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Speaker 1: The world is becoming increasingly proficient at telling stories that

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Speaker 1: deny God. As such, we need Thinking Christian to become

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Speaker 1: as natural as breathing. Welcome to the Thinking Christian podcast.

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Speaker 1: I'm doctor James Spencer, and through calm, thoughtful theological discussions,

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Speaker 1: Thinking Christian highlights the ways God is working in the

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Speaker 1: world and questions the underlying social, cultural, and political assumptions

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Speaker 1: that hinder Christians from becoming more like Christ. Now onto

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Speaker 1: today's episode of Thinking Christian. Hey, everyone, welcome to this

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Speaker 1: episode of Thinking Christian on Doctor James Spencer. I'm joined

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Speaker 1: by doctor Rashish Varma, and we're continuing our conversation about

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Speaker 1: biblical masculinity and really about what it means to become

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Speaker 1: a male disciple of Jesus. And so today we're going

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Speaker 1: to be discussing whether or not or how masculinity and

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Speaker 1: femininity were thought of in relation to the virtues in

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Speaker 1: the ancient world. And so this is very much a

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Speaker 1: discussion that I'm interested in, but on an expert on

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Speaker 1: and so it's great to have Ashi's here to talk

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Speaker 1: about it. So you just wanting to give a little

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Speaker 1: bit of your background on your intersection with the virtues

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Speaker 1: and theology, just so people have a context for what

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Speaker 1: this is and where you're coming from with it.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, I have a lot to say about virtues. It's

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Speaker 2: been a it's been a central focus of mind for

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Speaker 2: well over a decade, going back to my master's work.

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Speaker 2: When I first encountered it, it was specifically in the

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Speaker 2: context of conversations on epistemology, which is a fancy word

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Speaker 2: that means how do we how do we know that

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Speaker 2: we know? The late Jay Wood was a major player

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Speaker 2: in this, and he was a professor of mine of philosophy.

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Speaker 2: One of the key tenants is with virtue epistemology is

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Speaker 2: perhaps we're looking at things wrong in the modern age

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Speaker 2: when we when we keep asking the questions of knowledge

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Speaker 2: instead of it being a set of criteria of all

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Speaker 2: these things you need to fit together to say this

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Speaker 2: counts as knowledge right. So quick example would be I

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Speaker 2: did this once in class. I said to a student.

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Speaker 2: Let's say so and So's dad works on the railroad

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Speaker 2: and he comes home after a long day of work,

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Speaker 2: and he's tired. It was one hundred degree day, and

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Speaker 2: she knows after work he already likes to unwind. He

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Speaker 2: has the seat he likes to sit in and he relaxes.

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Speaker 2: Leave him alone for an hour while he recharges. On

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Speaker 2: this particular day, it's so hot that she thinks, yes,

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Speaker 2: I'm going to leave him alone, but I need to

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Speaker 2: leave him alone actively. I'm gonna go in there and

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Speaker 2: give him some lemonade help him recharge. She looks out

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Speaker 2: into the family room. She sees a head poking up

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Speaker 2: over the chair that he likes to sit in that

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Speaker 2: time of the day, and so she thinks, okay, he's home,

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Speaker 2: and she goes in there and it turns out it's

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Speaker 2: her uncle that's sitting in that chair. And then she

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Speaker 2: looks across the room and there's her dad. So her

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Speaker 2: dad was in the room, right, And the question of

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Speaker 2: epistemology is did she know that her dad was in

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Speaker 2: the room. And the answer is, for most epistemologists know

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Speaker 2: because there's a qualification that entails more than just being

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Speaker 2: right about something right. You certainly can't know something that

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Speaker 2: you're wrong about, but you don't Just being right doesn't

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Speaker 2: mean that you know right. She was right for the

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Speaker 2: wrong reason. So what are those reasons? Is the question

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Speaker 2: of epistemology. Now the added dynamic here, when I did

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Speaker 2: this with one of my students, was she was just dumbfounded,

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Speaker 2: and I was a little confused. I thought, this is

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Speaker 2: a lot of interesting stuff, but dumbfounded is a little

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Speaker 2: that much. She said, how did you know? My dad

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Speaker 2: works on the railroad? And I just chuck on and said,

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Speaker 2: are you serious? Yeah, yeah, Well it was a live

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Speaker 2: example within the example, right. I didn't know. I happened

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Speaker 2: to be right right, just like her in that fictive story.

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Speaker 2: I also happened to be right, but I did know,

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Speaker 2: so it served as a double example. Right. But what

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Speaker 2: Jay would in company Linda Zagzebsky is another major player

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Speaker 2: in this conversation, was maybe it's more than just trying

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Speaker 2: to figure out what those qualifications are for being right.

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Speaker 2: There's also a character element, and that's the virtue piece

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Speaker 2: that they were trying to draw into this. And that

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Speaker 2: was my first introduction to it, because at first it

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Speaker 2: seems odd I have to have strong character to be

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Speaker 2: counted as knowing now, we won't get into the depths

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Speaker 2: of that conversation other than to say, became increasingly compelling

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Speaker 2: to me to think character is a dynamic here, right,

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Speaker 2: Posturing yourself as a person who cares well and rightly

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Speaker 2: about knowing well is an important part. And in fact,

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Speaker 2: knowing well you don't just know because you have an

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Speaker 2: innate curiosity, but you have a desire to know things

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Speaker 2: on such an intricate level that the character of getting

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Speaker 2: people right matters. Right. I'm not going to just believe

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Speaker 2: someone comes to me with a story. I don't just

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Speaker 2: believe that story because they told me, or because I

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Speaker 2: like the person, or because what they said just sounds

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Speaker 2: outlandish enough that it must believe it. Right. What are

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Speaker 2: the characteristics that go into wanting to understand a situation

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Speaker 2: well enough? Right? So that got me into other conversations

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Speaker 2: that led me to someone named Dan Treyer, a late

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Speaker 2: theologian a Wheaton College, as well as Kevin Van Hooser,

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Speaker 2: who ended up being my doctoral supervisor. Where I wanted

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Speaker 2: to get into this more and more, and that led

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Speaker 2: into my dissertation, and for me, the question was historically

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Speaker 2: Christians do care about virtue right, which is virtue based ethics,

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Speaker 2: but they tended to be relegated to theological circles, especially

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Speaker 2: Catholic circles that Protestants tended to get nervous about. In fact,

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Speaker 2: they'd say that's a that's a Catholic issue. We don't

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Speaker 2: get into that. In fact, most Protestants in the modern

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Speaker 2: age tended to be drawn towards something called deontology on

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Speaker 2: one side, or utilitarianism on the other. The ontology is

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Speaker 2: a fantasy word that just basically says duty based ethics. Right,

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Speaker 2: you have a you have a larger sense of what's right,

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Speaker 2: is right, is always right, and that's what you do. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: And that tends to be the most common, especially among evangelicals.

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Speaker 2: Utilitarian ethics tends to be consequentialist ethics, which is just

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Speaker 2: a way of saying, we consider what the result will be,

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Speaker 2: and based upon the result, we make the right decision. Now,

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Speaker 2: a basic example, you're you're hiding a group of Jewish

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Speaker 2: people in the middle of the Holocaust. These Nazi soldiers

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Speaker 2: come to your door and they ask are you hiding

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Speaker 2: any Jewish people in your house? For the utilitarian, the

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Speaker 2: consequential based out like, the answer is really easy, right.

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Speaker 2: The consequence of me telling the truth is they're going

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Speaker 2: to take these Jewish people away and probably kill them,

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Speaker 2: if not kill them, put them in concentration camps. So

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Speaker 2: I lie, and that lie is not wrong because the

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Speaker 2: consequence is what matters. So there's an ethical dynamic tied

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Speaker 2: into the consequence. Yes, for the de ontologist, where it's

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Speaker 2: what's right is right, is always right? Right, these universal

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Speaker 2: imperatives categorical imperatives. Kant would say, it's a little bit

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Speaker 2: more complicated. I don't want to lie. Lying is wrong, yeah,

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Speaker 2: But if I don't lie, murder is going to happen. Right,

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Speaker 2: So Kant says, you find ways to truthfully be deceitful

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Speaker 2: because you can't lie. Yeah, So I think, well, the

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Speaker 2: question they asked my daughter, one of my daughters is

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Speaker 2: really good at this one. She picks on my words

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Speaker 2: all the time. If she wanted to be, she'd be

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Speaker 2: aontologists and training. But it's I think about the words.

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Speaker 2: Are you hiding a Jewish person in your house? Well,

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Speaker 2: it just so happens. I have a trapdoor in my

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Speaker 2: kitchen that leads under my house. So no, I don't

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Speaker 2: have Jewish people in my house. And I think all

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Speaker 2: this in my head. Obviously you don't say that out loud,

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Speaker 2: and so now I can, with a clean conscience tell

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Speaker 2: the truth. No, I do not have Jewish people in

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Speaker 2: my house. Everyone wins. I told the truth. Technically, the

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Speaker 2: people that I'm hiding are safe, and as long as

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Speaker 2: the soldiers believe me, they go away.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: The virtuoist and this is the more common historical Christian understanding,

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Speaker 2: but not a terribly prominent Protestant theory over the last

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Speaker 2: several centuries, says things are more complicated. Right. It's one

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Speaker 2: thing to speak of the Nazi situation and think of consequences.

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Speaker 2: It's another thing when you don't know what the consequence

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Speaker 2: will be. You don't know how things will turn out.

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Speaker 2: So let's take that Nazi example and let's move to

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Speaker 2: the Book of Joshua. So Joshua's sunspies into Jericho to

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Speaker 2: scope the place out, and now you've got Rahab. And

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Speaker 2: Rehab is in the same situation. She's hiding a couple

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Speaker 2: of these spies, and the soldiers come to her door.

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Speaker 2: We're looking for these spies? Are you hiding them? And

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Speaker 2: Rehab says no. Now she doesn't have the deontological situation

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Speaker 2: in hand where she can just say, well, I technically

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Speaker 2: didn't like the Rahab lies, right. But the interesting thing

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Speaker 2: about it is that she's commended as faithful and she's

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Speaker 2: the one who survives the destruction of Jericho right, her

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Speaker 2: and her family. So things seem a little bit more complicated.

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Speaker 2: Now from the consequentialist side, how could she possibly know

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Speaker 2: the consequence would be better for her to tell a lie.

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Speaker 2: As far as she knows, her protecting two people in

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Speaker 2: the face of these soldiers is stealing her own death warrant. Right,

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Speaker 2: as far as she's concerned, perhaps she's going to be

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Speaker 2: a martyr for this. She believes in the God of Israel,

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Speaker 2: she trusts that these people here for the right thing,

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Speaker 2: but it's not going to turn out well for her,

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Speaker 2: So she sort of fails. Both dynamics and the virtuous

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Speaker 2: would say, well, what matters here is character. In the

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Speaker 2: case of rehab, the reason she's saved is the character

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Speaker 2: of faith, the character of faithfulness, the character ultimately of

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Speaker 2: willing to place her life on the line to stand

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Speaker 2: up for what is right, even if the consequence is

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Speaker 2: the loss of her life and the life of those

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Speaker 2: she's standing.

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Speaker 3: Up for right.

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Speaker 2: And so this virtuous mentality is looking that way, and

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Speaker 2: that's to me, that was the most compelling ethical theory

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Speaker 2: and remains the most compelling ethical theory. Now, as we'll

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Speaker 2: talk a little bit about there's a sordid tale for virtue.

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Speaker 2: I don't want to overlook that. But my question was,

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Speaker 2: as I got into my doctoral work, what does it

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Speaker 2: mean to affirm the virtuous as a Protestant who stands

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Speaker 2: in a line of people who've generally been too scared

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Speaker 2: to think of virtue because it's quote that Catholic way

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Speaker 2: of thinking. So I wanted to try to make it,

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Speaker 2: make it theologically palatable for Protestants in general. So that's

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Speaker 2: kind of the background of how I got into it,

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Speaker 2: but also the issues that were at play that made

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Speaker 2: it more compelling to me because as I look at

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Speaker 2: the works of Jesus, the words of Jesus, the New Testament,

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Speaker 2: Corpus in general, really the Old Testament in general, character

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Speaker 2: seems to be what's on full display, right, whether it

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Speaker 2: be situations like Rahab or situations like where God gives

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Speaker 2: you this sacrificial system in the Old Testament and then

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Speaker 2: he says multiple times or either way right right, all

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Speaker 2: the way to the end of the Old Testament. With Malachi,

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Speaker 2: it's not really what I'm after after heart, right, It's

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Speaker 2: about the formation of these patterns of mercy, fat patterns

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Speaker 2: of justice. Right. So then the next question that comes

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Speaker 2: into virtue that I think especially makes it significant to

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Speaker 2: biblical theological ethics is that virtue cares about character. But

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Speaker 2: the formation of character is not just about a one

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Speaker 2: time does it all?

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Speaker 3: Right?

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Speaker 2: It's about the patterns or a word that you and

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Speaker 2: I both like in various context habits.

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Speaker 3: Yeah.

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Speaker 2: Right, So if we think about driving a car, when

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Speaker 2: we first drove a car, at least for me, it

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Speaker 2: was a terrifying thing. I was excited right up until

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Speaker 2: I started driving it. Sure, But of course decades later

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Speaker 2: we don't think about it. We often will end up

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Speaker 2: at our destination and realize we've been zoned out for

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Speaker 2: the last twenty minutes. Right, well, how does that happen?

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Speaker 2: We've built habits, hopefully of good driving, that allow us

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Speaker 2: to not have to agonize over every moment of driving

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Speaker 2: or every detail of driving, so that it becomes like

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Speaker 2: second nature and virtues wanting to say that ultimately these

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Speaker 2: decisions are not things that we can spend every moment

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Speaker 2: agonizing over, these ethical decisions. But for someone like rehab,

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Speaker 2: it's about building that ethical character over time or the habits,

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Speaker 2: so that when the moment arises, we habitually act in

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Speaker 2: a way that we ought to act in a way

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Speaker 2: that lifts up other people around us, whether or not

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Speaker 2: it means a consequence that's thriving for all of us. Right, So,

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Speaker 2: in the case of Rahab again, or the person hiding,

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Speaker 2: the Jewish soldier, or the Jewish refugees, it may turn

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Speaker 2: out really bad, oddly on paper for all of them.

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Speaker 2: They all die, but they did the right thing ostensibly

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Speaker 2: out of a sense of character that they'd formed through

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Speaker 2: right decisions over time.

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Speaker 1: Go ahead, No, I mean, I find it really interesting.

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Speaker 1: It feels like what it's moving toward is the deontological position,

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Speaker 1: and I don't know that that's correct. So there's a

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Speaker 1: part of me that so when we think about the

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Speaker 1: virtue aspect of this and the building of character across time,

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Speaker 1: that what we're always going to end up with is

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Speaker 1: some approximation of how we should act within a given moment,

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Speaker 1: because that moment is so strange and odd. And I

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Speaker 1: still like the analogy of a baby mobile above a

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Speaker 1: baby's crib, and you touch one side of it, and

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Speaker 1: the whole thing moves and not necessarily in ways that

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Speaker 1: that you wantderstand how it's going to move, right.

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Speaker 3: And so with the virtue ethics.

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Speaker 1: As you're developing these patterns of integrity across time, patterns

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Speaker 1: of virtue across time, is that similarly what's happening like

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Speaker 1: in any given moment, you are trying to embody faithfulness,

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Speaker 1: You're trying to be you know, embody these virtues of charity, mercy, compassion,

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Speaker 1: what have you. But in any given situation, you may

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Speaker 1: find yourself unsure how to go about doing that because

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Speaker 1: the consequences seem so dire, and the the the right

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Speaker 1: thing seems like it's going to end up with the

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Speaker 1: wrong result.

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Speaker 3: Does that make sense? And so you're as you're on this.

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Speaker 1: Road, you're you're developing a consistent pattern, but not a concrete,

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Speaker 1: completely rigid understanding of what to do in any given situation.

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Speaker 2: That's right, That's right.

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Speaker 3: Okay.

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Speaker 2: So if we think about someone like the nineteenth century

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Speaker 2: Danish philosopher Kirkgard, he spent a lot of time really

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Speaker 2: dwelling upon the sacrifice or the potential or the near

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Speaker 2: sacrifice of Isaac Yes at the hands of Abraham, and

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Speaker 2: for him he wasn't a virtuous to per se. He

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Speaker 2: came up with a whole another way of thinking that

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Speaker 2: I don't entirely buy, but I think his scenario is instructive.

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Speaker 3: For him.

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Speaker 2: He was critiquing, especially a day ontological understanding of these

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Speaker 2: sort of static ethical codes that we just memorize, right,

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Speaker 2: the way that we tend to think of, I would say,

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Speaker 2: wrongly the Ten commandments, thou shalt not kill? Right. And

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Speaker 2: yet here's Abraham, before those codes obviously are given to him.

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Speaker 2: He's told, Hey, take Isaac up to that mountain and

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Speaker 2: offer him as a sacrifice.

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Speaker 3: Right now.

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Speaker 2: You and I have discussed when we were working through Genesis,

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Speaker 2: a series that I don't think will be out yet,

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Speaker 2: but check it out, YEA, that there are other things

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Speaker 2: that play there for Abraham than just a simple, out

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Speaker 2: of nowhere, blank slate command, go kill your son Isaac. However,

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Speaker 2: he does have this moment that Kirkerguard wants to say,

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Speaker 2: where it's a there's something of an assault upon his

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Speaker 2: ethical code if he's thinking, don't kill because now the

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Speaker 2: God who he's supposed to obey, who is trusting, who

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Speaker 2: has led him into this new land, who's made these

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Speaker 2: promises to him, wants him to kill not just anyone

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Speaker 2: but his own son, and not just any son, but

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Speaker 2: the only son that's supposed to be the avenue to

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Speaker 2: the fulfillment of the promises made to him. Right, So,

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Speaker 2: for Kirkerguard, the answer is despair. You enter this moment

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Speaker 2: where your rigid categories of ethics will ultimately lead you,

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Speaker 2: in complicated situations to despair. Now, the question is what

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Speaker 2: do you do with that despair? You wallow in that despair,

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Speaker 2: in which case you're functionally a broken person, and maybe

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Speaker 2: you chuck everything and you say, I reject faith in

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Speaker 2: Yahweh the covenant God, or I reject faith in Jesus

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Speaker 2: because it's asked me now to do something I can't do.

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Speaker 2: Cure of God's answer is you graduate finally in that

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Speaker 2: ultimate despair into what's the true ethical and the true

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Speaker 2: ethicals obedience to God. I would break from him there

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Speaker 2: and say that the obedience has too much in the background,

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Speaker 2: right of how do you know this is the place

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Speaker 2: to show obedience or how do you know that the

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Speaker 2: obedience will be paid forward in the case of Abraham

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Speaker 2: in the right way? Well, Kiderguard would say, well, you

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Speaker 2: don't know. You just do it because God said to

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Speaker 2: do it. The virtuous way would say, there's a sense

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Speaker 2: of character at play where you're you're trusting God. So

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Speaker 2: for the for the theological virtue tradition, faith or trusting

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Speaker 2: God is itself an ethical reality. Your trusting God is

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Speaker 2: so formed in you because you trust God every day

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Speaker 2: in the little things. Give us this day our daily bread. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: deliver me, Deliver me from evil? Right, forgive me my debts.

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Speaker 2: If you're doing this in the daily life, then when

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Speaker 2: this cataclysmic event that could cause you despair comes upon you,

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Speaker 2: you recognize there's more at play than meets the eye.

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Speaker 2: And so perhaps as as you've spoken about it before,

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Speaker 2: when Abraham encounters this seemingly awful command from God, he's

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Speaker 2: recognizing there has to be more than meets the eye, right,

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Speaker 2: because God has already given me this son in my

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Speaker 2: age and in my wife's old age, in a way

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Speaker 2: that God didn't have to do, but God did because

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Speaker 2: God promised it. And I've already learned in the little

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Speaker 2: things to trust God. So now the form of that,

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Speaker 2: the habit of mine, the habit of disposition to trust,

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Speaker 2: is in place. And so the virtuous action is to say,

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Speaker 2: I don't actually perhaps believe that God intends to have

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Speaker 2: me kill Isaac, or that God will allow Isaac to

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Speaker 2: stay dead. I believe God, who has already shown me

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Speaker 2: these steps, will do something about it. Right, So I

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Speaker 2: think of I mentioned Dan Tryer once he told me

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Speaker 2: sometimes God perhaps puts things in front of you to

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Speaker 2: teach us to say no. You shouldn't assume every opportunity

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Speaker 2: is a real opportunity that you should say yes to.

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Speaker 2: And I take that to heart, right, But how do

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Speaker 2: you know those moments? Well, you don't know it in

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Speaker 2: any sort of straightforward way. But if you have the

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Speaker 2: habit of disposition, and you're faithfully working forward to build

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Speaker 2: those habits of trust, perhaps you know in a certain

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Speaker 2: moment there is a path that I could take, and

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Speaker 2: take that path seems like it could get me the

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Speaker 2: right result that I want. But I think that path,

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Speaker 2: based upon this habit of faith that I've been forming,

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Speaker 2: based on the habit of charity of justice that I've

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Speaker 2: been forming, seems like the wrong path. It requires me

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Speaker 2: to compromise in the wrong ways. So perhaps it's better

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Speaker 2: to quote something else we've talked about, lose in the

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Speaker 2: right way, and that's actually a win. Right. Yeah, So

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Speaker 2: there would be the disposition, the character the virtuous want

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Speaker 2: to talk about.

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Speaker 1: So let me give just one more example to make

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Speaker 1: sure I think, because I think I understand this, and

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Speaker 1: I'm kind of reading it through Pierre Bordio's habitists, Like

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Speaker 1: it seems like it has a lot of connection there

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Speaker 1: where you're kind of learning how to go about operating.

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Speaker 1: Pierre Bordeo's has a little bit more impetus, I think

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Speaker 1: on the reward structure, like the capital within a field,

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Speaker 1: but I also don't think that's inconsequential to the virtue

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Speaker 1: side of things.

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Speaker 3: So but here's my here's my thought.

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Speaker 1: Like I got a job offer to travel around and

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Speaker 1: meet with CEOs, Christian CEOs of different companies, and I

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Speaker 1: would sort of disciple, you know, ten or fifteen of

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Speaker 1: these CEOs is the job, right, But it required an

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Speaker 1: awful lot of travel. This is a couple of years ago.

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Speaker 1: My daughters were fifteen at the time, my son would

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Speaker 1: have been eighteen, just going off to college. You know,

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Speaker 1: we were in the midst of adopting our youngest.

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Speaker 3: And I'm just sitting there.

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Speaker 1: I'm like, this is a really cool job, like discipling

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Speaker 1: these guys, and you know, like I had the right

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Speaker 1: disposition for it. You know, I'd been in executive leadership positions.

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Speaker 1: I'm not not overly confident, right, but I'm not I'm

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Speaker 1: also not going to be a pushover, right, So there's

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Speaker 1: not gonna be this ego trip between me and the CEOs, right.

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Speaker 1: And and I was like, this would be a really

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Speaker 1: cool job, right, really interesting, really compelling job, great opportunity

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Speaker 1: that I ended up saying no to because in part

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Speaker 1: I was like, I have to travel, I'd have to

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Speaker 1: be gone most of the time, and that's not gonna work.

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Speaker 1: It's not gonna It's not just that it's not gonna work,

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Speaker 1: it's that I don't want to be an absentee father

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Speaker 1: at this time in my kids' lives. Like this job

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Speaker 1: would be perfect if it were seven years down the

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Speaker 1: road or something like that.

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Speaker 3: Right, you're really cool.

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Speaker 1: I could travel, you know, kids would be out of

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Speaker 1: the house mostly and like wouldn't be really missed. And

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Speaker 1: it's one of those moments where I can remember just thinking, like, intuitively,

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Speaker 1: you get this job offer, it's a great job offer.

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Speaker 1: There's high potential there, and it was really easy for

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Speaker 1: me to say no. And it had nothing to do

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Speaker 1: with this is a bad job or I thought these

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Speaker 1: people were untrustworthy, like there's no suspicion lying around the corners.

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Speaker 1: It was just when you look out across your whole

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Speaker 1: life and you're trying to figure out who you're going

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Speaker 1: to be in the moment, that job didn't fit and

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Speaker 1: I can tell right.

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Speaker 3: Is that sort of the kind of.

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Speaker 1: Logic that you're suggesting. Now, obviously it wasn't a positive decision,

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Speaker 1: but that's sort of that, Dan Tryer. Sometimes we get

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Speaker 1: opportunities we need to say no to right and it's like, Nope,

406
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Speaker 1: that one was a no, not for any real good

407
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Speaker 1: reason that I could point out other than I didn't

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Speaker 1: want to be away from home all the time.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's precisely the sort of thing that virtue ethics

410
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Speaker 2: is trying to get at. That there's no clear cut

411
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Speaker 2: good at the end that you're trying to work towards right. Right,

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Speaker 2: No one's going to say that the opportunity to do

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Speaker 2: this work that was put before you was inherently a

414
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Speaker 2: good or a bad right. If anything, it seems like

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Speaker 2: a good it's work support your family financially, right, something

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Speaker 2: you theoretically could have enjoyed. But the disposition, the character

417
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Speaker 2: development is the ability for you to work through larger ramifications,

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Speaker 2: not in a consequentialist way, right, Not in the sense

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Speaker 2: of if I do X, then my daughters will resent

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Speaker 2: me ten years down the line.

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Speaker 3: Right.

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Speaker 2: You can't know that, And that doesn't mean there's no

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Speaker 2: way for you to negotiate it in a way that

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Speaker 2: they wouldn't resent you. It's rather thinking dispositionally about what

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Speaker 2: is it that is best in the moment and in

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Speaker 2: the near future. Right. But it doesn't mean that in

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Speaker 2: every situation your calculations in precisely the right way.

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Speaker 3: Right.

429
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Speaker 2: You're filtering it through other virtues. You're thinking about it

430
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Speaker 2: in terms of fatherhood, You're thinking of it in terms

431
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Speaker 2: of family, in generally, thinking about it in terms of

432
00:25:59,240 --> 00:26:04,240
Speaker 2: the development of young people in this case who were

433
00:26:04,280 --> 00:26:07,920
Speaker 2: your children, right, And all those things work together where

434
00:26:07,960 --> 00:26:10,840
Speaker 2: you realize there is a higher good, and that's ultimately.

435
00:26:10,960 --> 00:26:17,040
Speaker 2: Virtues are directed towards goods, and virtues want to want

436
00:26:17,080 --> 00:26:21,000
Speaker 2: to rate goods of what is the better good, and

437
00:26:21,119 --> 00:26:24,360
Speaker 2: especially theological virtuants to say the higher good, the highest

438
00:26:24,400 --> 00:26:29,680
Speaker 2: good is ultimately that which promotes the love of God. Right,

439
00:26:29,800 --> 00:26:32,919
Speaker 2: It recognizes God's love but also promotes the love of

440
00:26:32,920 --> 00:26:35,920
Speaker 2: God and others. So in your case, you're thinking, even

441
00:26:35,960 --> 00:26:39,080
Speaker 2: if not explicitly right, that the habit of formation is

442
00:26:39,119 --> 00:26:42,720
Speaker 2: thinking about what promotes the highest good of my children

443
00:26:42,800 --> 00:26:46,040
Speaker 2: growing as people who love God with all their hearts, soul,

444
00:26:46,080 --> 00:26:50,479
Speaker 2: mind and strength, and love their neighbor as themselves. And

445
00:26:50,520 --> 00:26:51,720
Speaker 2: that's how you make that decision.

446
00:26:52,000 --> 00:26:52,840
Speaker 3: Right.

447
00:26:52,840 --> 00:26:55,720
Speaker 2: But a virtuous could very well say there's no inherently

448
00:26:55,800 --> 00:26:58,400
Speaker 2: bad decision in this case, or it might say they

449
00:26:58,400 --> 00:27:02,280
Speaker 2: all might seem like bad decisions, but what is what

450
00:27:02,359 --> 00:27:04,960
Speaker 2: is the greatest good? Theologically? It's to promote the love

451
00:27:05,000 --> 00:27:05,359
Speaker 2: of God?

452
00:27:05,760 --> 00:27:07,359
Speaker 3: Yeah? Right, Yeah?

453
00:27:07,400 --> 00:27:10,119
Speaker 1: And I don't I didn't think it through like I

454
00:27:10,119 --> 00:27:12,399
Speaker 1: think that's good. Like I wasn't thinking my kids was

455
00:27:12,400 --> 00:27:16,000
Speaker 1: to resent me. I was thinking more in terms of

456
00:27:17,080 --> 00:27:18,639
Speaker 1: is this the person I want to be?

457
00:27:19,640 --> 00:27:19,800
Speaker 2: Right?

458
00:27:20,080 --> 00:27:22,360
Speaker 1: Is this who I've really like? You know, I left

459
00:27:22,400 --> 00:27:25,560
Speaker 1: higher education. I came into this new nonprofit position so

460
00:27:25,600 --> 00:27:28,080
Speaker 1: I could work from home, partially because I could work

461
00:27:28,080 --> 00:27:30,040
Speaker 1: from home partially so I could slow my life down

462
00:27:30,480 --> 00:27:34,000
Speaker 1: be a husband and a father. And so I've done that.

463
00:27:34,720 --> 00:27:37,840
Speaker 1: Why would I now shift logic to go into this

464
00:27:37,880 --> 00:27:41,600
Speaker 1: other realm, you know, range and like jump into this

465
00:27:41,600 --> 00:27:45,080
Speaker 1: new position where I could no longer do that, and

466
00:27:45,160 --> 00:27:48,679
Speaker 1: so it wasn't a it wasn't a consequentialist decision. It

467
00:27:48,760 --> 00:27:53,080
Speaker 1: was more of a trajectory and personhood decision, right like,

468
00:27:53,800 --> 00:27:56,320
Speaker 1: is this a is this the moment where you just

469
00:27:56,359 --> 00:27:59,920
Speaker 1: shift gears and do something out of sheer ambition or

470
00:28:00,119 --> 00:28:05,240
Speaker 1: interest or whatever and you know, forget everything else kind

471
00:28:05,280 --> 00:28:07,000
Speaker 1: of like you did at the beginning of your career,

472
00:28:07,920 --> 00:28:12,000
Speaker 1: or do you stay the course because you at one

473
00:28:12,040 --> 00:28:14,280
Speaker 1: point in the past came to realize that this is

474
00:28:14,320 --> 00:28:18,159
Speaker 1: where your life needed to go, right like, And so

475
00:28:18,280 --> 00:28:22,840
Speaker 1: that that was very much the guiding paradigm for it. Yeah,

476
00:28:22,840 --> 00:28:26,840
Speaker 1: but let me shift because we're we probably should get

477
00:28:26,840 --> 00:28:30,520
Speaker 1: to masculinity and femininity at some point. So that last

478
00:28:30,520 --> 00:28:33,200
Speaker 1: thing you said, that virtue is to lead to the

479
00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:35,560
Speaker 1: highest good? Right if we just left it there and

480
00:28:35,600 --> 00:28:37,800
Speaker 1: we take it out of a Christian context for a moment,

481
00:28:38,200 --> 00:28:39,640
Speaker 1: and we just said virtue is to lead to the

482
00:28:39,720 --> 00:28:44,880
Speaker 1: highest good. So there isn't now an overlay of covenant

483
00:28:44,880 --> 00:28:48,400
Speaker 1: loyalty d yahweh and obedience to the Lord and you know,

484
00:28:49,160 --> 00:28:53,800
Speaker 1: adherence to a triune sort of doctrinal statement or something

485
00:28:53,840 --> 00:28:58,440
Speaker 1: like that. Like it's just the highest good. That's only

486
00:28:58,560 --> 00:29:02,160
Speaker 1: almost sets the stage for or both really really amazing

487
00:29:02,280 --> 00:29:05,960
Speaker 1: things and really really manipulative things.

488
00:29:07,000 --> 00:29:08,400
Speaker 3: Yeah, right, and so.

489
00:29:08,440 --> 00:29:10,840
Speaker 1: You can see how it would lead to the good side.

490
00:29:11,040 --> 00:29:12,520
Speaker 1: You can also see how it would lead to the

491
00:29:12,600 --> 00:29:13,200
Speaker 1: dark side.

492
00:29:13,360 --> 00:29:13,560
Speaker 3: Right.

493
00:29:13,600 --> 00:29:16,840
Speaker 1: It's the force and depending on how you use it. Now,

494
00:29:16,880 --> 00:29:18,960
Speaker 1: it's going to create good and bad things.

495
00:29:18,720 --> 00:29:19,240
Speaker 3: In the world.

496
00:29:19,360 --> 00:29:23,080
Speaker 1: So how does virtue go off the rails as it

497
00:29:23,160 --> 00:29:26,120
Speaker 1: moves from let's aim for the highest good? What's the

498
00:29:26,160 --> 00:29:29,280
Speaker 1: sort of dark side of virtue in relation to masculinity

499
00:29:29,280 --> 00:29:30,040
Speaker 1: and femininity?

500
00:29:31,320 --> 00:29:37,120
Speaker 2: Yes, great question. So sort of a sub question in

501
00:29:37,160 --> 00:29:42,200
Speaker 2: this is does virtue entail some sort of gendered concept?

502
00:29:44,800 --> 00:29:47,560
Speaker 2: And I think I should answer that with a brief sketch,

503
00:29:47,880 --> 00:29:52,040
Speaker 2: not going to the details. We don't have time for that. Historically,

504
00:29:52,080 --> 00:29:57,560
Speaker 2: I'll say, unfortunately it has. But I also want to

505
00:29:57,600 --> 00:30:04,120
Speaker 2: say at its best shouldn't and at its best people

506
00:30:04,120 --> 00:30:09,200
Speaker 2: have recognized that it shouldn't and doesn't. Right, So historically

507
00:30:09,280 --> 00:30:13,400
Speaker 2: it has just some quick points. This is true in

508
00:30:13,440 --> 00:30:16,960
Speaker 2: the Church's history. This is true outside of Christian thinking

509
00:30:16,960 --> 00:30:21,600
Speaker 2: about virtue. Aristotle in the three hundred s BCS writes

510
00:30:21,600 --> 00:30:26,480
Speaker 2: as nikomaky and Ethics, and he argues that true virtue

511
00:30:26,880 --> 00:30:31,600
Speaker 2: is in fact a male phenomenon. Women can't achieve it,

512
00:30:32,720 --> 00:30:36,760
Speaker 2: but he doesn't think it's inherent to just a generic masculinity.

513
00:30:36,920 --> 00:30:40,680
Speaker 2: So he distinguishes between the kind of masculinity that he

514
00:30:40,760 --> 00:30:44,840
Speaker 2: wants to affirm, which is thoughtful, which is detached in

515
00:30:44,880 --> 00:30:49,480
Speaker 2: some ways from the passions that lead to the fluctuations

516
00:30:49,480 --> 00:30:53,800
Speaker 2: in our material reality, and it's related instead to the

517
00:30:53,880 --> 00:30:58,040
Speaker 2: lack of fluctuation that he sees in the permanence of intellect. Now,

518
00:30:58,080 --> 00:31:01,920
Speaker 2: what he means by that is the thinking person, the

519
00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:07,080
Speaker 2: person who dwells on mind over matter, intellect over emotion,

520
00:31:07,480 --> 00:31:11,600
Speaker 2: reason over emotion. That's the path, and for him, that

521
00:31:11,720 --> 00:31:16,440
Speaker 2: is a male tendency. But it is a tendency, interestingly enough,

522
00:31:17,080 --> 00:31:21,960
Speaker 2: that's distinct from the other extreme, which is a machismo,

523
00:31:22,200 --> 00:31:26,880
Speaker 2: a kind of masculinity that is about brute strength, that's

524
00:31:26,920 --> 00:31:33,840
Speaker 2: about overpowering physically. I say interestingly because I think that

525
00:31:34,000 --> 00:31:41,000
Speaker 2: sort of brute strength is where not just the Christian tradition,

526
00:31:41,200 --> 00:31:43,720
Speaker 2: but the modern tendency tends to go to. Right, I

527
00:31:43,720 --> 00:31:45,760
Speaker 2: don't think you have to look any further than the

528
00:31:45,880 --> 00:31:48,280
Speaker 2: archetype of the superhero, which, by the way, I enjoy

529
00:31:48,360 --> 00:31:53,360
Speaker 2: superhero things, but we should be honest about them as well. Yeah,

530
00:31:53,680 --> 00:31:56,320
Speaker 2: So on the one side you have the negative look,

531
00:31:56,680 --> 00:31:59,480
Speaker 2: which is the feminine, and for him, the feminine is

532
00:31:59,480 --> 00:32:02,560
Speaker 2: inherently tied to emotional ups and downs. Right, it's the

533
00:32:02,560 --> 00:32:06,280
Speaker 2: stereotype that still exists. Right, Ah, you're too emotional. Right,

534
00:32:06,360 --> 00:32:09,880
Speaker 2: you're thinking, you're thinking through your period. That's why you're thinking.

535
00:32:10,040 --> 00:32:14,640
Speaker 2: All these terrible stereotypes that have often been laid upon

536
00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:17,920
Speaker 2: the floor or at the feet of women. And on

537
00:32:17,920 --> 00:32:26,400
Speaker 2: the other side there's the bad masculine, the machismo. History

538
00:32:26,400 --> 00:32:29,360
Speaker 2: has shown us that while these things have shifted a bit,

539
00:32:30,040 --> 00:32:32,680
Speaker 2: they haven't gone away. So if you look at, for instance,

540
00:32:33,800 --> 00:32:37,360
Speaker 2: the giant colonial rush that leads us from the fourteen

541
00:32:37,400 --> 00:32:40,120
Speaker 2: hundred to fifteen hundred and sixt through the eighteen hundreds, right,

542
00:32:41,200 --> 00:32:44,760
Speaker 2: virtue is an important part of that conversation, unfortunately, because

543
00:32:44,840 --> 00:32:49,400
Speaker 2: it becomes the justification. Right, we see these peoples, and

544
00:32:49,480 --> 00:32:53,200
Speaker 2: these peoples, whether they be in Africa, whether they be

545
00:32:53,240 --> 00:32:55,120
Speaker 2: in India, whether it be in the Americas as we

546
00:32:55,160 --> 00:32:59,040
Speaker 2: know them today, the common thing to varying degrees, and

547
00:32:59,080 --> 00:33:01,880
Speaker 2: the varying degrees was important because the varying degrees determined

548
00:33:01,920 --> 00:33:04,880
Speaker 2: what you do now in the colonial bush. So the

549
00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:08,320
Speaker 2: African person was seen to be the most barbaric and

550
00:33:08,400 --> 00:33:13,800
Speaker 2: so they must be enslaved. The Indian person was seen

551
00:33:13,880 --> 00:33:17,520
Speaker 2: as having glimmers of hope, so you just colonize, don't enslave.

552
00:33:19,640 --> 00:33:24,120
Speaker 2: The person who was in the Americas was seen as barbaric,

553
00:33:25,720 --> 00:33:29,760
Speaker 2: but also useless because they were seen as not strong

554
00:33:29,920 --> 00:33:34,200
Speaker 2: like black bodies of Africa, and therefore they should be

555
00:33:34,760 --> 00:33:42,480
Speaker 2: forced into submission and worst case scenario exterminated. Interestingly, the

556
00:33:42,520 --> 00:33:46,400
Speaker 2: common thread was that in each of these situations, the

557
00:33:46,520 --> 00:33:51,920
Speaker 2: reason you have the scenarios and play that would enable

558
00:33:52,080 --> 00:33:57,040
Speaker 2: people being seen as barbaric was because the colonizers thought

559
00:33:58,120 --> 00:34:04,960
Speaker 2: they're too effeminate. So looking at the first nations peoples,

560
00:34:05,280 --> 00:34:08,640
Speaker 2: the men don't act in a masculine enough way, well,

561
00:34:08,680 --> 00:34:12,160
Speaker 2: what is a masculine enough way? They didn't do the

562
00:34:12,280 --> 00:34:15,200
Speaker 2: sorts of things across, They didn't draw the lines between

563
00:34:15,360 --> 00:34:17,719
Speaker 2: male and female roles in their society the way that

564
00:34:18,719 --> 00:34:20,759
Speaker 2: the English or the French, or the Spanish, or the

565
00:34:20,840 --> 00:34:23,080
Speaker 2: Dutch or the Germans did right or the Portuguese whoever

566
00:34:23,120 --> 00:34:26,560
Speaker 2: was doing the colonizing, and as a result, this was

567
00:34:26,600 --> 00:34:33,000
Speaker 2: a sign that their nature had been warped, and therefore

568
00:34:34,000 --> 00:34:39,959
Speaker 2: good Christian virtue requires that we suppressed them in order

569
00:34:40,000 --> 00:34:43,319
Speaker 2: to destroy their way of being. A common phrase was

570
00:34:44,160 --> 00:34:47,759
Speaker 2: killed the Indians save the person in order to then

571
00:34:47,840 --> 00:34:51,479
Speaker 2: lift them up civilly into a better way of being,

572
00:34:51,719 --> 00:34:54,880
Speaker 2: so that they can now enter into the path, a

573
00:34:54,960 --> 00:35:01,320
Speaker 2: virtue which can culminate in the reception of grace. Similar

574
00:35:01,400 --> 00:35:04,879
Speaker 2: things were said centuries later, for instance, during World War Two.

575
00:35:05,000 --> 00:35:07,880
Speaker 2: You know, Winston Churchill is a beloved figure in the

576
00:35:07,880 --> 00:35:11,960
Speaker 2: Western world, much more complicated figure in the Indian world.

577
00:35:12,400 --> 00:35:19,160
Speaker 2: Winston Churchill his actions that ostensibly were important for the

578
00:35:19,200 --> 00:35:23,960
Speaker 2: Allied forces in freeing the enslaved Jewish peoples that had

579
00:35:24,000 --> 00:35:27,160
Speaker 2: already been killed. Some estimates say in the range of

580
00:35:27,200 --> 00:35:33,040
Speaker 2: six million people. His actions deliberately right. There's plenty of

581
00:35:33,160 --> 00:35:38,759
Speaker 2: actual physical evidence writing correspondence, deliberately led to the starvation

582
00:35:38,880 --> 00:35:42,680
Speaker 2: of tens of millions of people in India for the

583
00:35:42,719 --> 00:35:45,760
Speaker 2: greater good, right utilitarian, for the greater good in his mind,

584
00:35:46,080 --> 00:35:52,840
Speaker 2: of feeding English people and creating a stockhold of food

585
00:35:52,920 --> 00:35:55,279
Speaker 2: resources so that English people wouldn't be worried about where

586
00:35:55,320 --> 00:35:58,200
Speaker 2: their next bite was coming from, so that morale would

587
00:35:58,200 --> 00:36:01,359
Speaker 2: be high, so that they could then fight the Nazis, right,

588
00:36:01,480 --> 00:36:03,880
Speaker 2: so to save the six million, tens of millions of

589
00:36:03,880 --> 00:36:07,600
Speaker 2: people starved to death in India. When people like Mahatma

590
00:36:07,640 --> 00:36:12,359
Speaker 2: Gandhi stood up against this, the criticism was, we can

591
00:36:12,480 --> 00:36:16,520
Speaker 2: see the inherent racial inferiority of the Indian people, which

592
00:36:16,600 --> 00:36:19,640
Speaker 2: allows for us to be able to say the greater

593
00:36:19,719 --> 00:36:23,360
Speaker 2: good is to feed the English and to keep English

594
00:36:23,400 --> 00:36:29,520
Speaker 2: morale high overfeeding Indian people. And we see the moral

595
00:36:29,680 --> 00:36:32,960
Speaker 2: and natural inferiority of the Indian people in someone like

596
00:36:33,000 --> 00:36:36,279
Speaker 2: Mahatma Gandhi. The person who stands up for them is

597
00:36:36,320 --> 00:36:39,680
Speaker 2: not masculine enough, he's too effeminate, and that shows their

598
00:36:39,760 --> 00:36:44,120
Speaker 2: racial inferiority. Right. The logic is hopefully sounds insane, but

599
00:36:44,160 --> 00:36:47,239
Speaker 2: that was the logic. You have similar sorts of logic

600
00:36:47,280 --> 00:36:51,480
Speaker 2: in Africa, right, that lead to the enslavement of African peoples.

601
00:36:53,920 --> 00:36:56,799
Speaker 2: That the idea is this virtue sat in the middle.

602
00:36:56,560 --> 00:37:02,799
Speaker 1: Of that, right, and counter yeah, well, I just want

603
00:37:02,840 --> 00:37:05,279
Speaker 1: to yes, virtue sat in the middle of it.

604
00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:05,920
Speaker 3: But it's.

605
00:37:09,239 --> 00:37:14,400
Speaker 1: It's a constructed virtue. Right, So this is one of

606
00:37:14,440 --> 00:37:17,960
Speaker 1: the things, like a DC Schindler writes on this fair amount,

607
00:37:18,239 --> 00:37:21,479
Speaker 1: he's a Catholic philosopher, and so one of the things

608
00:37:21,480 --> 00:37:23,840
Speaker 1: he talks about is the good, the true, and the beautiful,

609
00:37:23,880 --> 00:37:30,600
Speaker 1: the transcendentals, and his emphasis is on something like, because

610
00:37:30,600 --> 00:37:33,400
Speaker 1: we don't determine the good, the true, and the beautiful,

611
00:37:33,400 --> 00:37:36,080
Speaker 1: we only recognize them. These are my words, not his,

612
00:37:36,200 --> 00:37:37,719
Speaker 1: but this is the sense of what he's saying. So

613
00:37:37,760 --> 00:37:40,400
Speaker 1: we recognize the truth, the good, and the beautiful, or

614
00:37:40,440 --> 00:37:45,520
Speaker 1: we don't, right, But either way, we don't determine them.

615
00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:48,600
Speaker 3: They are what they are. There is a good, there

616
00:37:48,680 --> 00:37:49,880
Speaker 3: is a true, there is a beautiful.

617
00:37:52,040 --> 00:37:55,279
Speaker 1: And in a in sort of an extrapolated way, then

618
00:37:55,280 --> 00:37:59,120
Speaker 1: they have a claim on our lives. They have a

619
00:37:59,160 --> 00:38:02,480
Speaker 1: sort of quasi authority over us. If we want to

620
00:38:02,480 --> 00:38:04,480
Speaker 1: be good, we have to then align with the good.

621
00:38:04,480 --> 00:38:06,040
Speaker 1: If we want to be true, we have to align

622
00:38:06,040 --> 00:38:07,680
Speaker 1: with the truth. If we want to be beautiful, we

623
00:38:07,719 --> 00:38:10,680
Speaker 1: have to align with the beautiful. That kind of idea, right,

624
00:38:11,200 --> 00:38:13,840
Speaker 1: And we have to recognize not just in the sense

625
00:38:13,840 --> 00:38:16,799
Speaker 1: of identifying them this is good, this is true, this

626
00:38:16,880 --> 00:38:20,520
Speaker 1: is beautiful, but recognized in the sense of accepting the

627
00:38:20,520 --> 00:38:24,239
Speaker 1: claim that they have and subjecting ourselves to that. And

628
00:38:24,320 --> 00:38:26,960
Speaker 1: so our actions begin to when I say a line,

629
00:38:27,360 --> 00:38:30,399
Speaker 1: they begin to settle underneath the good, settle underneath the truth,

630
00:38:30,440 --> 00:38:34,120
Speaker 1: settle underneath the beautiful. And so when you say virtues

631
00:38:34,160 --> 00:38:38,360
Speaker 1: in the middle of that, what I think it Maybe

632
00:38:38,360 --> 00:38:40,080
Speaker 1: you'll agree with this, But what I would say is

633
00:38:40,120 --> 00:38:44,359
Speaker 1: what's happening is it's a manipulated virtue. It's something that

634
00:38:44,400 --> 00:38:49,520
Speaker 1: has been taken and instead of just recognizing it and

635
00:38:49,560 --> 00:38:54,279
Speaker 1: subjecting oneself to it, it's been reshaped and molded to

636
00:38:54,480 --> 00:39:01,359
Speaker 1: fit human agenda and then weaponized to justify whatever it

637
00:39:01,400 --> 00:39:04,080
Speaker 1: is that anybody wanted to do. There is no real

638
00:39:04,160 --> 00:39:08,920
Speaker 1: sitting beneath it. There's only a manipulation of it.

639
00:39:09,000 --> 00:39:12,560
Speaker 2: Is that a fair Yes, I agree, and I think

640
00:39:12,600 --> 00:39:15,000
Speaker 2: it's for it. I don't think I know. For that reason,

641
00:39:16,120 --> 00:39:20,560
Speaker 2: I have felt inclined to say that the way to

642
00:39:20,680 --> 00:39:25,240
Speaker 2: react is not to throw out this category of virtue right,

643
00:39:25,360 --> 00:39:28,279
Speaker 2: but rather to recover it right, and to recover it

644
00:39:28,440 --> 00:39:30,920
Speaker 2: not merely in a classical way, because the classical way,

645
00:39:30,920 --> 00:39:35,520
Speaker 2: as I've already said, has its gendered problems. But if

646
00:39:35,520 --> 00:39:39,560
Speaker 2: we can recover in a theological way that really attends

647
00:39:39,600 --> 00:39:42,520
Speaker 2: to the central question. Even as Aquinas asked it right

648
00:39:42,600 --> 00:39:44,680
Speaker 2: not to say that the use of Aquinas was all

649
00:39:44,760 --> 00:39:47,920
Speaker 2: that great. The use of Aquinas was deeply problematic. But

650
00:39:47,960 --> 00:39:50,480
Speaker 2: the way that he asked the question was what is

651
00:39:50,520 --> 00:39:54,640
Speaker 2: that central good? It's the love of God and the

652
00:39:54,680 --> 00:39:56,960
Speaker 2: love of neighbor its self. And of course we can

653
00:39:57,000 --> 00:40:01,279
Speaker 2: think think to the way that this is presented to

654
00:40:01,360 --> 00:40:05,440
Speaker 2: us in the Gospel of Luke right where the Jewish

655
00:40:05,440 --> 00:40:10,880
Speaker 2: person asks Jesus, so, who's our neighbor? Right, because of

656
00:40:10,920 --> 00:40:14,040
Speaker 2: course he got that. The implication at play there was

657
00:40:14,520 --> 00:40:17,719
Speaker 2: you're asking us to love people that don't have our

658
00:40:17,760 --> 00:40:21,000
Speaker 2: best in mind. And Jesus' response is the story of

659
00:40:21,040 --> 00:40:23,719
Speaker 2: what we think of as the good Samaritan. Yes, And

660
00:40:23,760 --> 00:40:26,399
Speaker 2: the good Samaritan Jesus is trying to show them is yeah,

661
00:40:26,400 --> 00:40:29,759
Speaker 2: that's precisely the person that you think it's okay to

662
00:40:29,840 --> 00:40:34,759
Speaker 2: not love. In other words, the neighbor is everyone. It

663
00:40:34,840 --> 00:40:41,520
Speaker 2: crosses our boundaries, It crosses our cultural, our social geography

664
00:40:41,560 --> 00:40:46,319
Speaker 2: boundaries that we make. And had these people who were

665
00:40:46,360 --> 00:40:49,640
Speaker 2: ostensibly acting in the name of Jesus and using virtue

666
00:40:49,719 --> 00:40:53,319
Speaker 2: to colonize in pretty oppressive ways, to allow people to

667
00:40:53,320 --> 00:40:59,239
Speaker 2: starve to death in oppressive ways, had they really considered

668
00:40:59,320 --> 00:41:02,880
Speaker 2: the depths and hearts of what Jesus was saying, and

669
00:41:02,960 --> 00:41:05,840
Speaker 2: the way that at its best the tradition wanted to

670
00:41:05,880 --> 00:41:11,320
Speaker 2: grab a hold of that. Yeah, I think the answer

671
00:41:11,320 --> 00:41:14,239
Speaker 2: would have been the cultivation of a kind of understanding

672
00:41:14,239 --> 00:41:19,520
Speaker 2: of virtue that broke both these masculinity femininity divides and

673
00:41:19,920 --> 00:41:23,640
Speaker 2: these racial divides that they were used to unfortunately cement.

674
00:41:25,200 --> 00:41:28,240
Speaker 1: Yeah, because I would say, even as we have talked

675
00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:31,600
Speaker 1: through all the different views of masculinity, and we could

676
00:41:31,640 --> 00:41:34,879
Speaker 1: go back through Driscoll and Partridge and even Piper, right,

677
00:41:35,040 --> 00:41:37,720
Speaker 1: all three of those are doing something. And I would

678
00:41:38,120 --> 00:41:40,680
Speaker 1: just in the most generous possible way that I could,

679
00:41:40,719 --> 00:41:43,799
Speaker 1: I think they're trying to do something good, Like I

680
00:41:43,800 --> 00:41:49,040
Speaker 1: don't think they're trying to be detrimental to anyone in

681
00:41:49,080 --> 00:41:51,840
Speaker 1: any way, and don't see them as a disrespector of women,

682
00:41:51,880 --> 00:41:54,120
Speaker 1: And I don't see them as trying to, you know,

683
00:41:54,760 --> 00:41:57,920
Speaker 1: create some sort of a screen where men don't see Christ.

684
00:41:58,400 --> 00:42:00,960
Speaker 1: I think that's an effect of what they're doing to

685
00:42:01,000 --> 00:42:05,239
Speaker 1: some degree, but I don't think that's their intention. I

686
00:42:05,280 --> 00:42:08,120
Speaker 1: think what's happening is that there is this again, a

687
00:42:08,239 --> 00:42:12,640
Speaker 1: sort of a malformation of virtue right where we move

688
00:42:12,960 --> 00:42:17,399
Speaker 1: quickly from love God, love neighbor Okay, now how does

689
00:42:17,440 --> 00:42:20,000
Speaker 1: that look. Well, it looks like this, and if you

690
00:42:20,040 --> 00:42:22,800
Speaker 1: don't look like this, now you're a problem.

691
00:42:22,920 --> 00:42:23,120
Speaker 3: Right.

692
00:42:23,200 --> 00:42:27,200
Speaker 1: It's this black sheet effect in social identity theory, right

693
00:42:27,640 --> 00:42:30,400
Speaker 1: where you know, you have sort of a prototypical person

694
00:42:30,440 --> 00:42:32,000
Speaker 1: and this is what you're supposed to be, and this

695
00:42:32,040 --> 00:42:33,400
Speaker 1: is how you're supposed to look, and this is how

696
00:42:33,440 --> 00:42:35,480
Speaker 1: you're supposed to act. And if you don't look and

697
00:42:35,560 --> 00:42:38,480
Speaker 1: act like that, if you're not actually that person, then

698
00:42:38,680 --> 00:42:41,560
Speaker 1: and the more you deviate, the more deviant you are,

699
00:42:42,719 --> 00:42:45,680
Speaker 1: and you become more and more suspicious within the community,

700
00:42:46,520 --> 00:42:49,360
Speaker 1: Whereas the more you align, you can get away with

701
00:42:49,400 --> 00:42:50,200
Speaker 1: a lot more stuff.

702
00:42:50,920 --> 00:42:52,320
Speaker 3: And so it creates.

703
00:42:51,960 --> 00:42:55,920
Speaker 1: These weird dynamics within a community where, oddly enough, the

704
00:42:55,960 --> 00:43:01,239
Speaker 1: more prototypically whatever, the more prototypically masculine person can get

705
00:43:01,280 --> 00:43:04,600
Speaker 1: away with doing things that they shouldn't be doing they

706
00:43:04,640 --> 00:43:10,200
Speaker 1: can versus the less masculine person is always viewed with suspension,

707
00:43:10,360 --> 00:43:16,160
Speaker 1: always more under more scrutiny, always subject to more oversight

708
00:43:16,920 --> 00:43:19,279
Speaker 1: than someone who is viewed as in this case like

709
00:43:19,320 --> 00:43:23,959
Speaker 1: prototypically masculine. And so it's a very interesting and odd

710
00:43:24,040 --> 00:43:29,360
Speaker 1: sort of I don't know, reinforcing the loop when we

711
00:43:29,440 --> 00:43:33,400
Speaker 1: get this wrong when we start to say masculine equals

712
00:43:33,480 --> 00:43:38,080
Speaker 1: virtue and then we define what masculine is. We're not

713
00:43:38,200 --> 00:43:44,759
Speaker 1: actually subjecting ourselves to virtue. We're taking it over. We're

714
00:43:45,120 --> 00:43:48,920
Speaker 1: doing something equivalent to Again, you referenced our Old Testament stuff.

715
00:43:48,920 --> 00:43:49,600
Speaker 3: This will be out.

716
00:43:49,840 --> 00:43:52,920
Speaker 1: It's actually on Patreon, so we'll have it on Patreon

717
00:43:52,960 --> 00:43:54,480
Speaker 1: for you, but if you wanted to listen to it.

718
00:43:54,920 --> 00:43:58,680
Speaker 1: When we talk about the sin in the garden, right,

719
00:43:58,840 --> 00:44:02,120
Speaker 1: there's a desire or for self determination. I don't want

720
00:44:02,160 --> 00:44:04,520
Speaker 1: God to determine what is or what is not good.

721
00:44:04,600 --> 00:44:08,799
Speaker 1: I want to decide what is good for myself. And

722
00:44:08,880 --> 00:44:11,360
Speaker 1: so we see that in Genesis three, we see it

723
00:44:11,360 --> 00:44:14,640
Speaker 1: in Genesis six. It's sort of an ongoing theme in scripture.

724
00:44:14,800 --> 00:44:14,960
Speaker 3: Right.

725
00:44:15,360 --> 00:44:17,839
Speaker 1: We want to do things on our own terms, as

726
00:44:17,840 --> 00:44:22,360
Speaker 1: opposed to subjecting ourselves to God His law, goodness, truth, beauty,

727
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:27,200
Speaker 1: any of these things that God determines. That's what it

728
00:44:27,280 --> 00:44:32,800
Speaker 1: feels like. Is happening with regard to virtue as well.

729
00:44:32,960 --> 00:44:39,319
Speaker 2: Yeah, agreed. And even as we see a changing landscape

730
00:44:40,040 --> 00:44:42,960
Speaker 2: over the course of twenty three hundred years, let's say

731
00:44:42,960 --> 00:44:47,640
Speaker 2: from Aristotle's description, where a particular kind of masculinity over

732
00:44:47,680 --> 00:44:51,040
Speaker 2: and against another kind of masculinity on one side and

733
00:44:51,320 --> 00:44:55,719
Speaker 2: blanket femininity on the other side. Right, even if that

734
00:44:55,760 --> 00:44:58,880
Speaker 2: way of describing things isn't identical with how we prescribe

735
00:44:58,880 --> 00:45:05,000
Speaker 2: things today, the core reality of it, unfortunately is the same. Right,

736
00:45:05,120 --> 00:45:07,759
Speaker 2: So that what we end up doing here is we

737
00:45:07,840 --> 00:45:13,040
Speaker 2: create a sense of robust masculinity, a robust sense of

738
00:45:13,120 --> 00:45:17,080
Speaker 2: character within that. Right, you're a poor man if you

739
00:45:17,080 --> 00:45:20,480
Speaker 2: don't live into this. Yes, that does sit over and

740
00:45:20,520 --> 00:45:25,400
Speaker 2: against on the one side women, which begs the question

741
00:45:25,600 --> 00:45:29,520
Speaker 2: that we've asked in earlier episodes of so does that

742
00:45:29,600 --> 00:45:32,520
Speaker 2: allow for anything for women? Well, the answer is that yes,

743
00:45:32,560 --> 00:45:35,480
Speaker 2: they have a nicely scripted answer for this is what

744
00:45:35,960 --> 00:45:41,440
Speaker 2: female virtue looks like. That really is about keeping them

745
00:45:41,760 --> 00:45:45,000
Speaker 2: within a place that we could say is encircled around

746
00:45:45,160 --> 00:45:49,680
Speaker 2: the right kind of masculine body. Right, So it's a

747
00:45:49,719 --> 00:45:56,520
Speaker 2: sort of subservience. But it also does great disservice to

748
00:45:56,680 --> 00:45:59,520
Speaker 2: the men who can't live into that, just for simple

749
00:45:59,600 --> 00:46:02,120
Speaker 2: reason of that's not how they're wired, whether it be

750
00:46:02,120 --> 00:46:06,440
Speaker 2: because their frames can't can't allow them to build muscle

751
00:46:06,520 --> 00:46:08,400
Speaker 2: in the way to make you think, well, that's a

752
00:46:08,440 --> 00:46:11,719
Speaker 2: man right in the superhero way, or because they have

753
00:46:11,960 --> 00:46:14,760
Speaker 2: a greater interest in other things, right, they gravitate towards

754
00:46:14,840 --> 00:46:17,480
Speaker 2: the arts, for instance. So I don't think it's a

755
00:46:17,520 --> 00:46:22,560
Speaker 2: surprise that you tend to have certain notions of intunedness

756
00:46:22,760 --> 00:46:26,200
Speaker 2: with the arts tied when men are interested in it,

757
00:46:26,320 --> 00:46:28,920
Speaker 2: tied to certain lifestyles that are a push against that

758
00:46:28,960 --> 00:46:32,680
Speaker 2: notion of masculinity, right. And to me, that's a travesty

759
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:37,160
Speaker 2: because it's such an it's a powerful, but such an

760
00:46:37,280 --> 00:46:41,759
Speaker 2: arbitrary distinction as to what kinds of people are even

761
00:46:41,840 --> 00:46:43,680
Speaker 2: able to live into it, so that now you have

762
00:46:43,800 --> 00:46:49,360
Speaker 2: people that feel forced into socially created models of alternatives

763
00:46:50,440 --> 00:46:53,279
Speaker 2: that should have been places should have been places that

764
00:46:53,360 --> 00:46:57,160
Speaker 2: were welcomed into the body of Christ, welcome to the

765
00:46:57,320 --> 00:47:00,400
Speaker 2: very body of Christ, as people who had something unique

766
00:47:00,440 --> 00:47:05,759
Speaker 2: to offer in their very dispositions and their ways, in

767
00:47:05,800 --> 00:47:13,200
Speaker 2: their strengths intellectually emotionally to offer to the rest of creation,

768
00:47:13,640 --> 00:47:16,879
Speaker 2: right in the name of Jesus. And what I want

769
00:47:16,920 --> 00:47:19,480
Speaker 2: to say why I don't think virtues should be chucked

770
00:47:19,480 --> 00:47:23,719
Speaker 2: out with these problems is because again, if we're capturing

771
00:47:23,800 --> 00:47:27,160
Speaker 2: who Jesus was, and the very words of Jesus and

772
00:47:27,200 --> 00:47:32,000
Speaker 2: the ways that his disciples at their best tried to

773
00:47:31,040 --> 00:47:35,000
Speaker 2: to bring that to different settings. Right, whether in Antioch,

774
00:47:35,080 --> 00:47:40,080
Speaker 2: or in Jerusalem, or in Rome or in Ephesus, is

775
00:47:40,120 --> 00:47:44,479
Speaker 2: a kind of understanding that was attentive to the great

776
00:47:44,560 --> 00:47:47,480
Speaker 2: variety that there is. Right love requires that attentiveness. To

777
00:47:47,560 --> 00:47:50,520
Speaker 2: love neighbor as self is to understand who is this neighbor.

778
00:47:51,120 --> 00:47:52,520
Speaker 2: And I don't think we have to look any further

779
00:47:52,560 --> 00:47:58,320
Speaker 2: than our children. Right. I have a son who loves sports.

780
00:48:00,400 --> 00:48:03,279
Speaker 2: That part of his personality is really easy for me.

781
00:48:04,320 --> 00:48:06,680
Speaker 2: I love sports. I don't have to work hard in

782
00:48:06,719 --> 00:48:11,040
Speaker 2: that sense to know how to cultivate that in a

783
00:48:11,040 --> 00:48:11,520
Speaker 2: good way.

784
00:48:12,200 --> 00:48:13,879
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a.

785
00:48:13,880 --> 00:48:21,759
Speaker 2: Daughter who hates sports, and on some basic level, I

786
00:48:21,800 --> 00:48:24,000
Speaker 2: could say that that's really hard for me, but honestly

787
00:48:24,040 --> 00:48:26,640
Speaker 2: isn't because I love her and I get it. I

788
00:48:26,719 --> 00:48:29,239
Speaker 2: get what makes her tick. And my job is not

789
00:48:29,400 --> 00:48:31,480
Speaker 2: to get her to sit in front of a TV

790
00:48:31,640 --> 00:48:35,239
Speaker 2: with me and watch a basketball game. I can be

791
00:48:35,360 --> 00:48:38,000
Speaker 2: okay with the fact that I'll do this with my

792
00:48:38,080 --> 00:48:41,160
Speaker 2: oldest son. I won't do this with my oldest daughter, right,

793
00:48:41,719 --> 00:48:43,040
Speaker 2: But I know what I do need to do with

794
00:48:43,040 --> 00:48:44,560
Speaker 2: my daughter, and some of those things are things that

795
00:48:44,600 --> 00:48:46,640
Speaker 2: I'm just not good at things that have never really

796
00:48:46,680 --> 00:48:50,560
Speaker 2: interested me. That's okay. The goal here is to cultivate

797
00:48:51,480 --> 00:48:54,680
Speaker 2: a sense in her that the things that really make

798
00:48:54,719 --> 00:48:58,239
Speaker 2: you tick are parallel in some sort of way to

799
00:48:58,320 --> 00:49:00,920
Speaker 2: the things that make me tick. Right, be different things,

800
00:49:01,120 --> 00:49:05,040
Speaker 2: but I know that cultivating that ultimately for the greatest

801
00:49:05,080 --> 00:49:08,279
Speaker 2: good of the love of God is what matters. Yeah,

802
00:49:08,320 --> 00:49:12,640
Speaker 2: And that's what virtue at is best as attentive to. Yeah,

803
00:49:12,680 --> 00:49:15,440
Speaker 2: and can break actually the sorts of boundaries that it

804
00:49:15,560 --> 00:49:17,160
Speaker 2: historically it's been used to create.

805
00:49:18,200 --> 00:49:19,160
Speaker 3: Yeah.

806
00:49:19,400 --> 00:49:21,040
Speaker 1: When I think that gets us back to a point

807
00:49:21,040 --> 00:49:23,279
Speaker 1: we've made in a few different shows. And I don't

808
00:49:23,280 --> 00:49:25,080
Speaker 1: want to make it seem like, you know, let's all

809
00:49:25,120 --> 00:49:28,759
Speaker 1: pull back out the WWJD bracelets and you know, just

810
00:49:29,000 --> 00:49:31,960
Speaker 1: start asking what would Jesus do? But the imitation of

811
00:49:32,040 --> 00:49:35,000
Speaker 1: Christ involves an awful lot. It's not simple.

812
00:49:35,239 --> 00:49:35,640
Speaker 3: It can be.

813
00:49:36,320 --> 00:49:39,600
Speaker 1: We can make it very complex, right, There's a lot

814
00:49:39,600 --> 00:49:42,000
Speaker 1: that can go into it. And I think this sort

815
00:49:42,000 --> 00:49:44,920
Speaker 1: of thinking you're give us gone, giving us on virtues

816
00:49:45,040 --> 00:49:48,279
Speaker 1: ties into this imitation of Christ. It's just it has

817
00:49:48,320 --> 00:49:52,640
Speaker 1: to be reordered. And so that fundamental order of let's

818
00:49:52,680 --> 00:49:56,400
Speaker 1: love God with all we are and have not first,

819
00:49:56,480 --> 00:49:58,560
Speaker 1: I try to avoid that kind of language. I still

820
00:49:58,640 --> 00:50:01,319
Speaker 1: like the idea of when we're thinking about loving God

821
00:50:01,400 --> 00:50:05,680
Speaker 1: with all we are and have, it's immersive, right. So

822
00:50:06,040 --> 00:50:08,560
Speaker 1: I think I've used the scuba diving analogy on the

823
00:50:08,560 --> 00:50:11,040
Speaker 1: show before, but basically, it's like when you scuba dive,

824
00:50:11,560 --> 00:50:14,480
Speaker 1: your body has no other choice but to move differently.

825
00:50:15,920 --> 00:50:18,239
Speaker 1: You don't move the same when you're immersed underwater as

826
00:50:18,280 --> 00:50:20,520
Speaker 1: you do when you're up on land. And so when

827
00:50:20,520 --> 00:50:22,640
Speaker 1: we immerse ourselves into the love of God, we have

828
00:50:22,719 --> 00:50:24,759
Speaker 1: to move differently. We have to see differently, we have

829
00:50:24,800 --> 00:50:27,799
Speaker 1: to communicate differently. Everything changes for us because we're now

830
00:50:27,840 --> 00:50:31,520
Speaker 1: immersed within this love for God, and in that immersion,

831
00:50:31,800 --> 00:50:36,200
Speaker 1: as we reach out and love other people, now that changes.

832
00:50:37,080 --> 00:50:40,359
Speaker 1: We have to do it differently, right, There's no real

833
00:50:40,400 --> 00:50:43,480
Speaker 1: other choice. And so this is the sort of sort

834
00:50:43,480 --> 00:50:48,120
Speaker 1: of immersive, embodied, embedded experience that we're looking for. When

835
00:50:48,160 --> 00:50:51,080
Speaker 1: we say imitation of Christ, it's not here's the set

836
00:50:51,120 --> 00:50:53,720
Speaker 1: of rules, this is what Jesus would do. Just follow these,

837
00:50:54,800 --> 00:51:00,080
Speaker 1: it's not even close to that's your scuba diving. And

838
00:51:00,520 --> 00:51:02,439
Speaker 1: you now have to tick with your feet and move

839
00:51:02,480 --> 00:51:05,279
Speaker 1: with the fins. You have to breathe through an apparatus, like,

840
00:51:05,640 --> 00:51:07,719
Speaker 1: there are a lot of changes now that you have

841
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:11,560
Speaker 1: to go through because this is a transformative experience. It's

842
00:51:11,560 --> 00:51:14,279
Speaker 1: not what you're used to and so you know you're

843
00:51:14,320 --> 00:51:16,920
Speaker 1: going to feel different pressure under the water than you

844
00:51:16,960 --> 00:51:19,000
Speaker 1: do up on land. All of that is going to

845
00:51:19,040 --> 00:51:22,400
Speaker 1: affect how you do things, and that's what we're seeking

846
00:51:22,480 --> 00:51:26,640
Speaker 1: as we think about loving God first. So I think

847
00:51:26,680 --> 00:51:30,440
Speaker 1: that the problem I really have when we go into

848
00:51:32,480 --> 00:51:35,720
Speaker 1: these conversations where we try to tie masculinity in virtue

849
00:51:35,760 --> 00:51:39,840
Speaker 1: together right as we've seen some of the authors do

850
00:51:40,040 --> 00:51:43,800
Speaker 1: in varying different ways, or let's say masculinity in the

851
00:51:43,840 --> 00:51:49,720
Speaker 1: Bible together in various different ways, is that it does

852
00:51:49,880 --> 00:51:53,200
Speaker 1: feel just like an overlay to me. And so here's

853
00:51:53,239 --> 00:51:58,279
Speaker 1: what I mean. If we think of masculinity as a

854
00:51:58,400 --> 00:52:02,040
Speaker 1: bucket term into which we could put a whole bunch

855
00:52:02,040 --> 00:52:10,319
Speaker 1: of other terms tough, strong, big, bold, courageous, all these

856
00:52:10,360 --> 00:52:12,960
Speaker 1: different other terms, and we just say, okay, all of

857
00:52:13,000 --> 00:52:18,120
Speaker 1: it's under masculinity, there's at least two problems that are immediate.

858
00:52:18,280 --> 00:52:21,000
Speaker 1: Number one is is that the only place those other

859
00:52:21,080 --> 00:52:24,879
Speaker 1: terms can go. Could I also put those under femininity?

860
00:52:25,920 --> 00:52:29,680
Speaker 1: If that's one problem. The other problem is, if we're

861
00:52:29,719 --> 00:52:34,919
Speaker 1: saying tough, why don't we just say tough, Like, why

862
00:52:34,920 --> 00:52:36,319
Speaker 1: do we need the other Why do we need the

863
00:52:36,400 --> 00:52:40,360
Speaker 1: umbrella term. If we're saying big, why don't we just

864
00:52:40,360 --> 00:52:43,480
Speaker 1: say big, Right, Harry, Let's just.

865
00:52:43,480 --> 00:52:48,200
Speaker 3: Say Harry, Like. Masculine doesn't have to mean anything.

866
00:52:49,880 --> 00:52:51,960
Speaker 1: And I think that's the other part of the problem

867
00:52:52,040 --> 00:52:54,880
Speaker 1: is we're using it as this umbrella term with all

868
00:52:54,880 --> 00:52:58,640
Speaker 1: these ambiguous concepts underneath it, but the word itself doesn't

869
00:52:58,640 --> 00:53:00,960
Speaker 1: really mean anything nonspecific.

870
00:53:02,760 --> 00:53:05,319
Speaker 3: Right. Whereas if you know, I were looking at you.

871
00:53:05,320 --> 00:53:07,600
Speaker 1: And you say, okay, you play basketball, I could say

872
00:53:07,640 --> 00:53:11,080
Speaker 1: you're athletic. I don't have to say your man masculine,

873
00:53:11,480 --> 00:53:17,279
Speaker 1: you're athletic. Those two aren't synonyms, right, And so I

874
00:53:17,320 --> 00:53:20,920
Speaker 1: think there's there's this problem when we use these terms

875
00:53:21,520 --> 00:53:25,879
Speaker 1: that a lot of times we're tying other things underneath them, right,

876
00:53:26,080 --> 00:53:31,879
Speaker 1: and and pretending that this word masculine actually means all

877
00:53:31,960 --> 00:53:35,600
Speaker 1: of these things all at once, and that we can

878
00:53:35,719 --> 00:53:37,719
Speaker 1: use it as that umbrella term in a way that

879
00:53:37,920 --> 00:53:42,080
Speaker 1: is faithful to what all these other phrases mean. We

880
00:53:42,200 --> 00:53:45,600
Speaker 1: encountered this when we talked a little bit about wisdom right,

881
00:53:46,480 --> 00:53:49,000
Speaker 1: lady wisdom, lady Folly. Well, it's not like I mean,

882
00:53:49,200 --> 00:53:51,560
Speaker 1: it's a great example because we've just talked this whole

883
00:53:51,560 --> 00:53:53,879
Speaker 1: episode on virtue. How is it that you can call

884
00:53:53,880 --> 00:53:59,719
Speaker 1: our lady wisdom. Right, It's got a lot of conceptual

885
00:53:59,760 --> 00:54:02,720
Speaker 1: over lab virtue and wisdom, but we've got to apply

886
00:54:02,760 --> 00:54:05,200
Speaker 1: it and proverbs to lady wisdom. You've also got it

887
00:54:05,200 --> 00:54:08,839
Speaker 1: to apply to lady folly. Well, you can't detach those

888
00:54:08,840 --> 00:54:13,200
Speaker 1: two and now say, well, but really, vices are really feminine.

889
00:54:13,239 --> 00:54:17,320
Speaker 1: Folly is definitely feminine, but the virtues are masculine.

890
00:54:18,719 --> 00:54:20,200
Speaker 3: Just none of it makes any sense.

891
00:54:20,960 --> 00:54:22,719
Speaker 1: And so I think that at the end of the day,

892
00:54:22,719 --> 00:54:25,239
Speaker 1: we've got to really shoot for this idea of when

893
00:54:25,280 --> 00:54:29,640
Speaker 1: we're imitating Christ, we're immersing ourselves within love of God,

894
00:54:30,280 --> 00:54:32,480
Speaker 1: and we're allowing that love of God to change the

895
00:54:32,520 --> 00:54:35,000
Speaker 1: way that we orient ourselves in the world, change the

896
00:54:35,000 --> 00:54:37,040
Speaker 1: way we move in the world, change the way we think,

897
00:54:37,280 --> 00:54:38,480
Speaker 1: change the way we operate.

898
00:54:39,320 --> 00:54:41,960
Speaker 3: And as we do that, we'll be much closer to.

899
00:54:43,400 --> 00:54:48,760
Speaker 1: Living along the grain of virtue than if we decide

900
00:54:48,800 --> 00:54:55,040
Speaker 1: we want to be masculine. That's sort of my takeaway

901
00:54:55,040 --> 00:54:56,279
Speaker 1: from this part of the conversation.

902
00:54:56,320 --> 00:55:03,279
Speaker 2: I guess yeah, and with me, it's to reemphasize, to

903
00:55:03,400 --> 00:55:07,720
Speaker 2: affirm virtue isn't to affirm every historical or even most

904
00:55:07,800 --> 00:55:12,760
Speaker 2: historical uses of virtue. It's to affirm to affirm why

905
00:55:12,880 --> 00:55:16,359
Speaker 2: in the first place the Church saw this category as

906
00:55:16,400 --> 00:55:20,160
Speaker 2: a meaningful category, not to affirm what the Church did

907
00:55:20,160 --> 00:55:26,759
Speaker 2: with that, right, yeah, right, So there's a big difference, right,

908
00:55:26,800 --> 00:55:28,600
Speaker 2: And we can see and I and we didn't even

909
00:55:28,680 --> 00:55:31,640
Speaker 2: go into all the ways in which the Church saw

910
00:55:31,680 --> 00:55:36,120
Speaker 2: that category, saw it valuable, and felt the need to

911
00:55:36,160 --> 00:55:39,520
Speaker 2: modify it from the way that say Aristotle had used it. Right,

912
00:55:39,680 --> 00:55:41,600
Speaker 2: But there were a number of ways, and these are

913
00:55:41,640 --> 00:55:43,880
Speaker 2: ways to be commended, right, whether it be the ways

914
00:55:43,880 --> 00:55:47,840
Speaker 2: in which the capitation Fathers broke that gendered boundary and

915
00:55:47,880 --> 00:55:51,200
Speaker 2: they're understanding the virtues, or the way that Thomas Aquinas

916
00:55:51,239 --> 00:55:55,920
Speaker 2: felt the need to rethink what courage really was in

917
00:55:56,000 --> 00:55:59,719
Speaker 2: light of the Jesus who walked willingly and knowingly to

918
00:55:59,760 --> 00:56:02,920
Speaker 2: the us, knowing that he would die and that was

919
00:56:03,000 --> 00:56:05,799
Speaker 2: the way to go, right, That would never have been

920
00:56:05,800 --> 00:56:10,560
Speaker 2: courage for very solid That would have been foolishness. So the

921
00:56:10,640 --> 00:56:14,759
Speaker 2: Christian tradition has some wonderful nuggets to on earth, but

922
00:56:14,800 --> 00:56:16,640
Speaker 2: that doesn't mean that we've always done the right things

923
00:56:16,640 --> 00:56:19,880
Speaker 2: with them. So if we can re attend to the

924
00:56:20,000 --> 00:56:23,920
Speaker 2: sorts of goods no pun intended, No, maybe pun intended

925
00:56:24,239 --> 00:56:28,640
Speaker 2: that that virtue is trying to get at and the

926
00:56:28,680 --> 00:56:33,839
Speaker 2: sort of character creation that it's intending to give us.

927
00:56:35,000 --> 00:56:37,239
Speaker 2: What that'll hopefully do is that we begin to look

928
00:56:37,239 --> 00:56:41,760
Speaker 2: at statements like Jesus makes of helping helping the orphan

929
00:56:41,800 --> 00:56:46,840
Speaker 2: and the widow helping the immigrant as statements that continue

930
00:56:46,880 --> 00:56:49,640
Speaker 2: to have a lot of major meaning that will put

931
00:56:49,719 --> 00:56:53,560
Speaker 2: us in different kinds of ways standing against the general

932
00:56:53,600 --> 00:56:58,160
Speaker 2: cultural tide. Right, Christians often do stand against the cultural tide,

933
00:56:58,160 --> 00:57:01,880
Speaker 2: but for the wrong reasons, I think, right to uphold,

934
00:57:02,440 --> 00:57:06,440
Speaker 2: you know, to recapture some sort of perceived classical reality

935
00:57:06,440 --> 00:57:12,040
Speaker 2: of masculinity, some classical understanding of toughness. But what if

936
00:57:12,080 --> 00:57:14,120
Speaker 2: we look to the person of Jesus as the one

937
00:57:14,160 --> 00:57:17,640
Speaker 2: who embodies that character are virtue in a way that

938
00:57:17,720 --> 00:57:23,560
Speaker 2: redefines perhaps what that toughness is. Yeah, yeah, no, I agree,

939
00:57:24,360 --> 00:57:26,440
Speaker 2: And that's not gendered, right, right.

940
00:57:26,400 --> 00:57:28,800
Speaker 3: It's not. It's it just is what it is.

941
00:57:28,840 --> 00:57:33,400
Speaker 1: It's it's courage, it's fortitude, it's restraint, it's it's all

942
00:57:33,400 --> 00:57:35,840
Speaker 1: those different things, right, and you can see them all

943
00:57:35,840 --> 00:57:39,440
Speaker 1: in Jesus, And it's not intended just for men. It's

944
00:57:39,480 --> 00:57:42,680
Speaker 1: intended for all those who believe in His name, like

945
00:57:43,160 --> 00:57:44,800
Speaker 1: this is something that all of us are supposed to

946
00:57:44,840 --> 00:57:50,320
Speaker 1: be conformed into. So well, dude, I'm I'm glad you

947
00:57:50,320 --> 00:57:54,120
Speaker 1: could bring to bear your multiple decades worth of experience

948
00:57:54,160 --> 00:57:58,440
Speaker 1: on this topic. So appreciate you walking us through it.

949
00:57:58,600 --> 00:58:00,520
Speaker 2: It's fun. Yeah, let's do again.

950
00:58:00,920 --> 00:58:02,880
Speaker 3: We probably will. I think this is a fun topic.

951
00:58:02,920 --> 00:58:05,640
Speaker 1: We'll dive into it a little deeper, but for right now,

952
00:58:05,640 --> 00:58:07,919
Speaker 1: we're close in it on an hour. These last couple

953
00:58:07,960 --> 00:58:11,320
Speaker 1: episodes have been necessarily longer because I think there are

954
00:58:11,360 --> 00:58:14,439
Speaker 1: just a little bit more complex topics, and so we've

955
00:58:14,440 --> 00:58:17,240
Speaker 1: gone a little longer. But hopefully everybody enjoyed it, and

956
00:58:17,600 --> 00:58:19,720
Speaker 1: we'll close up the episode here and we'll catch you

957
00:58:19,800 --> 00:58:21,000
Speaker 1: next time on Thinking Christian.

958
00:58:21,200 --> 00:58:22,800
Speaker 3: Take care, everybody.

959
00:58:23,440 --> 00:58:24,880
Speaker 1: I just want to take a second to thank the

960
00:58:24,920 --> 00:58:27,400
Speaker 1: team at Life Audio for their partnership with us on

961
00:58:27,440 --> 00:58:30,760
Speaker 1: the Thinking Christian podcast. If you go to lifeaudio dot com,

962
00:58:30,800 --> 00:58:34,000
Speaker 1: you'll find dozens of other faith centered podcasts in their network.

963
00:58:34,240 --> 00:58:37,560
Speaker 1: They've got shows about prayer, Bible study, parenting, and more.