, to offer our lives without expecting anything in return, or any worldly glory.” Saint of the Day, Copyright Franciscan Media

Make sure to join us for this awesome broadcast classic where Bob Enyart interviews Jonathan Cahn on the end times, AND for the first 10 minutes of our Bob Enyart End Times seminar. To get the entire seminar, click here! * About this Interview and on this Page: We a'e eagerly looking forward to the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but that should not make us vulnerable to fake news, even Christian fake news, and confused Bible teaching... - Rejecting The Harbinger's Claim of Divine Signs (far below) - Leading End Times Preachers All Dyin' of Old Age (just below) - List of the Erroneous Calculated Dates - Last Days vs. Last Minutes - The Timing of Christ's Return has Changed And related BEL Resources: - Debunking the Blood Moon Claims with a Creationist Astronomer - Bob Schedules Meet with End Times Preacher 9/24/17 (after predicted rapture) - BEL Y2K Survival Kit Cuts Power to House (so our wives don't think that were nuts) - Two Decades After 9/11 End Times Predictions Still Pending - Bob Enyart's End Times Seminar filmed four days after 9/11 to a live and "still here" audience!* 2016 Update: If Christian brother Jonathan Cahn would have paid closer attention to Bob's comments in this interview, and had taken this written show summary to heart, he could have averted the embarrassment of his failed prophecy of economic collapse for 2015. Further, at rsr.org/blood-moons#rsr-vs-the-apocalypse-gurus we make our argument that while the predictions of the End Times gurus are systematically wrong, here at Bob Enyart Live and RSR our biblically-based general and science predictions have an uncanny way of being confirmed!  This is a Special Edition of Real Science Radio. * LIST OF LEADING END TIMES PREACHERS * Leading End Times Preachers All Dyin' of Old Age:  The modern end-times movement really took off way back in the 1970s and 1980s. Did all the big-name end times teachers think that they would still be preaching in their 70s, 80s, and 90s, and as a group dying of old age? No, of course not. We discuss this in a series on BEL beginning on May 14th, 2018 for the 70th anniversary of the modern State of Israel. See specifically the program, How to turn perfectly good Scripture into bad predictions. We love these guys, and Bob personally (and literally) sat at the feet of Chuck Smith and Chuch Missler for scores of Bible studies. But clearly, their dying of old age indicates that they got something very wrong in their interpretation of the headlines and the Scriptures...   - Tim LaHaye (90, 1926 - 2016, Left Behind Series) - Chuck Smith (86, 1927 - 2013, founder, Calvary Chapel) - Chuck Missler (83, 1934-2018, end times teacher) - Harold Camping (92, 1921-2013, founder, Family Radio) - Hal Lindsey (91, b. 1929, Late Great Planet Earth) - Noah Hutchings (92, 1922-2015, six decades on Southwest Radio Church) - Irvin Baxter (75, 1945-2020, Endtime Ministries) as described by B.E. - John Hagee (81, b. 1940; recent error: Blood Moons) - Jack Van Impe (88, 1931-2020; had celebrated his 60-year anniversary with Rexella; began in ministry in 1948 and as a preacher in 1952). See Enyart discuss all this with WND readers.  * 2020 Update: * List of the Erroneous Calculated Dates: Here's an example of the never-ending, and so far, universally incorrect, calculating of end times dates by a Christian author, and then another example by the leader of the Jehovah's Witnesses...   * Remember When -- The Dates & The Headlines: Countless Christians were told that the following dates were significant because they represented end-times markers. Thousands of news headlines were misinterpreted prophetically to arrive at these erroneous dates. Of course the Lord will return one day, and hopefully, soon. But confused teachers used events and dates like these to confuse others. - 1850 for the ascent of the Anti-Christ (calculated by London's protestant scholar Robert Fleming, V.D.M in 1701 by adding to 608 A.D. the "1260 days" of Revelation, converting each day to a year - 1948 the nation of Israel is reconstituted in the Middle East - 1957 European Common Market (ECM) established with six nations - 1973 The ECM added three more nations, prophecy teachers added this up to Daniel's "ten toes" - 1980 In the decade of the 80s, three more nations joined the ECM, still adding up to Daniel's ten toes - 1993 The European Union (EU) was formed with 12 nations - 1995 Ten Nation European Alliance (WEU) formed, claimed to be Daniel's 10-toed prophecy - 2001 Islamic terrorist attack on America, claimed to represent the end times - 2010 Ten Nation European WEU decides to disband claimed as major fulfillment of prophecy - 2011 Ten Nation WEU officially disbands and absorbed into the EU - 2016 The now 28-nation EU begins to unravel with the UK's Brexit and Italy's no-confidence vote- 2020 With the U.K. officially out, the EU is down to 27 nations.* Counting Backwards From 2020: It's been... 1,520 years since A.D. 500, the year when Irenaeus, et al, predicted that Jesus would return 1,220 years since A.D. 800, the year when Sextus Julius Africanus predicted Armageddon 1,020 years since A.D. 1000, the year when Pope Sylvester II, et al, predicted the beginning of the end 176 years since 1844 when the early 7th Day Adventists believed Christ would have returned 170 years since 1850 when Robert Fleming, writing in 1700 A.D., calculated the anti-Christ's reign 142 years since 1878 when Jehovah's Witnesses said would be the last year for the church on earth 116 years since 1914 when the Jehovah's Witnesses said it would be the end 99 years since 1921 when the JW's said millions now living will never die 84 years since 1936, the year when Herbert W. Armstrong predicted the end (updated to 1943, '72, '75) 72 years since 1948 when Israel became a nation again after World War II 63 years since 1957 when the European Common Market was Daniel's ten-nation alliance 39 years since 1981 when Chuck Smith, et al, taught the seven-year tribulation would begin 35 years since 1985, the year Lester Sumrall wrote about in his book, I Predict 1985 38 years since 1982, the year Pat Robertson predicted would be the end of the world  32 years since 1988 a generate after Israel became a nation with 88 reasons for the Rapture in '88 26 years since 1994, the year that Harold Camping predicted would start the great tribulation 23 years since 1997, the year that Bishop James Ussher predicted would be the end of the world20 years since 2000, when the Y2K bug was predicted to herald the end times, and when and Lester Sumrall predicted would be the end, and when Jerry Falwell predicted would see God's judgment. 19 years since 2001 when America was attacked on 9/11 13 years since 2007, the year Pat Robertson wrote in 1990 would be the end 6 years since 2014 when the blood moons were supposed to indicate the end times.* Last Days vs. Last Minutes: Many years ago my call screener put through to me someone who told him that the diseases in the world were evidence of the Last Days. The guy, Jim from Columbus, Ohio asked me, "Bob, where do you stand on the Ebola virus?" I answered, "I'm against it." Looking at the news events listed above, when they occurred popular prophecy teachers claimed they represented end times prophecies. Well, it's been a long time since. The "end times" is a lot longer than any of them would have predicted. As we say at Denver Bible Church to those misinterpreting last-days prophecies, "From now only, will you only tell us about the Last Minutes?" Afterall, the most famous end-times teachers are all dying of old age and these last-days interpretations have been around for more than half a century. * The Bible shows the Timing of Christ's Return has Changed: You can link directly to this section as kgov.com/second-coming-timing or kgov.com/second-coming-timing-has-changed. For most folks, before reading this list we recommend praying, "Lord, if Your Word clearly teaches something that I will tend to reject because it conflicts with some of my biases, please help me to be humble before You and willing to challenge my preexisting beliefs." - God Views the End Times Calendar as Changeable: "I, the LORD, will hasten it in its time" Isa. 60:22 - Believers Can Change the Time of Christ's Return: Peter wrote that believers too should set about, "hastening the coming of the day of God" 2 Pet. 3:12 - Even the Length of the Tribulation will Change: Jesus said that, "those days will be shortened" Mat. 24:22 - Like God Shortening His Punishment of Israel: the Old Testament precedents for God shortening the coming Tribulation, include, "choose... seven years... Or... three months... Or... three days' plague..." And David said... "His mercies are great..." So the Lord heeded the prayers for the land, and the plague was withdrawn from Israel. 2 Sam. 24:12-17, 25 - For God Promised Mercy Regardless of Prophecy If...: "The instant I speak concerning a nation [Israel], to destroy it, if that nation against whom I have spoken turns from its evil, I will repent of the disaster that I thought to bring upon it." Jer. 18:7-8 (see also a dozen more Category 1 verses like that one, including the next, about Nineveh) - Again, Get This Down, God Promises Mercy Regardless of Prophecy If: "...forty days, and Nineveh shall be overthrown! [But then] they turned from their evil way; and God repented from the disaster that He had said He would bring upon them, and He did not do it." Jonah 3:10 - Before You Get Through Israel's Villages: "...I say to you, you will not have gone through the cities of Israel before the Son of Man comes." Mat. 10:23 (yet this did not happen, because as warned, God changed His plan for Israel; Jer. 18:9-10; Rom. 11) - Some of You Won't Die Until: "there are some standing here who shall not taste death till they see the Son of Man coming in His kingdom." Mat. 16:28 (this didn't refer to the Transfiguration which occurred about a day later; see too Mark 9 and Luke 9; yet they all did die, because God changed His plan for Israel, and grafted in the Gentiles; Jer. 18:9-10; Rom. 11) - John Might Not Die Before: "Then this saying went out among the brethren that this disciple would not die. Yet Jesus did not say to him that he would not die, but, 'If I will that he remain till I come, what is that to you?'" John 21:23 - This Generation Won't Pass Until: "Assuredly, I say to you, this generation will by no means pass away till all these things take place." Mat. 24:34  (yet that generation did pass away, because God changed His plan for Israel and instead grafted in the Gentiles; Jer. 18:9-10; Rom. 11) - Before Paul, Believers Sold their Homes: "all who were possessors of lands or houses sold them, and brought the proceeds of the things that were sold, and laid them at the apostles' feet; and they distributed to each as anyone had need." Acts 4:34-35; 5:1-2 (this behavior, appropriate at the time, changed after Paul's Acts 9 conversion when God grafted in the Gentiles) - Christ's Soon Return Permeated His Teachings: "Sell what you have and give alms" Luke 12:33; "And everyone who has left houses... or lands, for My name's sake..." Mat. 19:29. "...do not worry about your life, what you will eat; nor about the body, what you will put on" Luke 12:22. The "ravens... neither sow nor reap" yet "God feeds them" Luke 12:24. "He commanded them to take nothing for the journey except a staff——no bag..." Mark 6:8. "Provide neither gold nor silver nor copper in your moneybelts..." Mat. 10:9. "Sell all that you have and distribute to the poor, and... come, follow Me" Luke 18:22. (yet He did not return soon, as He had warned that He may change His mind). And even that Jesus went about all Galilee preaching "the gospel of the kingdom" Mat. 4:23; 9:35; 24:14; Mark 1:14-15 and Jesus said, "The time is fulfilled, and the kingdom of God is near. Repent and believe in the gospel [of the kingdom]" Mark 1:15; Mat. 3:2; 4:17 - With Homes Sold, They Became Poor: Remember that "all who were possessors of lands or houses sold them... and they distributed to each as anyone had need." Acts 4:34-35; 5:1-2 - It Was the Converts of the Twelve Who Fell into Poverty:  1 Cor. 16:1–4; 2 Cor. 8:1-9:15; Gal. 2:10; Rom. 15:25–31; Acts 11:27–30; 24:17 for communism quickly fails; the sale of pesonal property was to be a short-term tactic to survive the Tribulation and enter the Kingdom; the Postponement led to their poverty. - Paul's Converts Kept Their Homes and Provided Relief: (The "apostle to the Gentiles" was able to raise relief from his converts) 1 Cor. 16:1–4; 2 Cor. 8:1-9:15; Gal. 2:10; Rom. 15:25–31; Acts 11:27–30; 24:17 to support the believers in Judea who fell into poverty; they hadn't immediately become poor after selling their property, but after the delay in Christ's previously-expected soon return  - God Warned He may Not Give Israel their Kingdom as Prophesied: "And the instant I speak concerning a nation and concerning a kingdom, to build and to plant it, if it does evil in My sight so that it does not obey My voice, then I will repent concerning the good with which I said I would benefit it." Jer. 18:9-10 (see also Jer. 18:7-8; for God, unlike a juvenile judge, does not make empty threats) - One Year Probation Followed Three-Year Earthly Ministry: "'Look, for three years I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree [figuratively, Israel] and find none. Cut it down...' But he answered and said, 'Sir, let it alone this year also, until I dig around it and fertilize it. And if it bears fruit, well. But if not, after that you can cut it down.'" Luke 13:7-9 - Daniel's Seventieth Week Suspended: The prophet Daniel's 490-year prophecy (Dan. 9:24-27) of 483 years between the command to rebuild Jerusalem (by Artaxerxes Neh. 2:1-8) until the execution of the Messiah, followed by the next seven years that were to be the Great Tribulation (Mat. 24:15; Mark 13:14); but Israel rejected their resurrected Messiah so as God had warned (Jer. 18:9-10) He changed what He had prophesied for them by postponing both the tribulation and the Kingdom it would usher in. - After the Cross Ten Signs of the Tribulation Were Evident: See chapter 9 of kgov.com/the-plot for details; in the year beginning with Christ's death the signs of the Great Tribulation that occurred included the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, signs and wonders, earthquakes, believers beaten by councils, the laying on of hands to imprison, arrests leading to occasion for testimony, martyrdom, expectation of an abbreviated end times and of the soon appearance of signs in the sun, moon, and stars, irresistible wisdom displayed. - Fulfillment of Prophetic Seven Feasts of Israel Suspended: God ceased the apparent fulfillment of the Feasts of Israel on their very calendar days, for Jesus died on the day the Jews killed the Passover lamb; He was in the tomb during Unleavened Bread; raised on Firstfruits; gave the Holy Spirit on Pentecost; and He "tabernacled" among us (John 1:14, with the Greek saying not "dwelt" but "tabernacled"), likely fulfilling that feast; but the remaining two feasts including Trumpets are yet awaiting fulfillment, as God postponed His prophetic plan for Israel.    - Jesus Hardly Spoke About the End Times Until Just Before the Cross: The apocalyptic Olivet Discourse happened when Jesus said to His disciples, "You know that after two days is the Passover, and the Son of Man will be delivered up to be crucified." Mat. 26:1-2 - God the Son Didn't Know the Timing: and neither did God the Holy Spirit but only the Father, for it is in His purview to decide when Jesus shall return. Just Google: open theism verses, and see Category 15, which includes the following: The Holy Spirit, third person of the Godhead, did not know something that the Father knew, namely, the planned day and hour of the Second Coming Mark 13:32 and of course that lack of knowledge did not negate His divinity for the quantitative attribute of omniscience is not like the absolute qualitative attributes; likewise, no man, no angel, nor even the Son knew, for "of that day and hour no one knows, not even the angels of heaven, but My Father only" of the persons of the Godhead, with even the Second Person not knowing the timing of the Second Coming which was in the purview of the Father alone Mat. 24:36. - Israel's End Times Signs Not Relevant Today: When the Lord temporarily set aside Israel's Kingdom and their covenant of circumcision and grafted in the Body of Christ with its covenant of grace (this is not replacement theology), God's new sign, so to speak, of the end of the Body of Christ's time on earth is the "fullness of the Gentiles", whatever He means by that, be it a billion believers to populate heaven, or the Gospel preached worldwide, or holiness within the Body, etc.; so that, when "the fullness of the Gentiles has come in" then God will graft Israel back in again, "for God is able to graft them in again", and thereby resume the countdown on their end times calendar; Rom. 11:11-32. - To Read More about the Changed Date of the Second Coming: Click to get a copy of Bob Enyart's life's work, The Plot: An Overview of the Bible is the Key to its Details and review the list of 33 Categories of more than 500 scriptures at opentheism.org/verses. * Tonight on Denver's 7News: Bob Enyart said on 7News to Colorado's ABC audience that Christians who say that the death penalty is immoral are unwittingly accusing God the Father of being unjust, for He required a payment of death to pay for the sin of the world. We thank God for the opportunity to promote the principles of the Gospel on the nightly news! Please also see AmericanRTL.org/death-penalty.    Now Back to the Harbinger: * Enyart & Cahn Agree on the Theme of The Harbinger: Bob Enyart interviews Jonathan Cahn, the NY Times bestselling author of The Harbinger. Bob appreciates Cahn's warning to an America defiant of God but Enyart disagrees with Cahn's claim that 9/11 was a specific sign from God. See just below Bob's notes regarding his reasons for disagreeing with Jonathan Cahn's claims of a specific divine message in the events following the Attack on America.   * Rejecting The Harbinger's Claim of Divine Signs: (This is not meant to be harsh, for we love and appreciate Jonathan Cahn, and though airing a daily radio talk show, we don't want to be like David who became battle hardened; yet, this is meant to be direct.) The last nine minutes of audio on today's program were recorded twelve years ago at an End Times seminar conducted in Winona Lake, Indiana only four days after Sept. 11, 2001. Bob Enyart predicted that sincere Christian authors (who love and honor God and preach the Gospel) would find a Bible passage with a few uncanny similarities to 9/11, and so would claim that therefore Al Qaeda's attack on America was a sign from God. Consider Jonathan Cahn's few parallels (which get repeated often) from Isaiah 9:10 to 9/11 events. In the audio from September 2001, Bob Enyart illustrates how easy this is to claim fulfillment of a prophetic pattern when, compared to the Harbinger, he quoted more, and more significant, 9/11 parallels, not from Isaiah but from Revelation 17 and 18. As one small example, the greater parallel between Scripture and 9/11 is not a sycamore and a fir tree, but Washington DC and NYC debating the patent rights of murdered unborn children so that "the merchants of the earth" can buy and sell the "the bodies and souls of men." So Bob intentionally misinterpreted the Scriptures to show how easily (and even innocently) this is done, and while Cahn's parallels get to select from events over a period of years, Bob's many more prophetic parallels were all fulfilled on the very day of September 11th. Harbinger Expert Critic says: "Bob, I read your analysis this morning and it was dead right on every point." - David James, 3/24/13 The Internet hasn't existed for 2,700 years. Jonathan Cahn's nine harbingers are based on a quote in the Bible of men defiant against God, who, after suffering God's judgment, repeated in utter ignorance, "The bricks have fallen down, but we will rebuild with hewn stone; the sycamores are cut down, but we will replace them with cedars" (Isaiah 9:10). If the web had been forever, a Google search would probably return countless pages recording, after attacks, utterances throughout Judeo-Christian history of that quote. About 18 minutes into the program, Jonathan Cahn says about Isaiah 9:10 and the December 7, 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor that back then, "you don't have anyone quoting the Scripture of judgment." Perhaps, perhaps not. In the very center of the Internet's page of Pearl Harbor Quotes we read Isaiah 9:10, not in the NIV or NASB, because those versions were translated later, but in the King James Version. Cahn chose to present his message in a book of fiction. Not unlike the folks who think Star Wars is real, for many readers, Cahn's literary device blurs the distinction between truth and fiction. The requisite suspension of disbelief necessary to enjoy the elements of the story, a wary reporter, a surprised liaison, and an unnamed prophet with curious ancient seals, works to bias the reader who emerges from the novella into the real world lacking the desire to expend the mental energy necessary for an objective consideration of The Harbinger's theological claims. The first harbinger (i.e., a seal in the book's metaphor) is the 9/11 attack. Cahn says at about 6:30 into today's program that a first attack is a sign of God's judgment and that God's protection will be further lifted if the nation does not repent. Bob suggests to Cahn that not unlike 9/11, Pearl Harbor suffered 3,000 casualties, about 2,400 of whom were killed. We live here, today, and so we are inclined to discount far-flung attacks over the last 2,700 years and view the world, unsurprisingly, through our own eyes. Bob mentioned to Jonathan that years ago he had interviewed the beloved Hal Lindsey who, through a similar here-and-now-centered interpretation, suggested that the Second Coming would be in 1988. (This was not unlike superstitious European Christians who would panic when pestilence coincided with Halley's Comet, nor unlike those who thought Jesus would return on the Y2K computer bug, nor unlike those who thought that lightning strikes signified judgment from Zeus, until that is lightning rods ruined the divine aim. Superstition, sadly, is as rampant among Christian authors as it was among the Greeks who worshiped the pantheon.) We interpret our own suffering as though it were of biblical proportion, as Cahn said at about 21:40, that in addition to the harbingers (signs), America has suffered "economic collapse". Well, collapse means different things to different people. Within 48 hours of our prerecorded interview, Dow Jones reached an all time high, and at the very minute today's show began, Reuters reported, "Housing starts point to growing economic momentum." Compare that just to even recent decimation by tsunami, typhoon, earthquake, and to the countries bankrupted, the millions slaughtered, and tens of millions ruined by war, and even to the billions in Asia and Africa who've truly suffered debilitating poverty. That's economic collapse, whereas if God brought economic sanctions against America, it wouldn't look like a downturn, and it wouldn't primarily hurt the poor and middle class. Given the freedom to be arbitrary, fans of Nostradamus (who apparently predicted the second coming, to America in the year 2013, of Twinkies and Ding Dongs) and Jean Dixon point to fulfillment of prophecy. Ironically, Isaiah 9:10 itself is not even a prophecy, so any claimed fulfillment is metaphorical at best. However, The Harbinger itself fulfilled an actual prophecy, uttered in the very week of 9/11, at that End Times seminar, which predicted that such books would be written :). And I'm not even a prophet. Over a million Americans were killed in the civil and world wars. Weren't those lives worth a Bible verse? Around 25 minutes into the program, Bob agrees with The Harbinger, in that "for Israel, being a prophet was a matter of life or death" (p. 9). Enyart then explains that today, God has withdrawn His accountability system for prophets. Jonathan did not anticipate Bob's statement that stoning a false prophet to death is no longer commanded, nor permitted, by God, as the New Testament says, that with "the priesthood being changed [by Christ], of necessity there is also a change of the law" (Hebrews 7:12). So today, while Christians tend to forget and forgive (often without even admitting) the false prophecies of their brethren, unbelievers have long memories and stumble over our false prophecies and prophetic interpretations.     The actual parallel between Israel and America, regarding 732 B.C. and 2001, is only thematic, not divinely particular. When a nation ignores God, she becomes increasingly weak and vulnerable to destruction from within and without. Contrary to The Harbinger's emphasis (p. 19), this is true for Israel and America and for Italy, Germany, and Argentina. Christians disagree terribly over interpretation of the plain words in the Bible. Realize how loose our interpretations will then be of events! What is the meaning of a flood? An earthquake? An attack? It is God! Or perhaps it's the devil! Or was it, in fact, Osama bin Laden? Jesus disapproved of such interpretations of current events in Luke 13:1-5, and when Enyart debated D. James Kennedy's Professor of New Testament from Knox Theological Seminary, this very passage, regarding 2,000-year-old headlines of murder and a fallen tower, was central to the matter. The Harbinger makes the important observation that, "during national judgment, both the righteous and the wicked perish" (p. 30). Then Cahn writes, thankfully, that God was not with Al Qaeda, but he claimed this as part of the prophetic pattern, in that, God was not with Israel's enemies who attacked her. But again this is arbitrary, for there were plenty of times when God Himself orchestrated the attacks on Israel in punishment for her national adultery. Yet it is wrong to extrapolate from those extraordinary biblical interventions that, therefore, God is the one who orchestrates a molester's rape of a child, or the Holocaust. Attributing to God the designs of the wicked comes close to blasphemy, except that it is done in ignorance, although often, through negligent ignorance. Jonathan Cahn says, rightly I assert, that God was not with Al Qaeda, yet because of a degree of superstition, he then interprets defiance against Islamic terrorism as defiance against God. Is Israel defiant today against God? Yes. (Sadly, like America they are a nation of socialists who defend abortion and homosexuality.) Does that mean that Israel's defiance of Hamas is inherently condemnable? Of course not. Cahn takes a Time magazine reporter's perfectly valid quote as a double entendre, with the entire thrust of the book implying that the defiance is against God, even though it is typically explicitly stated, as in this case, that it is against Islamic terrorists. "Rebuilding Ground Zero was going to be America's statement of defiance," (p. 63, from July 1, 2008) "to those who attacked us."Four days after the attack on American on 9/11, in our End Times seminar at Winona Lake (home of a famous Bible center, Billy Sunday, and a prayer launch pad for Billy Graham's first crusade), I didn't have to stretch the details, as Jonathan does somewhat, to make far greater and more substantive parallels between 9/11 and the book of Revelation. The world trade center, her sins had reached to heaven, the nations, peoples, tongues, and languages, Babylon the great, is fallen, the kings of the earth see the smoke of her burning, standing at a distance for fear of her torment, watching the smoke of her ruin, the merchants of the earth have become rich through the abundance of her luxury, her plagues will come in one day, death and mourning, she will be utterly burned with fire, for strong is the Lord God who judges her, alas, that mighty city, for in one hour your judgment has come, their commerce has ceased, no merchandising today of gold and silver, precious stones and pearls, silk and scarlet, every kind of object, of wood, bronze, iron, and marble, incense, wine and oil, flour and wheat, cattle and sheep, pork bellies, and bodies and souls of men. For in the previous week, the targets of God's wrath, New York and Washington D.C. were debating the patent rights of the tiniest innocent babies, the embryos destroyed so that their bodies could be harvested and sold, by the Israelis, to businesses around the world, while American financial interests were angered that they may not be collecting the royalties they were demanding. And on the Hudson and in the New York harbor, all who travel by ship, and as many as trade on the sea, stood at a distance and cried out when they saw the smoke of her burning, saying, "What is like this great city?" Both can't be correct, but either or both, the Harbinger and the Revelation 17-18 prophetic "parallels", could be wrong. As the above paragraph demonstrates, the more powerful and biblically extensive prophetic interpretation of 9/11 is not The Harbinger, but The Revelation. And that one is certainly wrong! For one, I intended it to be wrong. And secondly, if Revelation 18 was being fulfilled before our eyes on September 11, 2001 that would mean that we are now twelve years into Revelation chapter 19, and by now, the Second Coming should have occurred. So if the strong prophetic parallel (Revelation) isn't true, the weak one (Harbinger) probably isn't true either. Allow me to be petty. A sycamore tree and a Norwegian fir (the claimed sixth and seventh signs) do not come close to the extraordinary depth of substance and parallel between 9/11 and Revelation 17 and 18. Besides (and these are insignificant, but mentioned because such trivialities in reverse, are used in The Harbinger to make its point. The World Trade Center wasn't made of bricks. (On the contrary, it is noted for being the first supertall building to be made without masonry.) And yes, (p. 72) New York City and America rebuilt. But so did Berlin. And Rome, one could say. Destroyed cities throughout history rebuilt, with notable exceptions like Nineveh. Isaiah speaks of many sycamores, not one as at the WTC. And as Cahn acknowledges, that tree destroyed on 9/11 had the same name, sycamore, but it was a different kind of tree; in fact, a different species, and a different genus. And a different family, and a different order. If it were much different, it wouldn't be a tree, one could say. (But then again, what couldn't one say?) Isaiah says the Sycamores (plural, not singular) would be cut down (not crushed) and replaced with woods of cedar, not with a single pine tree. (2014 Update: And as the replacement of the tree was a sign of the end times, so was the removal of the tree, after it died, said Cahn.) The Harbinger also embraces the invalid contradiction of freedom yet being forced, justifying this by saying, "It takes two oars to make a boat go straight" (p. 86). Yes, but that boat illustration presents not even a theoretical contradiction, let alone an actual one. And the world isn't going straight, unless we mean straight to hell. Some of the claimed fulfillments of the prophetic pattern are really the same thing, repeated references to the attack itself, and tower falling, and the rebuilding, and the quoting, in hubris, it is true, of Isaiah 9:10 to rebuild, as by one significant government official who was… John Edwards? That disgraced non-official failed vice-presidential candidate. The 8th harbinger, coming with some peculiar justification in that spoken words are invisible, has to do with the Lincoln Memorial in Washington, which is as it should be because D.C. was also a target (although there was no harbinger from Shanksville, Pennsylvania, for that was not an intended target no doubt). A claim repeated about slavery and the civil war is that every drop of shed blood was due to the judgment of God. So then why could the British and much of the world end slavery without a similar judgment? (That could be answered, but would require prophetic interpretations specific to the unique history of each country.) And a biblical hewn stone did not need to be quarried from a mountain, let alone in upstate New York, though that claim adds flavor to the fiction and yet another confirmation of the prophecy! One would think that bureaucracy could not thwart a divine sign. That stone, though, that Jonathan writes so much about, being quarried and celebrated, ended up not as the cornerstone at ground zero but at a suburban office building. For Mayor Bloomberg, et al., changed the One World Trade Center design and diverted one of the harbingers… to Long Island. A few words about Jonathan Cahn. We don't think that we convinced him, nor even gave him pause. Yet, at the same time, we don't think that he loves God any less than we do, nor do we believe that God approves more of us than He does of Cahn. We're just asking God to help us to do our best to rightly divide, and to urge all believers to rightly divide, the Word of Truth. The Ten Commandments judge Roy Moore publicly apologized here on KGOV.com for misinterpreting something as simple as a court ruling. When the U.S. Supreme Court upheld the partial-birth abortion "ban", Judge Moore, currently Alabama's chief justice, praised that ruling as a godly pro-life victory. Traveling to Birmingham, Alabama we challenged him to actually read the opinion, and he did, and so admitted that it was the most brutally wicked ruling in the history of the U.S. Supreme Court (and that's saying something). So there's hope for Jonathan too :) The great upside of Cahn's book is its theme, which is the nation's desperate need to turn to God and the horror of losing His blessing, for as Jonathan quoted a Bible commentary, "The defiance of God shuts out immeasurable good" (p. 76). The Harbinger's downside though, is that many of its Christian readers will become even more superstitious. -Pastor Bob Enyart Denver Bible Church (See also Bob's Writings at KGOV.com/writings, and Bob's End Times seminar, and his super fun verse-by-verse study of the Book of Revelation!)  Today's Resources: Bob Enyart's Last Days Bible Studies! Have it your way! You can enjoy Bob's: * Last Days Bible teaching on the end times (downloadable or on MP3 CD) * End Times seminar in Indiana given the week of 9/11 (downloadable or on MP3 CD) * Verse-by-verse studies on 1 Corinthians and 1 & 2 Thessalonians, both of which address rapture passages, or * Bob's Bible Study on The Book of Revelation, or read the End Times chapter in Bob's life's work, * The Plot. With any of these resources, you'll get the benefit of decades of Bible research!* See Our Bible Study Resources: We invite you to check out our theologythursday.com or our monthly subscriptions.

It's Wednesday, November 16th, A.D. 2022. This is The Worldview in 5 Minutes heard at www.TheWorldview.com. I'm Adam McManus. (Adam@TheWorldview.com) By Jonathan Clark Greek soccer player sentenced to prison for speaking the truth A court in Athens, Greece recently sentenced one of the country's greatest soccer players to 10 months in prison for allegedly posting “transphobic” comments. Forty-nine-year-old former soccer star Vasilis Tsiartas also receive a fine of over $5,000.  In 2017, he posted on Facebook, “God created Adam and Eve” in response to a law that would allow people to change their sex listed on official documents. The soccer player plans to appeal the sentence and the fine. Jesus asked in Matthew 19:4, “Have you not read that He who made them at the beginning ‘made them male and female.'?” European Christians targeted with 500 hate crimes Meanwhile, across Europe, Christians experienced over 500 hate crimes last year. The Observatory on Intolerance and Discrimination Against Christians in Europe released their 2021 report last week. France saw the most anti-Christian hate crimes followed by Germany, Italy, Poland, the U.K., Spain, Austria, Belgium, Ireland, and Switzerland. The most common attack directed at Christians and churches was vandalism.  The report said, “Religious freedom is gravely threatened in Europe, especially that of Christians. And the greatest threat arises out of relativism.” The shifting global population The United Nations estimates there are now eight billion people in the world. However, the global population is growing at its slowest rate since 1950. India is expected to overtake China as the most populous country next year. And Nigeria is expected to overtake the U.S. as the third most populous country at the same time. Countries in Africa and parts of Asia are projected to contribute to most of the world's population growth in the coming decades. COVID pandemic reduced influence of the church A new report from the U.K. found many families have become less engaged with the church since the COVID-19 pandemic. Forty-percent of families reported they were less engaged with the church, 44% said their engagement had not changed, and 16% said they were more engaged. Among church leaders, 48% said families in their congregations are less involved in the church.  The report stated, “For many Christian families the pandemic has brought a change in family priorities, with many explaining that whilst they were keen to continually strengthen faith at home, church attendance itself was not as high a priority for them as it has been pre-pandemic.” Psalm 63:1-2 says, “O God, You are my God; early will I seek You; my soul thirsts for You; my flesh longs for You in a dry and thirsty land where there is no water. So I have looked for You in the sanctuary, to see Your power and Your glory.” Republicans poised to take U.S. House of Reps. Republicans are poised to take control of the U.S. House of Representatives. After five races were called for the GOP on Monday, Republicans now have 217 seats in the House. They just need one more victory in the remaining 13 House races yet to be called. In Oregon, Republicans flipped a long-held Democrat House seat with the election of pro-life Republican Lori Chavez-DeRemer, the first Latina congresswoman from Oregon. Associated Press declares Katie Hobbs Arizona new Governor The Associated Press called the Arizona governor race in favor of Democrat Katie Hobbs.  With 2% of the vote left to count, the race is still tight, and an automatic recount could be triggered. As of yesterday, Hobbs led her Republican opponent Kari Lake by 0.8%. A recount is automatically triggered if a candidate wins by a margin of less than 0.5%. If elected, Hobbs would be the state's first Democrat governor since 2006. Judge overturns Biden's transgender policy Last Friday, a federal judge overturned the Biden administration's transgender policy. At issue was the Department of Health and Human Services' interpretation of Obamacare to prohibit health care providers from discriminating against people on the basis of so-called sexual orientation and gender identity. Two doctors from Texas challenged the interpretation and were represented by the conservative America First Legal Foundation. In 2022, 88 abortion mills closed or stopped killing babies And finally, Operation Rescue reports there are 683 abortions mills in 36 states and the District of Columbia. The is the lowest number of abortion mills in the U.S. in nearly 50 years. Fourteen states now have no abortionists operating in them following the Supreme Court's decision to overturn Roe v. Wade. This year, 88 abortion mills closed or stopped all abortions.  Close And that's The Worldview in 5 Minutes on this Wednesday, November 16th, in the year of our Lord 2022. Subscribe by iTunes or email to our unique Christian newscast at www.TheWorldView.com. Or get the Generations app through Google Play or The App Store. I'm Adam McManus (adam@TheWorldView.com). And, here to close the newscast today is my daughter, Mercy, who just turned 11 on Monday, Seize the day for Jesus Christ.

No, I am not suddenly endorsing the Rapture hypothesis but I am going to talk about how it is incompatible with any idea of white American (like me) and European Christians qualifying for it based on both Isaiah 58 and Matthew 25 and the historical reality of the persecuted church worldwide never being snatched from far worse than we can even imagine. This is a clarion call to all of us to bear fruit in keeping with repentance, without which, all the fasting in the world won't impress God. For those of you unfamiliar with my pre-Yom Kippur broadcasts, just know that I don't pull my punches. Transcript: https://theancientbridge.com/2022/10/episode-153-yom-kippur-and-the-rapture/  

Paul Gray discusses the early church Father's belief that “God is Good, Only Good, Always Good to ALL people! He also shows what the First Nation people, the Cheyenne Indians in North America believed about God centuries before European “Christians” came to tell them about a false version of a “not always good ‘god'” that they had to believe “or else!” Here's what the Cheyenne believed: “Maheo is still with us. He is everywhere, watching all his people, and all the creation he has made. Maheo is all good and all life; he is the creator, the guardian, and the teacher. We are all here because of Maheo.”See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

“People need hope ultimately --and that's what a full belly gives them – it allows them to plan for the future," says Ethan Forhetz of Convoy of Hope. Truckloads of tuna, beans, rice, fresh water, baby food, hygiene kits even cellphone chargers distributed through European Christians have been crucial to the survival of displaced families. Lead spokesperson Sara Forhetz says this ultimately fulfills the Convoy mission. “The real hope of the world is Jesus -- to make Him famous through the local church.” K-LOVE's Marya Morgan reports. [Educational Media Foundation - All Rights Reserved]

“People need hope ultimately --and that's what a full belly gives them – it allows them to plan for the future," says Ethan Forhetz of Convoy of Hope. Truckloads of tuna, beans, rice, fresh water, baby food, hygiene kits even cellphone chargers distributed through European Christians have been crucial to the survival of displaced families. Lead spokesperson Sara Forhetz says this ultimately fulfills the Convoy mission. “The real hope of the world is Jesus -- to make Him famous through the local church.” K-LOVE's Marya Morgan reports. [Educational Media Foundation - All Rights Reserved]

“People need hope ultimately --and that's what a full belly gives them – it allows them to plan for the future," says Ethan Forhetz of Convoy of Hope. Truckloads of tuna, beans, rice, fresh water, baby food, hygiene kits even cellphone chargers distributed through European Christians have been crucial to the survival of displaced families. Lead spokesperson Sara Forhetz says this ultimately fulfills the Convoy mission. “The real hope of the world is Jesus -- to make Him famous through the local church.” Air1's Marya Morgan reports. [Educational Media Foundation - All Rights Reserved]

April 28: Saint Peter Chanel, Priest and Martyr1803–1841Optional Memorial; Liturgical Color: RedPatron Saint of OceaniaMusumusu axed him to death for no reason at allIn Paris, just a few blocks down the Rue du Bac from the shrine of the Miraculous Medal, is a fine, imposing stone building. There are a lot of fine, imposing stone buildings in Paris, so from the outside this one is not exceptional. But once the visitor passes inside the complex of chapel, museum, dormitories, and garden, he understands what a venerable institution he is visiting—The Paris Foreign Mission Society. Approximately 4,500 missionaries went forth from this unique Society, mostly to Southeast Asia, to build the Church and preach the Gospel. From its beginnings in the seventeenth century until today, but most conspicuously in the nineteenth century, hundreds of priests and bishops from the Society were martyred, died violent deaths, or fell victim to tropical diseases. Of these, twenty-three Paris Foreign Missionaries are canonized saints. Other non-martyr French saints of the same era—Saint John Vianney, Saint Thérèse of Lisieux, Saint Catherine Laboure—together with the missionary martyrs, sparkle as the jewels in the crown of the vibrant Church of nineteenth-century France.Today's saint, Peter Chanel, was just one such Frenchman who left the comfort and familiarity of home to become a daring and rugged missionary priest. Peter Chanel grew up in rural France working as a shepherd. While in school, he loved to read about French foreign missionaries and wanted to emulate them. So he decided, “I will become a missionary priest!” After seminary studies, Peter was ordained a diocesan priest and served in parishes. But a few years later, he became one of the founding members of the Society of Mary, the Marists. And as a Marist father, he voyaged on the high seas to at last fulfill his missionary dreams. He sailed to one of the most tiny, remote, and unknown islands in the South Pacific. In 1837 Father Peter Chanel stepped ashore the speck of volcanic rock called Futuna to preach there, for the very first time, the name of Jesus Christ.On unknown Futuna, Father Chanel gave his all, at first drip by drip and then all at once. A lay brother who was with him later said of Father Chanel, “Because of his labors, he was often burned by the heat of the sun and famished with hunger, and he would return home wet with perspiration and completely exhausted. Yet he always remained in good spirits, courageous and energetic…” His apostolic labors generated few converts, but there was some progress nonetheless. Like so many missionaries, Peter had to overcome the counter-witness given by fellow European Christians trading in the area who cared little about their religion. In 1841 when the local Chieftain's son asked to be baptized, the Chieftain sent his son-in-law, Musumusu, to stop the conversion. A fight within the family ensued. Musumusu then went to Father Chanel's home and clubbed the priest with an axe until his blood puddled in the dirt. Father Peter was not yet forty years old when his missionary dream was fulfilled in martyrdom, giving Oceania its patron saint.The island of Futuna, in which our saint had such mixed success, converted completely and totally a few years after Saint Peter's martyrdom. Musumusu himself repented of his crime and was baptized. The island is, even in modern times, almost one hundred percent Catholic. An impressive church is the heart and center of every small town. Saint Peter Chanel's body now rests in a large Basilica in the city of Poi. The beauty and smell of tropical flowers always adorn the church. And on the night of April 27, the vigil of his Feast Day, hundreds of Futunians sleep outside the Basilica waiting for the festivities of their saint's feast day to begin the next morning. The brief life and sudden death of Saint Peter Chanel is powerful proof of how the blood of the martyrs waters the seeds of the Church. One sows, another reaps, and still another enjoys the harvest.Saint Peter Chanel, by your suffering and death, you converted a people. You were fearless in adventuring far from home to preach the Gospel. May your blood, spilled so long ago, continue to infuse all missionaries with courage and perseverance in their labors.

The Children's Crusade was a failed popular crusade by European Christians to establish a second Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem in the Holy Land, said to have taken place in 1212. The crusaders left areas of Germany, led by Nicholas of Cologne, and Northern France, led by Stephen of Cloyes. Bonus episodes as well as ad-free episodes on Patreon. Find us on Instagram. Join us on Discord.

Welcome to a particularly delicious romp through the history of the Spice trade with my guest, 'television's own' Wayne Wilderson. His IMDB Credits read like a CVS receipt and you'll find he is as effortless on the microphone as he is on camera. 00:04:55 - After telling you a little bit about where we are (and why I'm wearing my daughter's Hello Kitty Headphones) Wayne tells us a little bit about when he came to Hollywood and some of his favorite jobs... and there have been so many. Among his gigs was a 12-year run as the purple grapes in the Fruit of the Loom campaign. 00:07:52 - Wayne and Dawn get into the HILF. 00:08:51 - Dawn Lays out her sources and research:Book: Spice - The History of a Temptation by Jack Turner. Documentary: Absolute History with Kate Humble - Where Peppercorn and Cinnamon come from. Great Article about Magellan: by Steven Robert Carlson 00:11:10 - The plan for this episode is to cover not only the history of cinnamon and the other spices that originated in the same time and place - but also why humanity has been so intrigued by them for so long. 00:14:40 - Let's fuck.00:16:23 - Columbus sails the ocean blue in search of India  and her elusive spices and accidentally bumps into the Bahamas. He has a bad reputation now, but it wasn't much better in his lifetime on account of the total lack of familiar spices in the 'New World.' 00:20:25 - The Pope, in an effort to cool tensions between Spain and Portugal, divides the world between them. The Treaty of Tordesillas established that everything 'non-christian' discovered West belonged to Spain and everything East belonged to Portugal. And thus began the race to see how far East was West and who - in the end - would claim the Spice Islands.  00:21:20 - The Portuguese sailor, Vasco da Gama sets sail South around the Cape of Good Hope and successfully crosses the Indian ocean to arrive in Calcut, India. It's an extraordinary encounter.00:25:58 - The Portuguese in an effort to establish domination over the islands, leave Francisco Serrao as a representative to await their return. He has a string of wild adventures, eventually becoming BFF's and advisor to an Island sultan. He marries and never returns to Portugal... He does however, write a few letters to a guy named Ferdinand Magellan. 00:23:40 - Magellan sets sail on his history-making journey. The books say he circumnavigated the globe, but the details will reveal he - in fact died in the Philippines - and his exhausted, scurvy-laden crew had to hump one leaking boat back to Spain on their own. But, the Spanish still made a profit on the journey so...00:32:18 - The Dutch arrive in the Spice Islands and after pushing the Portuguese and the English out - prove to be brutal overlords. ...But this is not the beginning of the story. It can't be. There was a love and value placed on Spice that inspired all of this exploration and exploitation. In Part II, we take the road even further up the annals of history to the ancients. PART II00:35:33 - Welcome back!00:36:28 - The first known consumer of spice in history did not eat it.  It was Ramses II and he had it shoved up his nose during his mummification. 00:38:45 - The first known myth about cinnamon predated Ramses II - it is the story of the Phoenix who is is resurrected from its ashes. Ashes that were, in the original legend, mixed with cinnamon. 00:40:00 - The Roman's loved spice too much? It is argued that it at least contributed to the Fall the empire. It was because their growing obsession with exotic spices sent a wave of gold East; while what they got in return was primarily burned, and if eaten, supplied no nutritional value. 00:41:43 - When the later European Christians dominated, they at first rejected spices as a uniquely pagan tradition. In later centuries, however, they embraced them and in much the same way, and with much the same results as the Romans. 00:45:18 - Dawn covers the many varied uses and applications for spices over the centuries. From medicine, to ritual, to sex aide. 00:50:00 - Constantine the Great was a sex expert - he literally wrote the book on it - and there are some gems. 00:52:00 - It turns out, however, our timeless obsession with spice - cinnamon in particular - is justified! Dr. Alan R. Hirsch, director of the Smell and Taste Treatment and Research Foundation in Chicago has proven it!00:54:00 - The various spices pursued during the The Spice Trade fit nicely with the flawed medical wisdom of the time - that of The 4 Humors. It hinged on the idea that the health of a human being was tied to it's balance among being Hot, Cold, Wet and Dry. They were fairly arbitrary delineations that doctors - with both good and bad intensions - exploited for centuries. 00:56:30 - The end of the age, not too surprisingly, coincided with the beginning of one. The French one-armed thief, Peter Poivre, successfully stole cloves from Indonesia and successfully replanted them in France. It was 1776 and nobody cared anymore. 01:00:30 - One might be tempted to say that we as humanity have moved on from the silly ancient obsession with spices - and yet they are key ingredients in both Coca-cola and the top fragrance, Obsession by Calvin Klein... So have we? Thanks, as ever, for listening!We are enjoying an ever-increasing listenership and are so grateful for your ears... But I have NO IDEA who reads these things so if that is you - please introduce yourself.  There are lots of ways to do it - Instagram, Facebook or Email [hilfpodcast@gmail.com]. Also on our Instagram, you can see daily posts about the current episode - featuring photos, links and additional tid-bits about the people and places I talk about.  

Sverker Weissglas is an adventurer, prodigal-come-home, ragamuffin pirate who leads spiritual formation retreats through his sailing ministry: Living Journey. In this two-part interview, we hear about Sverker's story of encountering God in unexpected ways and rediscovering the life of Jesus. If you've ever walked through burnout, deconstructing your faith, and wondered what's on the other side--this one's for you.Sverker is a hero to many European Christians who have sought the life of Jesus after facing burnout or failure of some kind. I first met Sverker in 2011, when I was ready to walk away from Jesus altogether because I was so fried from years of serving in ministry. Sverker showed me how to rediscover Jesus, the gospel, and what it means to live the more of God. It was from Sverker I first learned what it meant to be loved by God as a human being, not just a human doing.Part 2 of this live the more podcast unpacks how Sverker rediscovered hope and purpose despite an intense period of spiritual burnout. "What if God doesn't need me...my gifts, service, etc.," Sverker asks, "What if God WANTS me; what if God LOVES me?"Please visit https://livingjourney.net/ to view the upcoming sailing trips Sverker is leading for men, men and women, and others. Sverker takes his fellow pirates on journeys through the Greek islands and other beautiful, European destinations. You will always remember and cherish a trip with this incredible man and the amazing people you'll meet, so check it out and book a trip!_____________Have you subscribed to our podcast yet? If not, we encourage you to subscribe so that you don't miss out the great content and conversations to come!  Would you consider leaving us a review on iTunes? Click here to subscribe and review in iTunes. We would love to hear what your favorite part of the podcast is. Thank you!Connect with us!Instagram | johnmiltonjordan // allisoncjordan Website | https://livethemore.com/

Sverker Weissglas is an adventurer, prodigal-come-home, ragamuffin pirate who leads spiritual formation retreats through his sailing ministry: Living Journey. In this two-part interview, we hear about Sverker's story of encountering God in unexpected ways and rediscovering the life of Jesus. If you've ever walked through burnout, deconstructing your faith, and wondered what's on the other side--this one's for you. Sverker is a hero to many European Christians who have sought the life of Jesus after facing burnout or failure of some kind. I first met Sverker in 2011, when I was ready to walk away from Jesus altogether because I was so fried from years of serving in ministry. Sverker showed me how to rediscover Jesus, the gospel, and what it means to live the more of God. It was from Sverker I first learned what it meant to be loved by God as a human being, not just a human doing. Part 1 of this live the more podcast explores Sverker's journey towards burnout--how he got there, what the telltale  signs were, and what God was doing in him. Part 2 will unpack his journey towards healing and recovery, where he rediscovered Jesus and a passion for helping others along the same path. Please visit https://livingjourney.net/ to view the upcoming sailing trips Sverker is leading for men, men and women, and others. Sverker takes his fellow pirates on journeys through the Greek islands and other beautiful, European destinations. You will always remember and cherish a trip with this incredible man and the amazing people you'll meet, so check it out and book a trip! _____________Have you subscribed to our podcast yet? If not, we encourage you to subscribe so that you don't miss out the great content and conversations to come!  Would you consider leaving us a review on iTunes? Click here to subscribe and review in iTunes. We would love to hear what your favorite part of the podcast is. Thank you!Connect with us!Instagram | johnmiltonjordan // allisoncjordan Website | https://livethemore.com/

Aaaarrr, thar be pirates! For centuries, Muslim pirates enslaved millions of European Christians along the Mediterranean Sea. A 13th century apparition of the Blessed Virgin to a Dominican, a king, and nobleman prompted the establishment of a religious community to ransom these enslaved Christians.

In a sense, 1521 is Mexico's 1619. A foundational moment that has for a long time been shaped by just one perspective, a European one.The story of how Hernán Cortés and his small army of conquistadors conquered the mighty Aztec Empire, in the heart of what's now modern Mexico City, has become a foundational myth of European dominance in the Americas. This is the story that for centuries was largely accepted as the truth. But in recent decades researchers have pieced together a more nuanced, complicated version based on indigenous accounts, a version that challenges many of the bedrock assumptions about how European Christians came to control the Western Hemisphere. In this episode, the story of the fall of Tenochtitlán.

It is a commonly-repeated story about America. European Christians traveled from Europe – some fleeing persecution – crossing the Great Sea to a Promised Land where they set up a God-glorifying Christian nation from which to bless the world. This retelling of the American story substitutes white Christians for the original chosen people of God … Continue reading Episode 157: White Christian Nationalism – “The Heretical Gospel of God and Country.”

In this week's Podcast, I interview Joy Lucius from the American Family Association. Joy has published a new book entitled, Rose and Odette – Unknown Children of the Holocaust. During the Holocaust, European Christians murdered 1.5 million children. Joy discusses her research in the mass murder of Jewish children and answers the unthinkable question: How could German and European Christians either stand idly by or become willing executioners of the Jews?

Dr. Thomas Sowell, PhD, of the Stanford Hoover Institution, a black conservative, famously said blacks were not enslaved because they were black, but because they were available.  Whites have enslaved whites.  Asians have enslaved Asians.  Blacks have enslaved blacks.  The U.S. is not a racist country.  On the contrary, based on Christian values, European Christians who emigrated to the New World, fought to end slavery in the Colonies, England and the rest of the world.  By the time the U.S. Constitution was enacted, nine of the original 13 Colonies had abolished slavery, and the U.S. had made operating a slave ship a crime, subject to the death penalty.  A democratic republic provides for freedom.  Socialism removes freedom, puts the government in charge and takes away the incentive to work and succeed.  May God bless the U.S. and help us maintain a democratic-republic. See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Subscribe to the podcast!https://podfollow.com/everythingeverywhere/ In the middle ages, a legend persisted among Europeans that there was a Christian ruler in Asia, or Africa, who would come to join with European Christians to help fight Moslems.  The only problem was, the distant Christian ruler didn't exist. Yet, while the ruler was a fable, the story was actually based on some facts.  Learn more about the legendary Prester John, and how Europeans pinned their hopes on him, on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. https://athleticbrewing.com/ -------------------------------- Associate Producer Thor Thomsen   Become a supporter on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/everythingeverywhere   Discord Server: https://discord.gg/UkRUJFh   Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everythingeverywhere/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/everywheretrip Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/EEDailyPodcast/ Website: https://everything-everywhere.com/everything-everywhere-daily-podcast/

Sara and I discuss cultural issues, including the need for White, European Christians to meet and marry others within their race, who also share their religion and values. Get in touch with Nathaniel: poetichonesty@gmail.com Support the podcast by sending Bitcoin: 38p3Qq8YvxTA7oTaPuTb1CHPxwhsuCRMeU

Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum sparked immediate backlash when he told a conservative youth gathering that European Christians built America from ‘nothing,' and that there is little Native American culture in American culture. He's not the first, nor probably the last, to try to rewrite Native Americans out of history. Also, the fate of hundreds […]

Former U.S. Sen. Rick Santorum sparked immediate backlash when he told a conservative youth gathering that European Christians built America from 'nothing,' and that there is little Native American culture in American culture. He's not the first, nor probably the last, to try to rewrite Native Americans out of history. Also, the fate of hundreds of millions of dollars in federal coronavirus relief money is now in the hands of the United States Supreme Court. The High Court heard arguments over whether Congress intended to include for-profit Alaska Native Corporations in aid intended for tribes. The arguments hinge on the language of one particularly confusing sentence in the legislation. Also federal health officials are considering resuming the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine after complications surfaced. We’ll talk with a medical professional about the latest. And #NativeNerd Vincent Schilling (Akwesasne Mohawk) will round out the hour with the latest in pop culture including his new favorite show, “Rutherford Falls”.

narrated by Chris Gratien featuring Joshua White, Maryam Patton, Zoe Griffith, and Gary Leiser | The Crusades loom large in the Western imagination of medieval history and Christendom's relationship with the Islamic world. But what did these wars of the 11th-13th centuries mean for Muslims at the time? In this episode, we explore the history of the Crusades and their impact on the Islamic world. While the wars of the Crusades were bloody, they were not necessarily the main event of Islamic history beyond the regions bordering the Crusader states. In the Eastern Mediterranean, these states emerged as sites of both conflict and contact between European Christians and Muslims. In our episode, we go beyond the battlefield to discuss the gendered portrayals of the Crusaders within Islamic sources, and we consider the intellectual implications of access to the Islamicate scholarly tradition offered in the Crusader states. We also discuss the history and memory of Salah ad-Din al-Ayyubi or Saladin, whose chivalry and military prowess inspired awe both among Europeans of his day and among Arab nationalists many centuries later during their struggle with Western imperialism. « Click for More »

narrated by Chris Gratien featuring Joshua White, Maryam Patton, Zoe Griffith, and Gary Leiser | The Crusades loom large in the Western imagination of medieval history and Christendom's relationship with the Islamic world. But what did these wars of the 11th-13th centuries mean for Muslims at the time? In this episode, we explore the history of the Crusades and their impact on the Islamic world. While the wars of the Crusades were bloody, they were not necessarily the main event of Islamic history beyond the regions bordering the Crusader states. In the Eastern Mediterranean, these states emerged as sites of both conflict and contact between European Christians and Muslims. In our episode, we go beyond the battlefield to discuss the gendered portrayals of the Crusaders within Islamic sources, and we consider the intellectual implications of access to the Islamicate scholarly tradition offered in the Crusader states. We also discuss the history and memory of Salah ad-Din al-Ayyubi or Saladin, whose chivalry and military prowess inspired awe both among Europeans of his day and among Arab nationalists many centuries later during their struggle with Western imperialism. « Click for More »

Paul and Silas bring the gospel to Philippi and we meet some of the first European converts to Christianity.

What’s so special about January 10, 2013? That’s the day Skye believes Christianity ceased to be viewed as a moral belief system in the U.S. Based on his new article, he talks about the three factors that conspired to fundamentally shift the way nonbelievers see the faith, and why it requires a new approach to ministry. Plus, research says American atheists are more religious than European Christians, the opioid epidemic has reached mollusks, & Phil discovers we have a second brain—you’ll never guess where.

What does the pilgrimage to St. James mean to Spain? And what role did the Way of St. James played for European Christians of medieval times? Here you get the backdrop of the design of the Spanish 1, 2 and 5 cent coins.

Michial Farmer moderates a conversation with David Grubbs and Nathan Gilmour on the Crusades, the wars of European Christians against Muslims, Jews, and Eastern Christians in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries. Starting with the wars that preceded Pope Urban's famous sermon and moving forward through a century and a half, the discussion explores the theological as well as the social realities surrounding the first, third, and children's crusades before discussing the rhetorical character of "Crusades" in twenty-first century Christian discourse.

Michial Farmer moderates a conversation with David Grubbs and Nathan Gilmour on the Crusades, the wars of European Christians against Muslims, Jews, and Eastern Christians in the eleventh, twelfth, and thirteenth centuries. Starting with the wars that preceded Pope Urban's famous sermon and moving forward through a century and a half, the discussion explores the theological as well as the social realities surrounding the first, third, and children's crusades before discussing the rhetorical character of "Crusades" in twenty-first century Christian discourse.

(corresponding to “Granny Goody’s Hairy Lips”) If my tale of “Granny Goody’s Hairy Lips” may be off-putting by some of its imagery, the tale of “Panther and Lynx,” upon which it is based, shall seem grotesque. A lynx and panther lose the fire they keep and Lynx goes out to steal some. He finds an old woman with fire. He steals a firebrand from her. When he does, the old woman notices it and spreading her legs, she looks at her vulva and accuses it of taking the firebrand, and strikes her vulva with another firebrand. This is very strange. In the end a series of grizzly bears, who are the old woman’s sons, seek out the lynx to punish him for taking the firebrand. By our understanding of the normal grammar of myth, some of this is not difficult to address. Animals in fables are a motif we have heard, and in the first instance this seems a classic tale, the theme of the taking and making of fire. This much we can make out. But the old woman striking her vulva with a firebrand and accusing it of taking fire is so bizarre, if not to say in our aesthetics obscene, that we can make no sense of it.We turn to the study of the semiotics of mythology and folklore to explicate it. We trust in scholars such as Campbell, Jung, Fraser, and Eliade, and in books such as the Encyclopedia of Symbols, and the Archetypes of the Body. Here we learn that fire has several associations, but foremost it represents the triumph of culture, the preferment upon the human animal of its gift makes us capable of keeping fire for so much that advances us, cooking and metallurgy and simply warmth and light. Fire symbolizes what makes us human, and also has psychological associations to the body, to the warmth of the body and the energies of the body. In his study The Forge and the Crucible, concerning metallurgy and alchemy in anthropological history, Mircea Eliade tells us that to keep embers is to keep the life of the body. This life-giving aspect is generative, just as a woman is naturally generative, and so fire suggests sexuality, for the generation of life is sexual. Thus, Eliade found: “According to the myths of certain primitive people, the aged women of the tribe naturally possessed fire in their genital organs and made use of it to do their cooking, but kept it hidden from men who were able to get possession of it by trickery. These myths reflect the ideology of a matriarchal society and remind us, also, of the fact that fire, being produced by the friction of two pieces of wood (that is, by their sexual union), was regarded as existing naturally in the piece which represented the female.”Thus the disconcerting motif of the old woman, fire and her vulva makes sense in the context, not in our aesthetics, but in the naturalism and explicit truth of Mrs. Wilson’s Tales.The translation of the Kathlamet text by Boas speaks of the old woman’s vulva, that is, the female genitals outwardly, but it seems by the way in which the matter is told that the exact usage should be the cavity of the vagina itself, the portal to the womb. In any case the explicit reference to women’s genitalia will be striking as a motif to us, because in our Western art the genitals of women is erased from view, unless it is intentionally pornographic. But this has not always been so. In Celtic stone artifacts found in England a strange fetish is portrayed, the Sheela-na-Gig, a squatting naked woman who holds open her vulva with both her hands to reveal her gaping vagina. The only survival of this pagan image, ironically, is stone carvings upon early Gothic churches, where sometimes other pagan artifacts, such as the Green Man, gargoyles and some other sexually explicit images, also survive in decorations to doors, eaves, and cornices. The interpretation of these by early European Christians is ambiguous. Joking references to the Sheela-na-Gig found it sexually obscene, but others interpreted it for the posture of birth. Still others considered them representations of Satanic matters. What is remarkable about this pagan presence in sacred Christian art is the fact of its survival despite a general religious intolerance for the erotic, indeed a profoundly anxious misogyny that deplored the sexuality of women, indeed was frightened of it.In listening to the tale of “Panther and Lynx” we should be reminded again how different is the conception of these matters in this culture, and once again remember these are Mrs. Wilson’s tales, who celebrated woman.

**Today's host(s):** Scot Landry and Susan Abbott **Today's guest(s):** Fr. Roger Landry, executive editor of The Anchor, the newspaper of the Fall River diocese; and Gregory Tracy, managing editor of The Pilot, the newspaper of the Boston archdiocese * [The Anchor](http://www.anchornews.org) * [The Pilot](http://www.pilotcatholicnews.com) * Some of the stories discussed on this show will be available on The Pilot's and The Anchor's websites on Friday morning. Please check those sites for the latest links. **Today's topics:** Cardinal Seán's Pastoral Letter on Evangelization, tornado in Springfield, new cause of canonization in Boston, US bishops on assisted suicide **A summary of today's show:**  **1st segment:** Scot welcomes Susan back to show. Susan said she's just back from the Sacred Hearts Retreat House in Wareham where she met with New England regional diocesan catechetical directors in a day of reflection. Scot said the Pastoral Center has been busy today because the convocation of the archdiocese's priests has been taking place nearby at Lombardo's in Randolph. Fr. James Moroney addressed them on the changes to the Roman Missal that are coming this Advent. Videos of recent workshops on the changes coming  to the Liturgy are available on the archdiocese's website. * [The New Roman Missal at BostonCatholic.org](http://www.bostoncatholic.org/newromanmissal.aspx) **2nd segment:** Scot begins by talking about the Cardinal's new pastoral letter called "The New Pentecost." He asked Fr. Landry to explain pastoral letters. It is meant to help Catholics to approach an issue from the perspective of the Catholic faith. It's a study by the author on a theme that he believes those to whom he's writing it need to react and respond to. This pastoral letter is a response of Cardinal Seán to starting in 1992, Pope John Paul II began calling for a New Evangelization of the Americas on the 500th anniversary of the discovery by European Christians. This calling to a new evangelization is meant to address those 83% of Catholics who don't regularly go to Mass very Sunday as well as those of the other 17% who have not let the Gospel fully impact their lives. Scot asked Gregory what he makes of the Cardinal releasing the document on Pentecost and linking evangelization to Pentecost. The Holy Spirit overshadowed the apostles, converting them from cowering in fear and calling them to go out and proclaim the Good News. We're also called to proclaim the Good News like the apostles did. * [Cardinal Seán's Pastoral Letter on Evangelization](http://www.BostonCatholic.org/Pastoral Letter) (Will be available on Friday, June 10) * ["Church must find more effective ways to evangelize, says pope" CNS, 5/31/11](http://www.catholicnews.com/data/briefs/cns/20110531.htm) Susan said that she's this letter as being right up her alley in terms of using in catechesis, formation and religious education and see hiow it's applicable to her ministry. Scot said we're called to evangelize and spread the word to others. He asked Fr. Roger how important it is to make people understand this isn't just the mission of the priests or professional lay ecclesial ministers. Fr. Roger said if we're not bursting forth with the desire to share the Good News with others, we have to wonder if we've fully receive the Gospel and recognize what great news it is. Pope John Paul II said in the encyclical [Mission of the Redeemer](http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/encyclicals/documents/hf_jp-ii_enc_07121990_redemptoris-missio_en.html) said 15 times that the work of evangelization is the work of all the disciples of the Lord. Jesus' two great verbs are to "come" to Him, but also to "go" out into the world. Scot said there are 11 sections to the Cardinal's letter. The first one states that Pentecost is the beginning of Evangelization. Then he talks about Catholics Come Home, evangelization as the start of each Catholic's ongoing conversion; evangelization as the primary mission of the Church; the meaning of evangelization; parishes as centers of evangelization; pastoral planning & evangelization; the new Roman Missal as an opportunity for evangelization; new Church movements and communities; immediate steps we can take to evangelize; and Blessed John Paul's oft-stated desire that all may know Jesus. **3rd segment:** Scot recalled the tornadoes in the Springfield diocese last week, the four deaths and more than 200 injuries. The diocese was hit very hard as well. Susan's counterpart, Sister Paul Robelard, said it was just terrifying. The chancery building wasn't damaged, but St. Michael's Resident, a home for retired priests and religious, was damaged. The chapel was ripped out of the middle of the building. The recently restored cathedral high school was also severely damaged. * [Massachusetts diocese seeks prayers, assistance during tornado recovery," The Pilot/CNS, 6/8/11](http://www.pilotcatholicnews.com/article.asp?ID=13429) There are many people still without homes and it will be a long time getting back on their feet. Scot said in the weeks prior to that was the tornado in Joplin, Missouri. His children, seeing the news, were very fearful and he assured them that we don't get tornadoes in Massachusetts, and now this happens. It left us all feeling vulnerable. Scot asked Gregory's take as a journalist. Gregory said as terrible as the devastation as the Missouri was, it didn't feel so close to home, but many of us know people in Springfield, and especially with those he works with in the diocese there. As important as reporting what happened is reporting the efforts that the diocese is making to assist those in need. Fr. Roger said people should pray. Bishop McDonnell has asked for prayers those who died in the storm, those who lost homes, those who were injured. These are our neighbors in both a literal sense and in a Gospel sense, so we could assist with monetary donations. But we also need to recall that our lives are a gift of God. It's easy to go about our lives and not recall that this could happen to us at any time. We need to be grateful to the Lord for every day he gives us. We need to respond, not with fear, but with gratitude and trust. Also, be ready, because at any time our death could come. Are we ready to face the Lord in our personal judgment? Bishop McDonnell said Catholic Charities is looking for help with immediate needs for household items, toiletries, baby supplies, and monetary donations. * ["Cause of canonization opens for Opus Dei priest," The Pilot, 6/7/11](http://www.pilotcatholicnews.com/article.asp?ID=13423) On June 2 at the Pastoral Center was the opening of the cause of canonization for Fr. Joseph Muzquiz, a priest of Opus Dei, who brought the movement to the United States. Fr. Roger knows Fr. Dave Kavanaugh, the promoter of the cause and priest of OPus Dei. He said Fr. Kavanaugh told him that Fr. Muzquiz was one of the first three Opus Dei priests ordained in Spain the 1940s. St. Josemaria Escriva had asked Fr. Muzquiz to bring Opus Dei to the US. They first went to Chicago and then came to Boston, coming here literally with nothing, trusting in God. Eventually, the movement has flowered in the United States with many beautiful facilities, chapels, and retreat centers. Fr. Muzquiz was known for his incredible peace and heroic virtue. He lived the real message of Opus Dei, to become holy in the midst of your ordinary activities. You don't have to be a martyr or travel to the end of the earth. He died on June 1, 1983.  In order to be canonized, you need two miracles, so they have printed up holy cards with prayers so that people can pray for their own needs and those they love. At this stage, he is called Servant of God and they will now investigate whether he lived the theological virtues of faith, hope, and love to a heroic degree.  Gregory said this is the first cause that he has experience with that has opened in Boston. The usual practice is that the cause opens in the diocese where the person died. He said though there were about 150 people present, many of whom knew Muzquiz personally, it was a highly canonical proceeding, with the reading of testimony and the signing of documents. There was a great sense of solemnity and it showed that the process of canonization is not just superfluous, but is very rigorous and much attention to detail is paid. Susan said she's only familiar with the archdiocese's connection to the cause for Blessed John Henry Newman, but that was an investigation of a miracle that occurred here, not the opening of the the cause and investigation. Scot said it was interesting to know about the formal roles in the process: the bishop of the diocese, the postulator of the cause (Fr. Kavanaugh), the episcopal delegate (Bishop Allué), the judicial vicar (Fr. Mark O'Connell), the promoter of justice (Fr. Rodney Kopp), and notaries (Fr. Michael Medas and Fr. Dan Harrington). Now the investigation will take testimony from many people and send that along with many other items of documentation to the Congregation for the Causes of Saints at the Vatican for consideration. They will investigate any possible miracle and perhaps make a recommendation to the Holy Father for beatification. Fr. Roger said those looking for miracles are encouraged to go to St. Joseph Cemetery in West Roxbury to pray at the tomb of Fr. Muzquiz for that miracle. **4th segment:** In the Pilot this week is an obituary for Fr. Thomas Keane, former Air Foorce chaplain and Quincy pastor. In The Anchor this week are the obituaries of Fr. Luis Cardoso and Msgr. Edmund Levesque. Msgr Levesque is Fr. Roger's predecessor at St. Anthony's in New Bedford. When Fr. Levesque arrived in the parish in 1990, he decided to renovate the church, which is a massive church. Because he had no money, he did it himself, erecting scaffolding and washing and painting the ceilings, then sanding and repainting the pews. He started to raise money for the school by cooking the dinner at Bingo every week. He died at he was going up the steps of a church to celebrate Mass. Fr. Luis Cardoso was an immigrant from the Azores and spent his whole priesthood in Fall River ministering to Portuguese Catholics.  Also this week, both dioceses celebrated the 25th anniversaries of a number of priests. The Boston priests celebrated Mass together at the Pastoral Center on Wednesday. * List of Archdiocese of Boston priests celebrating their Silver Jubilee: * Fr. Russell Best, St. Patrick, Boston * Fr. James Butler, Senior Priest * Fr. Richard Cannon, St. John the Baptist, Quincy * Fr. Thomas Foley, Episcopal Vicar and Secretary for Parish Life and Leadership * Fr. David Michael, St. Joseph, Needham * Fr. William Minigan, St. Joseph, Malden * Fr. Gabriel Lormeus, St. Mary, Lynn * Fr. Janusz Chmielecki, OFM Conv., Our Lady of Czestochowa, Boston * Fr. Gerard McKeon, SJ, Boston College High School * Fr. Joseph O'Keefe, SJ, St. Mary Hall, Boston College * Fr. Jose Ruisanchez, Opus Dei * Fr. Kevin Sepe, St. Francis of Assisi, Braintree * Fr. Mark Mahoney, St. Rose of Lima, Topsfield * Fr. Albert Faretra, St. Joseph, Belmont * Fr. James Doran, OMV, St. Joseph Retreat House, Milton * List of Diocese of Fall River priests celebrating their Silver Jubilee: * Fr. David Andrade * Fr. Freddie Babiczuk, Jr. * Fr. Thomas Frechette * Fr. Maurice Gauvin Jr. * Fr. Timothy P. Reis Susan said she has worked closely with Fr. Foley and Fr. Mahoney in the central ministries and has worked with many of the other priests as well. Moving on to other news, Fr. Roger said the US bishops when they meet in Seattle next week will be discussing assisted suicide and will be giving us a document on it. In Massachusetts, there is a new movement to promote assisted suicide. It comes as Dr. Jack Kevorkian, advocate of assisted suicide and antagonist of the culture of life, has recently died. He said this will be short enough for most people to read and pass along. * ["Bishops' document on assisted suicide will be first by full conference," CNS, 6/2/11](http://www.catholicnews.com/data/stories/cns/1102179.htm) * ["Assisted-suicide advocate Jack Kevorkian dies at age 83," The Pilot/CNS, 6/8/11](http://www.pilotcatholicnews.com/article.asp?ID=13425) Gregory said The Pilot will have an article about Fr. Frank Pavone's recent visit to Hingham and will summarize his talks on the pro-life cause. Also, Fr. Tad Pacholczyk writes this week on the topic of brain death and how to approach the issue from a Catholic perspective. Susan said she's interested in the article in The Pilot on the workshop that was recently held in North Andover on the changes to the Roman Missal.  Scot points out the article in the Pilot on the status of the archdiocese's pastoral planning office. He said Msgr. Will Fay was on The Good Catholic Life yesterday to clarify some of the misreporting on pastoral planning in the media recently. The article has direct quotes from Fr. David Couterier from the archdiocese's pastoral planning office that echo Msgr. Fay's comments yesterday.

The year is 1128 of the Common Era. The first crusade has just finished and European Christians are in control of the Holy Land. In the heart of it all stands the Holy City of Jerusalem and at its centre is the historical Temple of Solomon or as we know it today: the Dome of the Rock. 9 Knights Templar, following precise excavation blue prints, dig silently beneath the temple mount in the dead of night. Suddenly and without warning, they halt all digging. They quickly mount their horses and bolt directly back to Europe without stopping. What is uncertain is what they have found that night. What is known, is that shortly after returning, these Knights became enormously rich and powerful. Fast forward some two hundred years to the year 1318, October 12, the day before Friday the 13 th, 24 Templar Knights were seen boarding 18 ships off the coast of France. The next day Templar Knights around Europe were rounded up and thrown unceremoniously into jail to be tried for heresy and devil worship, Friday the 13 th forever cast into legend as an unlucky day…indeed. Off the coast of France , the 18 Templar ships previously mentioned, have set sail and were gone. Vanishing as if never existing. Their contents and passengers never to be heard from again. The Knights Templar; from their inception shrouded in secrecy. How could only 9 knights protect the Holy Land , what was their real mission? Did they find the secrets of the universe reportedly stored in hidden catacombs beneath the Temple Mount ? The Ark of the Covenant containing Moses’ original Tablets of The 10 Commandments? The Holy Grail with the power of immortality? The Knights Templar: They have forever been entwined with names like Richard the Lion Heart, the great Muslim leader Saladin and…Jesus Christ Himself. Were they indeed responsible for the safety of Jesus’ and Mary Magdalene’s offspring as stated in Dan Brown’s “The Da Vinci Code?” Does the Holy offspring wonder amongst today, waiting for the precise moment to declare themselves? Tonight on Night Fright we will separate the historical from the myth. Tonight on Night Fright we will unravel a mystery a thousand years old. Tonight on Night Fright historian Joel Shadow joins us in our own quest for the Holy Grail. It’s going to be a wild one. Strap in and hang on here we go...

What is the place of Yiddish in the context of a globalizing world? The role of Yiddish as a heritage language and its present uses by Jewish and non-Jewish speech communities around the world are considered, including Hasidim at one end of a cultural spectrum and European Christians at the other end. A theoretical description of the instruction of Yiddish and language competition with Hebrew and English is supplemented by a personal reflection on what it means to be a Yiddish speaker and Yiddish teacher in today's world.

This is the 11th episode in the story of Rabban Sauma, and we're closing in on the conclusion.After a month-long tour of the holy sites in and around Paris, Sauma had a final audience with King Philip. He meant it to be the crowning achievement in the royal treatment he'd lavished on the Chinese ambassador.It was held in the upper chapel of Saint-Chapelle where the just completed stained glass windows filled the room with light, giving the room its nick-name – The Jewel Box. Being newly installed, the colors were vibrant. The windows tell a Biblical history of the world. The room also holds statues of the 12 Apostles and vivid paintings that all combine to literally dazzle the eye. But it was the relics the room held that would have most impressed the Rabban. Philip carefully opened an ornate box holding, what was reputed to be, Jesus' crown of thorns. Another reliquary held a piece of wood from the cross.While several of Paris' relics were indeed brought back from the Holy Land after the first Crusade, these two had been secured by Philip's grandfather St. Louis in Constantinople 40 yrs before. Saint-Chapelle was built as simply a large reliquary to hold their reliquaries.Sauma's account of viewing these precious relics reports the King told him they'd been secured during the First Crusade IN Jerusalem. Either Sauma misunderstood, or Philip intentionally misled him. Philip wanted to encourage the Rabban in his appeal for a new Crusade. It's likely Philip fudged the facts so as to give Sauma the impression the French greatly honored the idea of a campaign to retake the Holy Land, even though he had no intention of making an imminent call for one. His behavior throughout the Rabban's visit suggests he wanted to curry the favor of the Mongol Ilkhans. Furthering that impression was the envoy and letter he sent with Sauma when he eventually returned to Persia. Before leaving Paris. Philip loaded him with lavish gifts, which the pious and humble monk lumps under the heading, “lavish gifts” in his account.So, armed by the assumption he'd secured the French King's commitment to a Crusade in alliance with the Mongols in Persia against the Muslim Mamluks, Sauma headed west to see if he could recruit the English King Edward I. It was fortunate that Edward just so happened to be near at hand, visiting his lands in Gascony, a region on the west coast of France just north of Spain. After a 3 week journey, Sauma arrived in Bordeaux in the Fall of 1287.Whereas the Parisians had plenty warning of the arrival of the Far Eastern Ambassador from the exotic Mongols and went all out in their celebration of greeting, the people of Bordeaux were surprised. “Who are you and why are you here,” they asked? When word was brought to King Edward, he sought to make amends for the poor way such an august figure had been greeted. Sauma smoothed over the rough start to his embassy among the English by giving Edward the gifts Ilkhan Arghun sent and letters of greeting from he and the Nestorian Catholicus Mar Yaballaha. Edward received them with marked appreciation, but it was when Rabban Sauma proposed an alliance with the Mongols against the Mamluks that he became most animated. “A new Crusade to liberate Jerusalem and bring aid to the beleaguered Outremer? Why that sounds stellar!” was his enthusiastic reaction. Only 6 months earlier, he'd vowed to take the cross. This seemed a glow of divine favor on his pledge, an affirmation of God's delight in him.While Edward intended to immediately embark on the adventure, events back home conspired to stall that plan. Wales rebelled, again; and entanglements on the Continent in the fractious politics and schemes of Europe hijacked his resources and attention.But all of that was yet future; near future to be sure, but not yet. As far as Sauma was concerned, he had the support of both the Kings of England and France in the proposed alliance with the Mongol Ilkhans in Persia in their long desire to rout the Mamluks from the Middle East.Furthering Sauma's sense of favor by the English King was the invitation to officiate Communion for the royal court. Though Sauma consecrated and served the elements according to the ancient Syriac formula, it was enough akin to the Mass that the participants were easily able to follow along, understanding not the words, but the meaning behind each movement of the ritual.And THAT – is simply remarkable!! Think of it. Though it's the close of the 13th C, and these two branches of The Church have been sundered from each other for 800 yrs, when adherents from the two groups engage in the focal point of their religious service, though they can't understand one another's speech, they DO understand what's happening, because the rite itself hasn't fundamentally changed. That's stunning, by anyone's reckoning.Once the service was finished, Edward threw a feast. It was his way to finalize and seal the agreement between England and Persia. Sauma didn't record what this royal feast served, but we have accounts of some of Edwards' other such feast. Let me just pass along the idea that you can go right ahead and picture the most raucous dining hall scene from any medieval movie with the ox spinning on a spit over a huge fire, chicken bones being thrown across the room in mass quantities, platers laden high with all kinds of bread and vegetables. And keg after keg of drink. Edward was known for these kinds of food & beverage extravaganzas.And once again, having achieved his official duties as Arghun's ambassador, Sauma turned to his personal mission; visiting the holy sites of Edwards' domains on the Continent. Edward not only provided guides, he paid all Sauma's expenses for this pilgrimage.When he returned, Edward did something curious. He took pains to make sure Sauma understood that European Christians believed in Christ alone. It seems someone may have gotten to the King and informed him of the ancient rift between the Nestorian and Western Church. For his part, Sauma wasn't going to throw over the much-needed alliance between East and West over nuances of theological wording that people who 800 years earlier had divided over – and THEY spoke the same language. A lengthy dissertation on the nature of the Trinity through translators just wasn't practical. So Sauma let it go.Late in 1287, with two-thirds of his mission accomplished, The Rabban decided it was time to head back to Rome and see if a new Pope had been selected. Two of Europe's most powerful armies were now committed to the cause. All they needed was permission from Rome's Bishop. By the end of the year, the obstinate cardinals still had not made a selection.Fleeing the cold of the French winter, he traveled to Genoa to await the election of the New Pope. Sauma's report of Genoa makes it clear it was maybe his favorite place in all his travels. The city was a beauty, the people warm and friendly.As much as he loved Genoa, Sauma's sense of responsibility began needling him. He wasn't, as they say, getting any younger. The trip back to Persia with his report to Arghun was going to be another major epic in a life FILLED with them. If the last months' long journey from Persia to the West had aged him years, the return trip would age the now sexagenarian a decade. He couldn't return to Persia by hopping aboard a 747. It meant another rickety ship across some of the most dangerous waters of the Med, to Constantinople, then across the Black Sea with its plethora of pirates, to the western end of the Silk Roads, then across Mesopotamia to Persia. [And we complain when we need to hop in the car and drive to the market down the street!]It's not difficult sympathizing with Sauma's rising guilt at enjoying Genoa when he knew how eager both his friend Mar Yaballaha and his ruler, Ilkhan Arghun was for his return and report. Sauma was a man with a profound sense of duty. What else could account for the multitude of manifest difficulties he'd endured over the previous decade? But Genoa had everything he'd been looking for in his pilgrimage. Duty won out over ease and Sauma began to chaff as he waited for the Cardinals in Rome to get it together.They finally did. In February 1288 they elected Jerome of Ascoli as Pope Nicholas IV. It was an auspicious choice for Sauma's mission. Some years before, Jerome had been Rome's ambassador to Constantinople to see about effecting a reconciliation between East & West. The effort proved unfruitful, but it made Jerome more aware of the needs and sensitives of the Eastern Church. If any Europeans can be said to be aware of the threat the Mamluks presented the Faith, Pope Nicholas IV was among them.It helped Sauma's cause that Nicholas was one of the people he'd spent considerable time conversing with when he'd before been in Rome. The two had hit it off, despite the language barrier.Nicholas sent an envoy to Genoa requesting Sauma's return to the Eternal City. Two weeks later, as Sauma's party reached Rome's outskirts, they were met by a delegation of church officials welcoming him to the City.Ushered into Nicholas' presence, Sauma showed him the highest form of obeisance he could by bowing on hands and knees, kissing the Pope's hands and feet, then rising to walk backward with arms crossed at the wrists before his chest; a Nestorian sign of the utmost honor. Sauma then delivered the last of his official letters and gifts from Arghun and Mar Yaballaha.Nicholas showed his ready acceptance of Sauma's embassy and person by requesting he stay and celebrate Easter with his Western brethren. Nicholas knew that Sauma, as a Nestorian Rabban, would feel the need to officiate at the events of Holy Week in some church setting. So rather than travel, we suggested he stay and plan on doing so there in Rome. Plush lodgings were secured for him and his attendants.Sauma then began preparations for Easter celebrations. He requested permission to conduct Mass so as to show Western Christians how it was done in the Nestorian tradition. The pope not only granted him permission, he showed great curiosity to witness the ritual. When the time came, a huge crowd was on hand. When all was said and done, the consensus was the same as in Bordeaux. While the language was different, the ritual was so similar as to make the differences inconsequential. So interesting was Sauma's conduct at the Mass, the Pope invited him to officiate at more services over the next few weeks. The Rabban asked in return of the Pope would favor him by serving him the Eucharist, which Nicholas heartily assented to. The day was Palm Sunday of 1288.Sauma reports that the crowds attending service that day were beyond anything his imagination could have conjured. People literally filled the streets, carrying branches of palms and olives.On Maunday Thursday of the next week, so many people packed the church where the Pope held Mass that when they said a united “Amen” the walls shook. The service over, the Pope then made the rounds of several locations in Rome where he bestowed blessing and favor on various people and artifacts. He ended by bringing his entire household staff together and washing their feet. Sauma was hugely impressed with this act of papal humility, describing it in depth. The day ended with a huge feast for some 2000.Good Friday began with a procession from the Church of the Holy Cross, where the Pope held aloft a piece of the Cross as massive crowds once again attended the scene. The rest of the day was spent in quiet meditation on the sacrifice of Christ.Saturday saw the Pope making the rounds to bestow more blessing on individual shrines and folk. Then Easter Sunday services were conducted in the ancient Church of Saint Maria Maggiore.Sauma knew his fellow Nestorians were curious about the practices of their Western Cousins, so he paid close attention to all that was happening around him., recording the events in as intimate detail as he could.Easter being complete and his mission now finished, Sauma asked permission to return home. Nicholas asked him to stay. Sauma struck for compromise He was more than pleased to stay, especially since it came from a sincere request on the part of the Pope with whom he was getting along well. BUT, a higher purpose was to be served in his return to Persia where he could share with the Mongol ruler the favorable reception he'd been shown across Europe. Certainly, that had to be a good harbinger of a future alliance. When word got out about the success of Sauma's mission, lingering tensions between East & West would subside. Such was the nature of medieval diplomacy.Then Sauma made a request that threatened to blow everything up.Picture that scene in a movie where two parties who are potential enemies, are in fact getting along and everyone's on pins and needles hoping for a new day of peace. Then there's a pause, and one of them says something that threatens to ruin it all. But the representative of the other aide at first just stares at them with a look of, well. That's the problem; no one knows what to think. And everyone starts moving their hand slowly toward their gun because they think, “Oh no. This is it. Get ready to start shooting.” But then the guy breaks out in a huge smile and starts laughing. The tension is immediately released.That's the scene when Sauma asked the Pope, for …  Ready? è Some sacred relics. At first, Nicholas was stunned at the boldness of Sauma's request. Nay; it was more than bold; it was brazen. He told the Rabban that if he were in the habit of giving relics to every foreign emissary who came to see him, there'd soon be nothing left in Rome to give.Still, in light of Sauma's perilous and long journey, he was pleased to give Sauma some treasures to take home. He gave him some scraps of cloth from clothes that were said to have belonged to Jesus and Mary, as well as various relics of different saints and special vestments for Mar Yaballaha. Maybe the most significant gift Nicholas bestowed was a letter patent authorizing Mar Yaballaha and his Nestorian Catholicus successors as the authority over the Church of the East. He gave Rabban Sauma a letter patent naming him Visitor General for all churches of the East, not just China, as the previous Nestorian Patriarch had done.Implied in Nicholas' issuing of these letter-patents was that HE, as the Roman Pope, had jurisdiction over the East. Sauma might like to have contested that. But what point? It's not like he was going to get Nicholas to back down. For goodness sake, the question of prime ecclesiastical authority had been going on for hundreds of years. Sauma was under no illusion he was going to set things right now. Rather, all he could do was blow up the alliance that seemed to be a done deal.After giving Sauma a large gift of gold to help pay his expenses, Sauma began preparations to return home.Nicholas gave Sauma a letter for Arghun, thanking the Mongol ruler for his beneficent rule of the Christians of his realm and thanking him for his offer of an alliance against the Mamluks. A copy resides in the Vatican museum. Then Nicholas launched into an appeal for both Mongols and Nestorians to submit to papal authority. He urged Arghun to convert to Christianity post haste and be baptized under the authority of Rome.Then he indicated while Sauma had indeed faithfully transmitted the Ilkhan's desire for an alliance, he and he alone could call a Crusade. The secular rulers of Europe might be gung-ho but they had no authority to approve a Crusade. Only he, as the head of the Church, possessed that right. AND, knowing the mindset of the rest of Europe, besides the monarchs of England and France, a Crusade wasn't in the cards at that time. So he adroitly side-stepped making a commitment, while at the same time, encouraging the Mongols to do their best against the common enemy.Arghun had indicated a willingness in his letter to the Pope to convert and be baptized IF that baptism could be done in a reclaimed Jerusalem, one free of the Mamluk scourge. Nicholas said Arghun had it backward. He ought to convert and be baptized NOW. That would assure him of heaven's favor in any campaign he undertook. His example would surely lead to mass conversions, furthering the promise of divine favor.So the Pope didn't out-right turn down an alliance not forbid a Crusade. He just shifted the emphasis of his letter onto the need for Arghun to trust God and surrender to him, which of course would be done by accepting the Roman Church's hegemony over his realm.Nicholas wasn't done with his letter writing. He penned one to Mar Yaballaha as well. This one began by praising the Nestorian Catholicus for his wise leadership of a challenged Church. But then it went into a long lecture on “proper” Christian doctrine, something the Nestorian Patriarch wasn't at all likely to look kindly on. The last paragraph was a blatant and tactless statement of the supremacy of the Roman church.Since these letters were open, Sauma read them both. He was deeply disappointed at the tone they took with the two men he reported to. Their condescending tone was sure to dishearten and alienate their recipients. The Pope refusal to sanction a Crusade or give any support to the proposed alliance seemed to make his entire trip West pointless.No doubt disappointed, Sauma managed to tamp down any expression of it in his concluding meeting with the Pope. He was probably just glad to be quitting the West & the prospect of going home.We'll wrap up Bar Sauma's magnificent tale in our next episode.

This episode of CS is the 3rd Overview in the series so far.We've spent quite a bit of time tracking the Reformation and need now to give a brief overview and analysis of what we've seen as we prepare for launching into the next era of Church History.There's a well-worn saying in English I'm not sure other languages duplicate. It says that “you can't see the forest for the trees.” The idea is that details can obscure the bigger picture. You fail to see a forest because all you see is a lot of trees.As we've spent many episodes tracking the Reformation and Counter-Reformation, we may be so distracted by all the names, places, dates and movements, we miss the larger picture and the summary effect of all this on the people of 16th C.Trends from the previous century came to fruition in the 16th that made for a monumental shift in people's idea of what The Church was. Consider a couple of the things that happened in the 15th C.Constantinople fell to the Turks in 1453.The New World was opened to Europe at the close of the Century. Till then, European Christians felt hemmed in by Muslims to the S and E, and by the Atlantic to the W. Missions were conceived of almost exclusively as the conversion of Muslims. Challenges to Christianity were pretty much limited to the threat of an aggressive Islam. That view seemed potent when news of the Fall of Constantinople washed over Western Europe.Yet in the hundred years of the 16th C, the situation changed dramatically. To the E and S, Islam was countered by the Spanish Reconquista and the failure of the Turks to take Vienna. The Battle of Lepanto in 1571 saw the end of Muslim naval power in the Mediterranean. Muslims armies, which had seemed irresistible till then, began to roll back.Then, the Atlantic, once an impassable barrier, suddenly became a highway. New worlds opened with the discovery of The New World. Sailing W, Spanish conquistadors conquered a realm far larger than their homeland.The Portuguese sailed S around Africa, setting up trade centers and missions in the Far East. And Islam, which had appeared the greatest barrier to Christian expansion, saw its main territory surrounded by the growing economic and military power of Europe. North Africa and western Asia shifted from being Muslim realms to European colonies.In all these lands newly opened to Europeans, Christianity established a foothold. Some of them would centuries later become their own vibrant center of missionary outreach at a time when Europe was growing increasingly secular.But, few who lived in the 15th C could comprehend the massive consequences of the events they witnessed. When Spain and Portugal came near to blows over who had the rights to what, the pope thought he could work a compromise by decreeing the W belonged to Spain while the E belonged to Portugal. But what about when sailing W leads to the E, and vice versa? The inevitable conflict was played out in the Philippines.King Ferdinand of Spain and his grandson, the famous Emperor Charles V, before whom Luther appeared at the Diet of Worms, were far more concerned with the politics of Europe than the promises of a New World. That would be like a company in the Year 2000 being more concerned with the telegraph than mobile cellphones.During the 16th C, when these vast geopolitical changes were taking place, the towering edifice of medieval Christianity collapsed. The Council of Trent tried to salvage what it could and set the scene for what became modern Catholicism. Protestantism diffused into dozens of groups amid the ruins of the medieval Church. The long-held ideal of a single church, with the vicar of Christ as its visible head, never a view held by the Eastern Church, lost its power in the West as well. From then on, Western Christianity was divided among a plethora of groups divided up along cultural and doctrinal differences.In spite of corruption and the many voices calling for reform, there was agreement among Christians the Church was in essence one, and its unity ought to be manifest in its organization. Most chief figures of the Reformation at first held such an understanding of the Church. Only a few rejected it. Most Protestant leaders believed the unity of the Church was crucial to its nature, and that although it was temporarily necessary to break unity to be faithful to God's Word, that faithfulness demanded all effort at regaining unity.As in the Middle Ages, people of the early 16th C took for granted that the survival of a nation-state required religious agreement among its subjects. That notion, which Christians rejected when a minority in the old Roman Empire, became the prevailing view after the conversion of Constantine. All who lived in a Christian state must be Christian and faithful members of THE Church. A bare-few places allowed Jews and Muslims to live among them but only as a lower-class, disenfranchised and persecuted.This view of national and concomitant religious uniformity is what led to the many wars of religion of the 16th and 17th Cs. Then, in some areas sooner than others, a conclusion was reached that religious tolerance was preferable to the devastation these wars brought. So began the long process, as one after another the various European states adopted policies of religious tolerance. That produced the modern idea of the secular state.The 16th C also witnessed the collapse of the ancient dream of political unity under an Empire. Charles V was the last emperor who would harbor such illusions. After him, the so-called emperors were little more than kings of Germany with limited power.The Conciliarist hope of reforming the Church was also shaken. For several decades, Protestant reformers hoped a universal council would set the pope's house in order. But the opposite took place. The papacy achieved its own reformation without help from a council.  By the time the Council of Trent met, it was obvious it wouldn't be an ecumenical council so much as a papal tool.Sincere believers, both Protestant and Catholic, saw many of the old certainties crumble around them. Discoveries taking place in the New World posed questions unanswerable by the old guidelines. Medieval foundations like papacy, empire, and tradition, no longer held. As Galileo had demonstrated the Earth wasn't a fixed point of reference, now it seemed there was NO fixed point to be trusted.Such were the times of Erasmus, Luther, Calvin, Knox, and the other great reformers. While the world was in chaos, they resolved to stand firm in Faith and the power of the Word of God. Luther and Calvin insisted that the power of the Word was such that, as long as the Roman Church continued reading, even though the pope and his advisors refused to listen, there was always in the Roman communion a “vestige of the church.” So they anticipated the day when the Church would once again cleave to the Word and set aside their differences to emerge in a united church once more.

Episode 54 – The Crusades – Part 1In the first episode of Communio Sanctorum, we took a look at the various ways history has been studied over time. In the Ancient world, history was more often than not, propaganda. The old adage that “History is written by the winners” was certainly true for the ancients. With the implementation of the Scientific Method in the Modern Era, the researching and recording of history became more unbiased and accurate. It was far from a pure report, but it could no longer be considered blatant propaganda. The Post-Modern Era has seen a return to bias; this time an almost knee-jerk suspicion of ALL previous attempts at recording history. Even attempts of Modernity to document history are suspect and assumed guilty of recording little more than the bias of the authors, though their works were footnoted and peer-reviewed. Post-modern critics adopt a presupposition all recorded history is fabrication, especially if there's anything heroic or virtuous. If it's a dark tale of hopelessness and tragedy, well, then, maybe it can be accepted. It's almost as though Post-moderns want to make up for the ancient historians' penchant for propaganda. Post-Moderns cast history as “neg-paganda” if I can coin a word.Let's attempt a shedding of our bias, even though we can't fully do that, as we look at the Crusades. Instead of layering onto the Christians of Europe in the 11th and 12th Cs the sensibilities of people who live a thousand years later, let's attempt to understand the reasoning behind the idea of taking up a pitchfork or sword and making a life-altering trip over hundreds of miles, through strange lands, to risk one's life for è What? Oh yeah, to rid the Holy Land of pagan infidels.Wait; Mr. Crusader-person; have you ever been to the Holy Land? Do you own land there that's been stolen? Do you have relatives or friends there you need to protect?  Have you ever met one of these infidels? Do you know what they believe or why they invaded?No? Then why are you so amped about marching half-way around the world to liberate a land you've not been all that interested in before from a people you know nothing about?See? There must have been some powerful forces at work in the minds and hearts of the people of Europe that they'd go in such large numbers on a Crusade. We may find their reasons for crusading to be horribly ill-conceived, but they were totally sold out to them.The Crusades reflected a new dynamism in the Christianity of Medieval Europe. People were driven by religious fervor, a yearning for adventure, and of course if some personal wealth could be thrown in, all the better. For 200 years, Crusaders tried to expel the Muslims from the Holy Land. It seems all the colorful figures of this era were caught up in the cause, from Peter the Hermit in the 1st Crusade, to the godly Louis IX, King of France, who inspired the 6th and 7th.Many Europeans of the medieval period viewed a pilgrimage as a form of especially poignant penance. These pilgrimages were usually trips to a local holy place or shrine erected to commemorate a miracle or to cathedrals where the relics of some saint were kept in a reliquary. But there was one pilgrimage that was thought to gain a special dose of grace – a trip to the Holy City of Jerusalem. The merchants of Jerusalem did a good business in keeping the constant flood of Christian pilgrims supplied with food, lodging and of course sacred mementos. Some pilgrims went by themselves; others in a group—ancient versions of the modern day Holy Land Tour. When pilgrims arrived in Jerusalem they'd make the rounds of all the traditional points of interest. They walked the Via Dolorosa to Calvary then sat for hours praying. When these pilgrims returned home, they were esteemed by their community as real saints; towering figures of spirituality.For centuries, peaceful pilgrims traveled from Europe to Palestine. The arrival of Islam in the Middle East in the 7th C didn't interfere. By the 10th C European bishops organized mass pilgrimages to the Holy Land. The largest we know of set out from Germany in 1065, with some 7,000 ! That's a lot of buses.To impede a pilgrim's journey was considered by the medieval Church as a serious breach of protocol because you endangered the pilgrim's salvation. If his pilgrimage was penance for some sin, you might deny him pardon by your altering his course. The mind-set of European Christians became one of extreme care to not interfere with Pilgrims once they'd set out.All of this faced a major problem in the 11th C when a new Muslim force took control of the Middle East. The Seljuk Turks, new and fanatical converts to Islam, came sweeping in to plunder the region. They seized Jerusalem from their fellow Muslims, then moved north into Asia Minor.The Byzantine Empire tried desperately to stop their advance, but at the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 the Turks captured the eastern emperor and scattered his army. Within a few years nearly all Asia Minor, the chief source of Byzantine wealth and troops, was lost, and the new Byzantine emperor sent frantic appeals to the West for help. He pleaded with Europe's nobility and the Pope, seeking mercenaries to aid in the rescue of lost territory.Then, reports began to trickle back about the abuse of Christian pilgrims on the Turkish controlled roads to Jerusalem. The trickle turned to a stream, the a river. Even when pilgrims weren't mistreated, they were subject to heavy fees to travel thru Muslim lands.The standard, brief description of the inception of the First Crusade goes like this ... In 1095, the Eastern Emperor Alexius I sent an urgent appeal for help against the Muslims to Pope Urban II. The Pope responded by preaching one of history's most influential sermons. In a field near Clermont, France he said to the huge crowd that had gathered, “Your Eastern brothers have asked for your help. Turks and Arabs have conquered their territories.  I, or rather, the Lord begs you, destroy that vile race from their lands!”But there was more to Urban's appeal than just liberating the East from infidel hordes. He also mentioned the European need for more land. He said, "For this land which you inhabit is too narrow for your large population; nor does it abound in wealth; and it furnishes scarcely food enough for its cultivators. Hence it is that you murder and devour one another, enter upon the road to the Holy Sepulcher; wrest that land from the wicked race, and subject it to yourselves.”Popes and bishops were accustomed to making such bold proclamations and issuing stirring appeals. They were nearly always met by loud “Amens!” and affirmations of the rightness of their call. Then people went home to lunch and promptly forgot all about what they'd just heard.  So the response to Urban's sermon that day was astonishing. The crowd began to chant, “Deus vult = God wills it!” But they did more than chant. People across the entire socio-economic spectrum of Europe began preparations to do precisely what the Pope had said è Go to Jerusalem and liberate it from the Muslims. They sewed crosses onto their tunics, painted them on their shields, fired up the smithies and made swords, spears and maces. Commoners who couldn't afford armor or real weapons, made clubs and sharpened sticks.They were going to go on a new kind of pilgrimage. Not as humble worshippers but as armed warriors. Their enemy wasn't the world, the flesh and the devil; it was the Muslim infidel defiling the Holy Places.As the Pope ended his impassioned appeal to the loud affirmation of the crowd, he declared their slogan Deus Vult! would be the crusader battle cry in the coming campaign.The pilgrims agreed to make their way east any way they could, gathering at Constantinople. Then they'd form into armies and march south toward the enemy.The First Crusade was underway.As word spread across France and Germany of the holy mission, people from across all social levels were caught up in Crusader fervor. A similar excitement was seen in the California and Yukon Gold Rushes. It's not difficult to understand why. We need to be careful here because removed by a thousand years we can't presume to know the motivations that shaped every Crusader's actions, even though there are not a few historians who claim to be able to do so. Surely motives were mixed and diverse. Some, out of simple obedience to the Church and Pope, believed it was God's will to expel the Muslims from the Holy Land. Being illiterate peasants, they couldn't read the Bible or know God's will on the matter. They believed it was the Pope's duty to tell them what God willed and trusted him to do it. When the Pope declared anyone who died in the holy cause would bypass purgatory and enter directly into heaven, all the incentive needed to go was provided for thousands who lived in the constant fear of ever being good enough to merit heaven.Another powerful incentive was the opportunity for wealth. Medieval Europe was locked in a rigid feudalism that kept the poor in perpetual poverty. There was simply no rising above the social level one was born into. A Crusade offered a chance at the unthinkable. The loot of a successful campaign could bring great wealth, even to a peasant. And those who returned gained a reputation as a warrior that could see them and their sons raised into positions of relative honor in a noble's army.The risks were great; but the benefits both tangible and significant. So thousands took up the crusader cause.The problem for the thousands of peasants who wanted to go was that no noble would lead them. On the contrary, the nobles wanted their serfs to stay home and tend their fields and farms. But the Pope's appeal had gone out to all and no noble wanted to be seen as contradicting the Church. So they just hoped no one would rise to lead them. It was one of those moments of profound leadership vacuum that just begged to be filled; who filled it was a man known as Peter the Hermit.Of all the Crusaders, Peter surely had the strongest scent. The monk had not bathed in decades. He rode a donkey that, eyewitnesses said, bore a remarkable resemblance to its owner. Peter's preaching was even more powerful than his odor. In 9 months, he gathered 20,000 peasants under his banner, then began the long and difficult trek east to Constantinople.They created chaos as soon as they arrived. Complaints of robbery poured into the Emperor's office. He knew these Western European peasants were no match for the Muslims, but he couldn't let them camp out in his city. They were ferried across the river where they immediately began pillaging the homes of Eastern Christians. Many of these poor, uneducated and illiterate peasants had come for loot and saw plenty of it right there. They'd already travelled a long way from home and were now among a people who spoke a different language, wore different styles and ate different foods. “Why, they don't look like Christians at all! And what's that you say? These people don't follow the Pope? Well, then maybe they aren't Christians. Didn't we set out to fight unbelievers? Here are some. Let's get to work.”“But these aren't Muslims!”“Okay. We'll compromise. We won't kill them; we'll just take their stuff.”Peter's peasant army put additional strain on the already poor relations between the Eastern and Roman churches. Two months later, the peasants marched straight into a Muslim ambush and were wiped out. Peter, who was in Constantinople rounding up supplies—was the lone survivor. He then joined another army, this one led by European nobility who arrived well after the peasants. These Crusaders defeated the Muslims at Antioch then continued on to Jerusalem.The Muslims failed to take this second movement of the Crusade seriously. It's not difficult to understand why. They'd just defeated a huge force of Europeans easily. They assumed they'd do the same to the smaller force that came against them now. What they didn't realize was that this force, while indeed smaller, was the cream of Europe's warrior class; mounted and armored knights who grew up on battle.On July 15, 1099, Jerusalem fell to the Crusaders. It was a brutal massacre. Around the Temple Mount, blood flowed ankle-deep. Newborn infants were thrown against walls. It wasn't just Muslims who knew the Crusaders' wrath. A synagogue was torched, killing the Jews trapped inside. Some of the native Christians were also put to the sword. To this day, the wholesale slaughter of the First Crusade affects how Jews and Muslims perceive the Christian faith.But -- and this in no wise is meant to be a justification for the brutality of the Crusades; it seems just a tad hypocritical for Muslims to decry the atrocities of the Crusades when it was by the very same means they'd laid claim to the holy land in the 7th C. In truth, while crusading under the Christian cross is a horrible violation of the morality of Biblical Christianity—Jihad, Holy War is one of the main tenets of Islam. Long before the Pope erroneously offered absolution to Crusaders and the promise of heaven to those who died in the campaign, Islam promised paradise to Muslims who died in Jihad. Historically, while the Christian faith has spread by the work of humanitarian missionaries, Islam has spread by the sword. Or we might say, while true Christianity expands by the sword of the Spirit, Islam spreads by a sword of steel.Following the conquest of Jerusalem, the Crusaders carved out four states in the Middle East; the Kingdom of Jerusalem, the County of Tripoli, the Principality of Antioch, and the County of Edessa.This First crusade was followed by eight more, none of them really able to accomplish the success of the first, if we can call it success. All told, the gains of the Crusades lasted less than 200 years. But one major accomplishment was the reopening of international trade between Europe and the Far East, something that had languished for a few hundred years.The Crusades have proven to be the focus of much historical study and debate. They're usually linked to the political and social situation in 11th C Europe, the rise of a reform movement within the papacy, and the political and religious confrontation of Christianity and Islam in the Middle East. The Umayyad Caliphate had conquered Syria, Egypt, and North Africa from the predominantly Christian Byzantine Empire, and Spain from the Arian Christian Visigoths. When the Ummayads collapsed in North Africa, several smaller Muslim kingdoms emerged and attacked Italy in the 9th C. Pisa, Genoa, and Catalonia battled various Muslim kingdoms for control of the Mediterranean.The Crusaders were emboldened in their prospects for success in the Holy Land because of the successes they'd had in the Reconquista, the conquest of the Muslom Moors in the Iberian Peninsula. Earlier in the 11th C, French knights joined the Spanish in their campaign to retake their homeland. Shortly before the First Crusade, Pope Urban II encouraged the Spanish Christians to reconquer Tarragona, using much of the same symbolism and rhetoric he later used to preach Crusade to the people of Europe.Western Europe stabilized after the Saxons, Vikings, and Hungarians were brought into the Church by the end of the 10th C. But the demise of the Carolingian Empire gave rise to an entire class of warriors who had little to do but fight among themselves. The incessant warfare sapped Europe of its strength and wealth. Europe needed an external enemy they could turn their wrath on. As we saw in a previous episode, while the violence of knights was regularly condemned by the Church, and there was the attempt to regulate them in the treaties known as the Peace and Truce of God, the knights largely ignored these attempts at pacification. The Church needed an external threat they could direct the knights lust for battle toward.It was also at this time that the Popes were in constant competition with the Western emperors over the issue of investiture - the question of who had the authority to appoint bishops; the Church or the nobility. In some of the squabbles between Church and State, the popes weren't above calling out knights and nobles loyal to them to back down the power of the Emperor and recalcitrant nobles. So the Pope's mobilizing an armed force wasn't that far out of context.Another reason Pope Urban called for the First Crusade may have been his desire to assert control over the East. Remember that the Great Schism had occurred 40 years before and the churches had been rent ever since. While historians suggest this as one of several reasons driving Pope Urban's decision to start the Crusade, there's no evidence from any of his letters this factored into his plans.Until the crusaders' arrival, the Byzantines had continually fought the Muslim Turks for control of Asia Minor and Syria. The Seljuks, Sunni Muslims, had at one time ruled the Great Seljuk Empire, but by the First Crusade it had divided into several smaller states at odds with each other. If the First Crusade and been waged just a decade before it would probably have been crushed by a united Seljuk force. But by the time they arrived in the Middle East, the Seljuks were at odds with each other.Egypt and most of Palestine was controlled by the Arab Shi'ite Fatimid Caliphate, which was far smaller since the arrival of the Seljuks. Warfare between the Fatimids and Seljuks caused great disruption for the local Christians and western pilgrims. The Fatimids lost Jerusalem to the Seljuks in 1073, then recaptured it in 1098 just before the arrival of the Crusaders.As I said at the outset of this episode, this is just a summary of the First Crusade. Because this is such a crucial moment in Church History, we'll come back to it in our next episode.As we end, I want to once again say, “Thanks” to all the kind comments and those who've given the CS Facebook page a like.Every so often I mention that CS is supporter solely by a few subscribers. You can probably tell the podcast is your typical sole-author, “guy, a mic, and a computer” arrangement. I'm so thankful for those who occasionally send in a donation to keep CS going.

This 84th Episode of CS is titled Lost & is a brief review of The Church in the East.I encourage you to go back and listen again to episode 72 – Meanwhile Back in the East, which conveyed a lot of detail about the Eastern Church & how it fared under the Mongols and Muslim Expansion in the Middle Ages.Until that time, Christianity was widespread across a good part of the Middle East, Mesopotamia, Persia, & across Central Asia – reaching all the way to China. The reaction of Muslim rulers to the incipient Mongol affiliation with Christianity meant a systemic persecution of believers in Muslim lands, especially in Egypt, where Christians were regarded as a 5th Column. Then, when the Mongols embraced Islam, entire regions of Christians were eradicated.Still, even with these deprivations, Christianity continued to live on in vast portions of across the East.Let me insert a verbal footnote at this point. Much of what follows comes form the work of Philip Jenkins, whose book The Lost History of Christianity is a stellar review of the Church of the East. I heartily recommend it to all you hardcore history fans.Consider this . . .The news recently reported the attacks by ISIS on Assyrian Christians in Northern Iraq. This is a reprise of 1933, when Muslim forces in the new nation of Iraq launched assaults on Nestorian & Assyrians, in what had once been the Christian heartland of northern Mesopotamia. But now, government-sponsored militias cleansed most of the area of its Assyrian population, killing thousands, and eliminating dozens of villages.Although the atrocities weren't new, the arrival of modern media meant they reached the attention of the world, raising demands for Western intervention.These anti-Christian purges were shocked many & elicited a new legal vocabulary. Within months, the Jewish lawyer Raphael Lemkin referred to the Assyrians & Christian Armenians before them, to argue for a new legal category called crimes of barbarity, meaning “acts of extermination directed against the ethnic, religious or social collectivities whatever the motive; be it political or religious.” In 1943, Lemkin expanded this idea and coined a new word for such abhorrent behavior—Genocide.Yes = The modern concept of genocide as a horror calling for international sanctions has its roots in successful movements to eradicate Middle Eastern Christians.I mention this less than century old genocidal campaign against Assyrian Christians because we may tend to assume the Middle East has ALWAYS been dominated by Islam, or at least, it has since the 7th C. What we ought to understand instead is that it was only in the last Century that the Middle East wasn't understood as a home to a significant popular of Christians. Take ANY Middle Eastern person out of the 18th C and plant them in the Middle East of today and they would be stunned by the paucity of Christian presence.Until a century ago, the Middle East was a bewildering quilt of religious diversity in which Christians were a familiar part of the social and cultural landscape. Particularly startling for our time traveler would be modern-day Turkey as a Muslim land.Historically speaking, until very recently, Christians were as familiar a part of the Middle Eastern scene as Jews are in the United States, or Muslims are in Western Europe. At the dawn of the 20th C, Christians of the Middle East were about 11% of the population while American Jews are only about 2%!The destruction of the Middle Eastern Christian community is an historic transformation of the region.The decline of Christianity in the Near East occurred in two distinct phases.The first occurred during the Middle Ages and largely as a result of the Crusades. But even then, Christians suffered more or less regionally. The Syriac Church was virtually annihilated while the Egyptian Copts held their own. Reduced to a minority status, they entrenched & proved durable.But the second phase of hostility against Christians began about a century ago with the advent of a new & virulent form of Islamism. Now Christians are being systematically eradicated; either by aggressive assimilation or outright persecution. The 20th C saw the emergence of a form of Islam intolerant of any other faith.The Ottoman Turks began as a rather small power in Asia Minor. After the Mongol invasions destroyed the Seljuks, the Ottomans used the wars that followed to create a power base in Asia Minor. They gradually spread over what had been the Christian Byzantine Empire. By the time they took Constantinople, the Ottoman Empire included the Balkans, and by 1500 they controlled the Black Sea. By 1520 they ruled most of the Muslim world west of Persia, as far as Algiers, and became the main enemy for European Christians. Their European conquests advanced rapidly through the 16th C under such Selim I & Suleiman the Magnificent. In 1526, the Turks conquered Hungary, destroying what was at that time a major European power. Turkish advances weren't reversed until the their loss at Vienna in 1683.Selim I took the title of caliph, and took his role as head of Islam seriously. He ordered the confiscation of all churches, many of which were razed, and Ottoman authorities forced thousands of conversions. A century later, the sultan Ibrahim planned the total extermination of Christians. From the 15th C onward, the pressure to convert to Islam was massive. Throughout Christian territories held vassal by the Turks was levied the “tribute of children” by which Christian families had to give a number of their sons to be raised by the state as slaves, or as elite soldiers, called Janissaries. These janissaries became some of the most feared warriors in the Sultan's army against the Europeans.Ottoman warfare was extremely destructive because it drew on methods stemming from the Turkish heritage of Central Asia. Ottoman forces massacred entire Christian populations, targeting clergy and leaders. In 1480, the Turks destroyed the Italian city of Otranto, killing 12,000 and executing priests by sawing them in half. The destruction of Nicosia in Cyprus in 1570 was a crucial loss to Europe. Accounts of Ottoman warfare and punishment include such gruesome techniques as impaling, crucifixion, and flaying. When a Christian leader in Wallachia, named Vlad decided to use these very same tactics against the Turks, it gave rise to the legend of Dracula.From the 15th thru the 19th Cs, the Turks ruled over a large Christian population on European soil. They called Christians rayah, “the herd,” and treated them as animals to be sheared and exploited. A Bosnian Muslim song says >> “The rayah is like the grass; Mow it as much as you will till it springs up anew.”Though pressure to convert was strong, Christianity survived, and managed to recover in a few places like Greece & Bulgaria. But the Eastern Orthodox Church now followed the way of their earlier cousins, the Nestorian and Jacobite Churches & passed under Muslim rule.As the Near East fell under the control of Islamic states, Western European nations had an ever-greater incentive to find alternative trade routes. This they did by exploiting the seas. Well into the 15th C, explorers dreamed of linking up with the fabled Prester John, and renewing the alliance against Islam. In the mid–15th C, the Portuguese explored the Atlantic & shores of Africa. By the 17th C, Europeans were well on their way to global domination. Rising economic power led to urbanization, and the share of the world's population living in Europe and in European overseas colonies grew dramatically. Demographic expansion vastly increased the relative power of European Christianity.Expanding commercial horizons brought Europe's churches into contact with the tattered shreds of the ancient Eastern Christian groups. Tensions between European and non-European churches were of ancient origin. As early as 1300, Catholic missions in China had met sharp opposition from Nestorians, who naturally saw the newcomers making inroads on their ancient territories. Now, however, the Latin powers were far stronger than before, and better able to enforce their will. During the great period of Spanish and Portuguese empire building from the mid-16th to 17th C, the leading edge of Christian expansion was the Roman Catholic Church, fortified by the militancy of the Counter-Reformation. As Catholic clergy and missionaries roamed the world, they found the remnants of many ancient churches, which they determined to bring under papal control.So long-standing was the separation of Western and Eastern churches that the 2 sides never stood much chance of an alliance. As Christianity fell to such dire straits outside Europe, Catholics dismissed foreign traditions as marginal or even unchristian. After the fall of Constantinople, Pope Pius II wrote to the victorious sultan, effectively denying that the non-Catholic churches were Christian in any worthwhile sense: they were “all tainted with error, despite their worship of Christ.” He more or less explicitly asserted the identity of Christianity with the Catholic tradition and, even more, with Europe itself.As Western Christians traveled the world, many were skeptical about the credentials of other churches. In 1723, a French Jesuit reported that “the Copts in Egypt are a strange people far removed from the kingdom of God…although they say they are Christians they are such only in name and appearance. Indeed many of them are so odd that outside of their physical form scarcely anything human can be detected in them.”Latins were troubled by the pretensions of these threadbare Christians, who nevertheless claimed such grand titles. In 1550, a Portuguese traveler reported that the 40,000 Christians along the Indian coast owed their allegiance to a head in “Babylon,” someone they called the “catholicos.” Bafflingly, they had not so much as heard of a pope at Rome. Some years later, envoys dispatched by the Vatican were appalled to discover India's Nestorians called “the Patriarch of Babylon the universal pastor and head of the Catholic Church,” a title that in their view belonged exclusively to the Roman pontiff.For the first time, many Asian and African churches now found themselves under a European-based regime, and were forced to adjust their patterns of organization and worship accordingly.Around the world, we see similar attempts at harmonization. From the 1550s, factions in the Nestorian church sought Roman support, and much of the church accepted Roman rule under a new patriarch of the Chaldeans. Like other Eastern churches, the Catholic Chaldeans retained many of their customs and their own liturgy, but this compromise was not enough to draw in other Nestorians who maintained their existence as a separate church. The Jacobites split on similar lines, with an independent church remaining apart from the Catholic Syrians.The most controversial moment in this process of assimilation occurred in 1599, when Catholic authorities in southern India sought to absorb the ancient Syriac-founded churches of the region, the Thomas Christians. The main activist was Aleixo de Menezes, archbishop of the Portuguese colony of Goa, who maneuvered the Indian church into a union with Rome at a Synod in Diamper. In Indian Christian memory, de Menezes remains a villainous symbol of European imperialism, who began the speedy Romanization of the church, enforced by Goa's notoriously active inquisition. The synod ordered the burning of books teaching Nestorian errors as well as texts teaching practices Europeans deemed superstitious. A substantial body of Syriac and Nestorian tradition perished. Many local Christians reacted against the new policy by forming separate churches, and in later years the Thomas Christians were deeply fragmented.Yet despite this double pressure from Muslims and Catholics, Eastern Christian communities survived. At its height, the Ottoman Empire encompassed the Middle East, the Balkans, and North Africa, & in Europe included millions of subject Christians. Even in 1900, Muslims made up a little less than half the empire's overall population.This survival seems amazing when we think of the accumulated military catastrophes and defeats between 1300 and 1600, and the tyranny of sultans like Selim I. Yet for all these horrors, the Ottomans also found it in their interest to maintain a stable imperial order. After Sultan Mehmet II took Constantinople, he formally invested the new patriarch with his cross and staff, just as the Christian emperors had done previously. Christian numbers stabilized as the Ottomans granted them official status under a system dating back to the ancient Persians. They had their own patriarch who was both religious and civil head. This system endured into the 1920s.Within limits, Christians often flourished, to the puzzlement of western Europeans, who could not understand the distinctive Ottoman mix of tolerance and persecution. Particularly baffling was the extensive use the empire made of non-Muslims, who were in so many other ways denied the most basic rights. Sultans regularly used Christians and former Christians as administrators, partly because such outsiders would be wholly dependent on the ruler's pleasure: eight of the nine grand viziers of Suleiman the Magnificent were of Christian origin.Making their life under the new order more acceptable, Christians actively proved their loyalty. Above all, Orthodox believers were not likely to work with foreign Catholic powers to subvert Turkish rule. The Orthodox found the Muslims no more obnoxious than the Catholic nations, whose activities in recent centuries had left horrendous memories. Apart from the Latin sack of Constantinople in 1204, later Catholic invaders like the Venetians had been almost as tyrannical to their Orthodox subjects as were the Turks. Even in the last days of the empire, a Byzantine official famously declared, “Better the Sultan's turban than the Cardinal's hat!” Matters deteriorated further when the Orthodox saw how Catholics treated members of their own church in eastern Europe.By far the worst sufferers from the carnage of the 14th C were the old Eastern Syriac churches, precisely because they had once been so powerful and had posed a real danger to Muslim supremacy. Neither Jacobites nor Nestorians ever recovered from the time of Timur. If we combine all the different branches of these churches, we find barely half a million faithful by the early 20th C, scattered from Cyprus and Syria to Persia. This implosion led to a steep decline in morale and ambition. Instead of trying to convert the whole of Asia as they had originally envisioned and seemed within their grasp, the Syrian churches survived as inward-looking quasi-tribal bodies. Succession to the Nestorian patriarchate became hereditary, passing from uncle to nephew. Intellectual activity declined to nothing, at least in comparison with its glorious past. Most clergy were illiterate, and the church texts that do survive are imbued with superstition and folk magic.Well …That brings us now back to Europe and the monumental shift the Western Church had been moving toward for some time, as we've tracked over 8 episodes in our series, The Long Road to Reform.We'll pick it up there in our next episode.