All in Beauty

347 N. Discriminations (5) Nurtured by Beauty

Jesus lived life in beautiful ways. He treated all people as images of God, respected their agency as full persons, never spoke down to them, and never treated people as though they were children. In this fifth episode on making necessary discriminations I talk about how beauty has been important in my own life: my marriage, my vocation, the art in my home, my church attendance, and even how I vote. Beauty—one of life's transcendent qualities—suggests more and therefore calls for more. Beauty doesn't play by the strict transactional rules of today's World Spirit. Come laugh with me as we think through the necessity of making decisions.

344 Are Easter and Christmas Pagan Holidays?

Mindful of how she and her husband raise their kids a listener and Patreon supporter of mine, Danielle, e-d me with a great question, are Christmas and Easter pagan holidays? After all, they both had pre-Christian pagan origins. I answer her great question by working through the way that God works, taking pre-existing forms and transforming them to his glory. Come and think with me in this least-worst blast-from-the-past.

335 RfYtB (8) Vivid—Life in God's Spirit

Christianity is not first the study of a book, or a new ethic, or a set of doctrines, as important as all those are. It is, instead, a lived experience. Or more carefully? Christianity is a felt telos: a orientation to life that filters and orients all our other experiences (even going to football games!). More specifically still, Christianity is (or can be) life in the third member of the Trinity: the Holy Spirit. And that is because the Spirit is a person, not a forcefield, not an it. In this episode I think pastorally and personally about life in God's Spirit. During the show's opening I reflect on the pastors—the Black Robed Regiment—who helped to foment the American Revolution. Would that revolt have occurred if it were up to today's pastors and priests? Why does that question even matter?

311 Secular vs. Sacred (1) Pulling Back the Curtain

Unaware, most Christians do life through a secular-sacred prism. We believe there are arenas that are isolated to the secular and others given to the sacred. Along similar lines we believe there things reserved for our minds to do and other, more private things, for our hearts to do. None of this is biblical and none of it is helpful. Most Christian colleges fall prey to this same schism and all politicians are chained to the secular-sacred split. In this ground-laying episode I clarify my own presuppositions and define important terms. Come think and laugh with me!

309 The Cult of Culture, 212-0 Women's Softball Team


From whence does culture come? Well, directly, from a cult. I explore and explain how cult and culture are related in this U.U. shotgun. Variously, I also work through the recent lingual faux pas of the Dali Lama, a very funny church-joke, Ukraine's president and his skimming money from the USA, a statue to honor a pedophile's dream, the United Nation's new policy on pedophilia, the significance of Tucker Carlson's recent firing at FOX, and the recent non-defense of Title 9 by House Democrats. I finish the show with a reflection on how humans are greater than angels.

298 Hypocritical Jesus?, Color and Beauty

In this shotgun podcast I work through Jesus and his take on tradition, whether or how Christianity is a tradition, the strange phenomenon of Christians who don't want to be Christian, a prayer for traumatized folks, how teaching college compared to teaching adult Sunday School, what kinds of things will keep the Statist government from finally overwhelming the citizenry, and beauty. God loves beauty! In a sharing act he gave us beauty to love, too! Come e-hang out with me for a while and enjoy some laughter! 

048 Why Are Rituals "From The Devil"?

My fourth episode on beauty. Did God make commandments forbidding rituals? Why did the Devil “tempt” us with rituals? Why, for billions of people, and millions of Christians, do rituals work? (Why are rituals so wonderful and important?) Was Jesus in any way ritualistic? Can God communicate to us without using words? Is any beauty to be found outside of words? Come an think through this important aesthetic category with me.

047 The Reformation Did WHAT to Beauty?

500 years ago the Reformation took a big billy club to beauty, nearly eliminating beauty from the Christian way of life. Why did that happen? Was it justified? Was it a good thing? Oh, and, what are the effects of the Reformation on our practice of Christianity today? What should we take, and what should we reject, from the Reformation? Lacking art in our churches, are we contemporary believers any less guilty of idolatry than ages past? This is part 3 in my 4-part series on Beauty.

046 Befriending Beauty

Whereas our society is superficial and loud, beauty comes in depths and peace. What are the benefits of enjoying beauty? Or, just what is beauty? Why do so many Christians ignore beauty? Is society right when it tells us that pretty and handsome are the same as beautiful? Why does the U.U. love beauty so much? How is beauty like God? Why would God have created the world with such beauty? Those questions are woven into my reflections here on one of the most overlooked gifts on the planet: beauty!