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SPEAKER_03I I would ask Tom this, and this is a surprising question, maybe, to nominate for me one thing, just one thing that Christianity has introduced that doesn't have some source, some parallel, some analogy in previous and in other civilizations. I cannot think of one and we'd love to hear if there is one. Do you accept that challenge?
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. I think the um the ideal of lifelong matrimony, the category of homosexuality and heterosexuality, the notion of secularism, the idea of there being religion science as it emerges in the 19th century, the idea that human beings are created in the image of God, that is obviously something that Christians share with Jews. And to this day, the heirs of that cultural tradition want to believe that their values are not contingent, but somehow are the property of all humanity.
SPEAKER_00What have the Romans ever done for us? It's a question asked by John Cleese in the film Life of Brian. He's playing the character of the leader of the Judean People's Front, or is it the People's Front of Judea that I can never quite remember? And uh he is in a meeting where they are discussing their their dislike of uh Roman rule. And John Cleese says this.
SPEAKER_06Education public education the fresh water system of public health. Please. Oh, please.
SPEAKER_00I love that. Um I love the line especially um the roads go without saying, right? Um when you're considering the benefits uh that another culture has brought, um, there are a lot of things that go without saying because they are so pervasive to your society that you you never really notice them. And I guess um my argument and the argument of many others, including historian Tom Holland, is that the impact of Christianity on the world is seen most clearly in the fact that you don't notice it. The roads go without saying, and Christian values kind of go without saying nowadays, and we've completely lost the sense that it was Christianity that gave to the world the sort of senses by which we now judge Christianity. I wrote a book about it called The Air We Breathe, and uh in it I talk about seven different values that have come to us through the Christianization of the West. And so our concepts of equality, compassion, consent, enlightenment, science, freedom, and progress are now so obvious to us that they are the air that we breathe. And you don't notice the air that you breathe, and yet you are dependent upon it in every moment. It's invisible to you, but it also goes unacknowledged most of the time. And what do you notice about so many of the critiques of the church? So many of the critiques of the church are that the church is unequal, cruel, coercive, unenlightened, anti-science, restrictive, and regressive. And what do you notice about those seven critiques of the church? All I've done is reverse the seven values. Why do we know that it's it's bad to be unequal, cruel, coercive, unenlightened, anti-science, restrictive, and regressive? Because we take for granted that equality, compassion, consent, enlightenment, science, freedom, and progress are these transcendent values. But those transcendent values do not go without saying. Or at least you can't get very far for very long without saying them, without articulating them. And at that stage I want to make two arguments. One is we did not get these values from Enlightenment humanism. That's the historical argument. We did not get those values from Enlightenment humanism. The sources of these values predate the Enlightenment by centuries, even millennia. And the second argument I'd make is that we could not get these values from mere secular humanism. We did not get them, and I think that's the historical case that uh historian Tom Holland and others make so well. But secondly, logically, I don't think we can derive those values from a godless universe, let's say. One person who disagrees with that historical thesis is AC Grayling, who is also a historian, a philosopher, and a secular humanist. He was on uh Premier Christian Radio's Unbelievable show with Justin Briley, and he was sat opposite Tom Holland in a big conversation. And at one point, AC Grayling sounds remarkably like John Cleese. Uh let's hear him put the question to Tom Holland: what have the Christians ever done for us?
SPEAKER_03I I would ask Tom this, and this is a surprising question, maybe, to nominate for me one thing, just one thing, that Christianity has introduced that doesn't have some source, some parallel, some analogy in in previous and in other civilizations. One novelty, one innovation in thinking about anything ethical, metaphysical, anything you like. And if you say I've racked my brains over this uh often enough, and I cannot think of one. We'd love to hear if there is one.
SPEAKER_00AC Grayling has played the part of John Cleese just perfectly. What have the Christians ever done for us? And Tom Holland is gonna do a masterclass in being the crowd at that point, and he's gonna raise, I I think by my accounting, seven things, which um his book, Dominion, uh, is based uh around sort of seven epochs because it's a very biblical kind of a number. And just off the cuff, he seems to come up with seven ways Christianity has introduced to the world these unique values. Here we go. I cannot think of one. We'd love to hear if there is one.
SPEAKER_03Do you accept that challenge?
SPEAKER_04Absolutely. I think the um the the ideal of of lifelong uh matrimony, I think that's a a very distinctive Christian concept. I think the the category of of what by the nineteenth century is coming to be categorized as as homosexuality and heterosexuality, I think they have no precedence. I think the notion of secularism, the idea of there being religions, I think all these are entirely exclusive to uh Christian civilization. I think the concept of science as it emerges in the 19th century, I think, is entirely exclusive to uh to Christian civilization. I think the idea that um human beings are created in the image of God, that is obviously something that Christians share share with uh with Jews, but that is a uh um it it it gives a degree of dignity to human beings that no other cultural tradition that I'm aware of even remotely approximates to. So I think that all of those are essentially what I'm talking in in giving that is I am talking about what makes Western civilization distinctive. And one of the things that absolutely makes Western civilization distinctive, and it's an inheritance of its Christian past, is its assumption that its values are universal. This has been fundamental to the way that Christians have understood their faith, that that it is for all of humanity. And to this day, the heirs of that cultural tradition want to believe that their values are not contingent, but somehow are the property of all humanity.
SPEAKER_00It's gotta be up there with one of the great debate comebacks in all debating history, I have to say. Um, so Tom Holland comes up with off the cuff kind of seven things, and a lot of them map onto the seven values that I I talk about in my book, The Air We Breathe. Um, but he he starts out with marriage, and it's not just him who is saying it. Um Kyle Harper, ancient historian, notices that the sexual revolution that has really shaped the modern world did not happen in the 1960s, but happened 1900 years earlier in the early church. And this marriage and family program um just had no precedence. Like monogamy was already a a real minority report within um the cultures of the day. Romans were monogamous, but it was kind of a serial monogamy. The idea that the doors are locked, no one gets out of this thing alive, and that it's one man and one woman sort of democratizes kind of sex and marriage to the point where all the other red-blooded males around Jesus, when they heard him teach this in Matthew 19, were like, gosh, this is like it would be better if we weren't married. This is this is such uh and Kyle Harper says, you know, all the libido of the world is to be cramped into this frail sacred union called marriage. And this is this is this Jesus thing, this Jesus revolution that revolutionized sex and marriage. Kyle Harper said it's an utter revolution. Um, Joseph Henrik in The Weirdest People in the World, he he says, this is what's built the modern world. He's the guy who coined the phrase weird for what Westerners are. We are Western, educated, industrialized, rich, democratic, W-E-I-R-D. We are weird. What has made us weird? There's a number of different Christian aspects that have made the West weird, but he focuses in on the marriage and family program. And this is what distinguishes a kind of the Western mind, uh, the Western mindset, the Western psychology from others. And he's written a big fat book to kind of uh go along with it. So that's marriage and then there's sexuality, um, homosexual and heterosexual as these distinct categories. That as a taxonomy of human identity is not a thing that other non-Western cultures today think about, nor is it down through history. Uh obviously, homosexual behavior um has been going on for forever, but that taxonomy that divides people according to their desires and puts them into the categories of homosexual and heterosexual is a is a Christian and post-Christian development that is unthinkable without the scriptures. Thirdly, secularism, and if AC Grayling is a secular humanist, he is utterly dependent upon this category. But secularism is the idea that there is a separation between the religious sphere and other spheres. And Jesus can say to people, give to Caesar what is Caesar's, give to God what is God's, and that becomes the kind of the realm of the cyculum, the realm of a hundred years, this this generation, this world. But then there's the religio, there is that which binds you to heaven, and those two spheres are very different. And that's the fourth thing, that there is such a thing as religion that can be separated out, so that you can you might have a chapter on the religion of Greece, as opposed to its politics, its ethics, and that that sort of thing. The idea that religion is this separable part of human life that can be studied all by itself and kept to itself is not uh an assumption that is shared by the rest of the world or the rest of history. You know, the British Raj in India are the ones who are telling those who live in Hindustan you guys are Hindus, are we? They say. And the British Raj, from their very Christianized worldview, say, well, yeah, because you've got holy men and holy books and holy spaces and holy days. So that that is a religion called Hinduism, right? And those who live in Hindustan are like, well, but it's just what we do. What do you mean it's a religion? And then you get the idea, oh no, but but India's going to be a secular state, and there'll there'll be religion that is a completely separate thing, and that your nationality can be one thing and your religion could be something quite different. Now that is absolutely natural within the pages of the Bible. You get to the New Testament and the Apostle Paul says, Look, you might be in Galatia. Um, I'm not telling you to stop being Galatian and start being Christian. I'm saying you can be Galatian there in Northern Turkey, what we would call Northern Turkey, and I'm not asking you to become an ethnic member of Israel, even, even though the church is kind of this global Israel. Paul is not saying stop being Galatian, start being this global Hebrew. Instead, apparently you can stop worshing the Galatian gods, but still be Galatian, and you can worship the God of Israel without becoming an Israelite. And so the link between your nationality and your culture and your religion is something that is basic to the Bible, but bonkers to the rest of the world. So the idea of the secular and the idea that there are religions as a separable thing, that's that's distinctly Christian. Fifthly, he talks about science, and he's not saying that the rest of the world has not been interested in studying the natural world. The rest of the world is continually interested in studying the natural world, but the method by which they go about that is not the method that was developed in the 16th century following a very distinctive Christian natural philosophy. There was a scientific revolution in the 16th century with Copernicus and Kepler and and uh Newton and Galileo and all those guys. There was a revolution because they were overturning an ancient way of thinking about the world. The Aristotelian way of thinking about the world was about descending into your mind to discover via reason the way things must be. And then you get with the scientific revolution, actually the experimental method, where instead of thinking about what must be, you test what actually is, and you actually go out of your way to disprove some of the intellectual giants of your age, including Aristotle. The Chinese had incredible technology, far advanced technology, um, to Europe in the same time period. They had all the intellectual firepower, they had all the technology, and yet they did not break through into what we call the modern scientific method because of some metaphysical commitments, some religious commitments, some spiritual commitments. And I go about that in the book. I don't have time to talk about those things now, but the Chinese in the 16th century were not trying to overturn the thinking of Copernicus, just as the the ancient thinkers were not trying to overturn the thinking of Aristotle. Whereas Christians at Christian universities for Christian reasons were definitely trying to disprove the inherited ideas that they have. And they were trying to disconfirm the hypotheses of people who were as venerable and as trusted as even an Aristotle, and they ended up overturning ancient systems of thought because actually of the sixth thing that Tom Holland talks about, the image of God, the idea that humanity is made in the image of God. That has all kinds of ethical implications. It also has implications for the discovery of science. Because science assumes that you've got laws up above that are regular and trustworthy. And again, this is one of the reasons why the Chinese had a different pathway when it comes to science and technology. They didn't have the same core belief that there is one God who is the author of all things and who, by his covenant love, keeps all things in a kind of a regular order that is trustworthy. Um they they didn't so much have that belief. Um but to believe in the image of God is to believe in a God who is a faithful covenant partner to us, who is the author of the laws of nature. And just as you can study the laws of the book of God, which is what theologians had always been doing, there is this other book. And there are laws that are written into nature, and just as we can study the laws of the book, we can study the laws of the world, and they are regular laws, they are dependable laws, and human beings are the kinds of creatures who can understand them, which is an astonishing thing to think. Why should this three pounds of gray matter have any grasp of the mysteries of the cosmos? Why should Homo sapiens clinging to this insignificant rock that's hurtling around a mediocre sun, why should we be able to fathom the mysteries of the cosmos? That's an extraordinary thing to think, and yet Christians on page one have been taught to believe in a regular, orderly, dependable God, and he unfolds his creation patiently, methodically, developing things from darkness to light, from simple things to complex things, from trees to birds and fish to land creatures, to man, to woman, you know, constantly getting more and more developed, more and more glorious, methodically, patiently, in an orderly fashion. And humanity then stands upon the earth as those who are uniquely tasked with understanding the world. The first thing that Adam does is name the animals. It's taxonomy, right? He he is understanding the world because he is the kind of creature who can understand the world and who is sent out into the world to have dominion over the created order in that sort of thing. Humanity made in God's image is right at the heart of the scientific revolution. It's also right at the heart of all kinds of ethical revolutions. The discovery of human rights, and certainly they are articulated in the 12th century, but they are articulated as a discovery of what humans are really like. So human rights can trace back to the image of God, the birth of charities, to see every single member of the human family as worthy of protection and provision, and to see our obligation towards those humans, and then to see the rights that those humans have for provision and protection, that's where you get charity, that's where you get rights from. That's where you get abolitionism from. You know, Frederick Douglass, uh, a former slave and a powerful preacher for abolitionism. Um, on the topic of the image of God, he said there can no more be a law for the enslavement of man made in the image of God than for the enslavement of God himself. Like if humans are in the image of God himself, you wouldn't enslave God, would you? Then what are you doing enslaving some section of the population? Human beings, all of them are made in God's image, and that has incredible implications for science and rights and charity and abolition, freedom. That's the sixth value that Christianity has injected into the world uniquely, and then seventhly, Tom Holland points to the universalism of Christianity, the idea that such transcendent values exist in all times for all peoples, and then there is the desire to enlighten people, to bring them into the light of Christ, no matter what they had believed about religions, let's say. They are to come in and share in this universal standard now. But Tom Holland points out that these things are very particular. They are not natural, they're not universal, they're not obvious, they're not self-evident, or at least they haven't been to the large majority of cultures around the world even today, let alone down through history. So there are seven different things that are unique to Christian civilization. What have the Romans ever done for us? Well, of course, the roads. The roads they go without saying. And I think those sorts of seven things, they kind of go without saying in our modern discourse. And that's why I called my book The Air We Breathe, because the air we breathe is invisible to us, and yet we rely upon it every moment. And imagine that I took a dislike to oxygen, and I j I just hate oxygen. And imagine I take to the streets and I just shake my fist and I say, I will oppose this element until my dying breath. Right? What have I done there? It's called a performative contradiction. By doing it, you undermine it, right? Um, I can speak against oxygen, I guess, but I use oxygen in order to speak against oxygen. You can oppose Christianity, and Christians do it all the time. Christians critique the faith all the time. It's just that when you critique the faith, you are assuming so much of the faith in doing it. When we take issue with Christianity, we take issue with it for being unequal, cruel, coercive, unenlightened, anti-science, restrictive, and regressive. The fact that that is such a common and recognizable shopping list of complaints against Christianity does not show how bad Christianity is necessarily, it certainly shows how pervasive Christianity actually is. It goes without saying. And gospel workers who might struggle to secure one elsewhere. Whether saving for yourself or on behalf of your church, your savings will support Christian ministries across the UK. And when you're ready to take your money out, you get it back with interest. If your spending and giving reflect your faith, shouldn't your savings as well? Open a savings account with Kingdom Bank today and put your money where your heart is. Visit kingdom.bankslash speaklife. Kingdom Bank is a member of the FSCS and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority and the Prudential Regulation Authority. So that's the historical argument that I want to make. We did not get these modern Western values from Enlightenment humanism. We did not. The historical case is that they have come to us through a process of Christianization. If you want the full story, go and read Tom Holland's Dominion. If you want a shorter version, you can read The Air We Breathe. But I think historically the case is sound. We have gotten where we've gotten to, not because anybody sat down, wrapped a towel around their head, and thought really deeply about human rights, and therefore we've got to where we've got to. These are sacred values that have been communicated to us through story, through reflecting on Jesus Christ as the hero of all heroes in the ultimate story, and we have inhabited that story century after century after century. It has shaped our moral imaginations. And we might have wandered away from that story for a bit, but even those people who reject the Christian story often do it for Christian-ish reasons. Historically, we have been shaped by Christianity. Those values have come to us through Christianity. But then the second argument is logically, I don't think we can get the values of secular humanism without Christianity. And here's where I want to switch from the historical argument to the logical argument and from Tom Holland's big conversation to Matt Dillahunty's big conversation. A couple of weeks after Tom Holland and AC Grayling debated on the Unbelievable program, I was on the Unbelievable program and I was opposite Matt Dillahunty, who is an atheist who was with the atheist experience for for many, many years. 100 million plus views on YouTube, a big a big deal in atheism and anti-theism online. And we were discussing where our values had come from, and I make the claim that modern secular humanism has come from Christianity, that it's just kind of Christianity light, and the conversation goes from there. Is secular humanism new? In one sense, yes, quite new. In in another sense, it's I think it's a repackaging of Christianity light. I I I I do think I do think Nietzsche's uh critique holds that uh secular humanism tends to be um Christianity where God is swapped out. Sort out, yeah, mate. Just get it out of your face.
SPEAKER_02Get it out of your face. Honestly. Um but to the extent that's true, can we just say that Christianity is the Hammurabic code swapped out or upgraded or changed, or that all of this is derivative? At some point we're talking about human beings and how they choose to try to answer the questions and live lives cooperatively. Whether you're going back to animism and some tribal struggle, then this becomes uh a more codified sort of language, and when people aren't paying attention to it and the the village elder is no longer sufficient authority, we appeal to one outside of there. I mean, this would also be a sufficient explanation for the the history of religion. So to say that secular humanism is uh a new newly packaged, light, modified version of Christianity r really isn't relevant if Christianity is a modified version of other things that all tie back to the human being.
SPEAKER_00Aaron Powell Okay, good point. So if we have come out of Christianity, fine. But what did Christianity come out of itself? And why why are we privileging the Christian part of our evolution, our long evolution historically towards the values that we now have? And Matt Dillahunty wants to see that Christianity is just continuous with uh uh a development that had stretched from before it. And so the Hammurabi Code from Babylon, we're going back sort of 1800 BC, uh, and and there we've got written down these codified laws, about 282 codified laws, that talk about the different strata of society by which you know the king rules, and and and there are slaves and there are free men and there are property owners and there's a king, and different laws apply to different people differently. Now, the Hammurabi Code is an excellent example of the way the ancient people think. They think with a vertiginously steep hierarchy of being with the king at the top and the slaves at the bottom, and you find your place within that hierarchy of being. And what is ethical behavior? What is justice? Justice is enforcing the inequalities that are inherent to nature. Nature has given us an unequal world, and who are you to overturn the inequalities of this world? Actually, justice and wisdom involves living well within your limits, knowing your place, and there are different laws for different people depending on their social status and social standing. As Larry Sidentop says in his excellent book, Inventing the Individual, at the core of ancient thinking we have found the assumption of natural inequality. That's at the core of the thinking. Natural inequality. Page one of the Bible, male and female are king and queen of all creation. Like there's a divine right of kings that's taught on the first page of the Bible. But who are the kings and who are the queens? All humans, right? All humans are kings and queens. That's page one of the Bible. It's it's a very democratic understanding of humanity, it's a very equalizing doctrine of humanity. Written into ancient ways of thinking, says Larry Sidentop, is the assumption of natural inequality. So where is the disjunct between that way of thinking and modern ways of thinking? Because a modern person is outraged that Aristotle or Plato would call slaves natural living tools, right? We are horrified by an idea taught by an Aristotle, for instance, that justice involves the enforcing of natural inequalities. Because nature has taught us, you know, certain inequalities, and therefore we are to live by them. Who are you to overturn what nature has decreed, right? That that's the way an ancient person thinks. It's not the way we think today. So where was the disjunct? Because I don't think that small incremental changes get you to the UN Declaration of Human Rights. I think there's a disjunct. And actually, Matt Delahunty also thinks there's a disjunct, and AC Grayling thinks there's a disjunct. They just think it happened around about the 17th century. And the emerging out of nowhere, really, has been this idea in human rights and flourishing and the rights-based international order. Uh it's it's all happened since the nasty dark ages of Christendom. And once we've had nasty Christendom in the rearview mirror, then has emerged enlightenment, right? The disjunct, according to a Matt Dillahunty or an A. C. Grayling, happened about 300 years ago, 400 years ago, maybe 500 years ago. But that that's about it. There was a renaissance, right? Uh a rebirth of culture out of nothing, which is a profoundly religious thing to think, right? I often call it the creationist account of history, right? The creationist account of history is that there were long ages of darkness, and then Descartes and Locke and people said, Let there be enlightenment and there was enlightenment, then suddenly, poof, you know, out it comes. But I think they identify the moment of disjunction with the wrong Emmanuel. Um, they identify it with Emmanuel Kant 300 years ago, rather than with Jesus Christ, uh, also known as Emmanuel, the Hebrew word for God with us. I think that Emmanuel is where true enlightenment has come from. And I think that makes sense of the disjunct. That actually there was a fresh injection into the human race. There was a kind of a let there be light moment. Uh it first happened at the beginning of the Bible, it next happened at the beginning of the New Testament, where God the Son comes to earth and is injected into the human family and gives us our rebirth, gives us our enlightenment. In a sense, we all believe in some kind of disjunction. I just think enlightenment happened with Jesus rather than with uh a bunch of Europeans 300 years ago. And I think that's pretty obvious when you look at those Europeans 300 years ago, because they're all so very Christian in all the things that they say. Every single person that I've just mentioned, Locke and Descartes and Kant, and they all had religious reasons. They were profoundly religious people, saying what they said for religious reasons, and for very Christian-ish reasons. So seeing the disjunct as happening in the 1700s is uh a false historical argument to make. But remember, we're we're trying to think about the logical argument. Could we get from a Hammurabi code to the UN Declaration of Human Rights? And what are the logical presuppositions that would get us there? That's the question I want to ask. And remember what Matt Dillahunty said, and then we'll hear my response.
SPEAKER_02Aaron Powell So to say that secular humanism is uh a new newly packaged, light modified version of Christianity r really isn't relevant if Christianity is a modified version of other things that all tie back to the human being. Trevor Burrus, Jr.
SPEAKER_00Which is a big if, and I don't think it is at all. I I think what what you get when you look at human civilizations, what you get when you look at the Hammurabi code, when you look at the Enumeralish, when you look at any number of the ancient Near Eastern texts, when you look at any number of Greco-Roman understandings of the world, or Persian understandings of the world, or Muslim understandings of the world, uh i is basically that in the realm of the flesh, in the realm of biological reality, it is survival of the fittest, you know, and and therefore sacrifice of the weakest. Here's where the logical case really is found. Um the history that we've had is a history of reflecting upon nature, and nature certainly favors the strong. And so the heart of the logical question I want to pose is can you get from nature favoring the strong to an ethic of care for the weak? And what are the steps logically from that to that if all you've got is nature to go by? How do you get from the privileging of the strong to care for the weak? And I think what you get absolutely uniquely in Christianity is the reverse of that. You you have in Christ the fittest who is sacrificed for the survival of the weakest. And what you get birthed out of the Christian movement is uh a a unique preference for the poor, the marginalized, the weak, the outsider to draw them in. Such that obviously in every society there's tit for tat and let's cooperate and let's do all that kind of stuff. But who is we in that sentence? Let let us cooperate. Well, who's the us, you know? It could be just you and me and not and Justin, or it could be just me and Justin and not you, right? Um who are the people on planet Earth who are actually saying uh it's actually all of us, even our enemies, are those who we include in the circle of humanity, and who we grant equal human dignity to, and who we say they must never be marginalized, no matter how weak they are, no matter how ineffectual they are, no matter how maladapted to survival they are, um they are ours, and uh we will you know we will grant them a universal human dignity. That's a thoroughly Christian idea. And it and it's it's not, you know, it's obvious that it's found on the first page of the Bible. Um so it's it's there in Judaism, but it's it is a uniquely Christian idea that I think secular humanism has taken on. But I don't think you derive that secular humanism anywhere else but in Christianity.
SPEAKER_02In Judaism.
SPEAKER_00Let's call it the Judeo-Christian worldview or whatever. Or just call it the Bible, right? Um so yeah, that that's that's that's my argument in a nutshell, that logically you don't derive care for the weak and the equal rights of all, right to the very fringes of the human family, without an injection of something that is not what nature is doing. Nature is doing survival of the fittest. In the Bible, you've got the sacrifice of the fittest for we the weakest, so that we the weakest might survive and thrive and pass on the compassion revolution. There's a disjunctive note to be injected into this world. And the reason why we've got to where we've got to is because of that injection into this world, because of him, because of Christ. And that's the heart of the logical argument that I want to make. We have these secular humanist values nowadays, and I want to say we did not get them from secular sources. That's the historical argument, but the logical argument is we could not get them from secular sources. Now, I mentioned there is such a thing as prosocial behavior in evolutionary biology, and of course I'm gonna pick knits off my kin because they're gonna pick nits off me, and there is such a thing as kin selection, so I'm gonna make sure that my genes are propagated by looking after my progeny and maybe even looking after my cousins, right? Because I can I can protect my genes moving forwards by protecting those within my kin. But why should I care about the other guy? In fact, I'm cooperating with my kin in order that I can outcompete the enemy. And the difference between my survival rate and their survival rate is actually what drives the evolutionary process. There is all sorts of cooperation that happens within survival of the fittest, but we draw the circle pretty narrowly around our kin and maybe around our tribe, perhaps around our nation, but certainly not to the other guy, and certainly not to the enemy, not to the very fringes of human society. And this, I think, is a unique contribution of Christianity into the world, one that we now say goes without saying. But it's worth saying. It's the air that we breathe, but it's worth every now and again focusing on your breathing. It's a spiritual practice that many different religions uh see the value of. Let's focus on our breathing and let's recognize where these values have come from. These things have come from a distinctly Christian outlook, and removing Christianity from that does not leave you with your secular humanist values unaffected. They are very affected, as we go on to talk about here. Trevor Burrus, Jr.
SPEAKER_02So on one hand, you seem to be saying you can't remove God and still maintain these things, and yet you're you're uh is uh claiming that secular humanism hasn't done exactly that.
SPEAKER_00Aaron Ross Powell Secularism has done exactly that or hasn't done exactly has done exactly that.
SPEAKER_02That when I when I advocate for secular humanist principles, when I when I do that, that I'm basically taking the principles that you see in Christianity and just removing God from it. So clearly you can do that.
SPEAKER_00You can do that, but on what grounds now is every human being in the image of God, or now in this new updated term, uh is every human being now included in the universal declaration of humanity. Yeah. Why is it universal? Why is it every human without exception, but it is exceptionally a human thing? Why have we drawn the circle all the way to the very fringes of human society, but not further? Because we recognize that there is something exceptional to the human being, but there are no exceptions within the human family, so that we we are all equal possessors of such a thing as a human nature. Now, Christianity hammered that out when it was starting to think about how is Jesus, the particular Jesus of Nazareth, how is he the savior of all humanity, even a woman? He's not a woman, and yet he saves women by becoming human because all people, male and female, are possessors of the same human nature. He's not a Gentile, he's a Jew, and yet all Gentiles are included in the one humanity that God has so exalted to the highest place. It's a profoundly Christian thing that we secularize, but when you secularize it, you have a cost because these are theological ideas. And you can't get rid of the theos out of the theological ideas. Theos is just a Greek word meaning God. These are foundationally and irreducibly theological ideas. But if you say you want to hold on to these theological ideas and we live in a godless universe, again, that is a performative contradiction. You are undermining what you're claiming simply by claiming it.
SPEAKER_02I don't necessarily see any evidence when I look at um Christianity in particular, at least the way I understood it when I was a Christian, that there's a God who has human interests at heart. It's humans who have human interests at heart. So not only would secular humanism stand with regard to Occam's razor, but the thing that we're appealing to is the very thing that we're seeking to do.
SPEAKER_00On Matt's view, we care about humans because we are humans, but why don't you then say um Americans care about Americans because they're American? Why don't you say white American males care about white American males because they're white American males? You know, Thomas Jefferson wrote the Declaration of Independence. Our creator has endowed us with these unalienable human rights to liberty. Um, and yet he was a slave owner with 600 slaves. The problem is always when we say we ought to have this kind of society, who is we and how are we going to guard against shrinking the circle to the powerful? Because that's what nature is always wanting you to do. Nature has always wanted you to shrink the circle around a tight-knit kin group. And you can be as compassionate as you like within that kin group, but it's in order to completely obliterate the out group. And to say that God doesn't solve the problem because God is this arbitrary figure outside the system and we don't know whether he exists or not, is to deal with a completely different God from the Christian God. The Christian God is the God who in Christ takes flesh for all time. Let me just finish with a place that we get to in the big conversation with with Matt Delahunty, uh, where we talk about what are the consequences of getting rid of God in this kind of moral discourse. And and Matt's very understandable objection is, well, what am I meant to do if I don't believe in God? Right? We all believe in humans because we all are humans. If you add this extra thing called God to your ethical system, well, that's an ethical system that can work with people who believe in God, but it's not going to work with everyone. So what are we going to do about that?
SPEAKER_02Aaron Powell, whatever problem secular humanism may have with regard to foundations of ethics, no religious foundation has any way of solving that. Because ultimately, if and until some God comes in and says, I am in fact the God of the universe and I am the moral authority, and people are forced to recognize that this is the case.
SPEAKER_00I mean, the most famous figure in human history has in fact showed up and said that he is the god of the whole thing and he's set in motion this movement that has indeed transformed the world. He has turned Godforsaken execution on the cross into world domination. It's the biggest water into wine miracle there could possibly be. So like God has shown up in history in order to say all these things, but yeah. Trevor Burrus, Jr.
SPEAKER_02Then the only thing that's happening is Glenn's saying God is a foundation of morality, and I'm saying humans are. And nobody is going to be n neither of those systems is going to work for people who don't accept that that's a foundation.
SPEAKER_00Aaron Powell Did do people have to all recognize this foundation in order for it to be the foundation? Aaron Powell No, and people don't need to recognize that two plus two equals four for it to be the case that two plus two equals four, and for you to go to your grave proclaiming that two plus two equals four. Even if the whole world said it was otherwise, then two plus two would still equal four. People don't need to recognize a moral truth to be a moral truth for it to be moral.
SPEAKER_02Trevor Burrus They do if they're gonna if you're talking about a moral system. If you want to if you want to create, you know, uh computer code and get people to start programming in it, you've got to be able to convince them about ones and zeros. So two plus two plus equals four isn't even in the same ballpark of there is a God. It's either true or it's not, but it's not a foundation for something. If you're talking about a moral system, the only the the the true foundation is agreement on what the foundation is, that the three of us care about human beings. That's good. And then we can start arguing about how much we care and where there's gonna be conflicts and everything else. But as long as we can't do any of that until we agree on that foundation. And if Glenn's foundation is there's a God at the bottom of this and he can't demonstrate that, then we're not even gonna get started on software.
SPEAKER_00That's not what two plus two equals four is um the analogue of in this conversation. Two plus two equals four is the analogue of um all human beings are worthy of provision and protection. All of them. Right? Do you would you agree with that? All human beings, all members of the human family, no matter what their achievements, no matter what their attributes, all members of the human family are worthy of all provision and protection.
SPEAKER_02I have no idea.
SPEAKER_00Wow. That's a problem. Look at Justin's face. I hadn't seen that before. Wow. Wow. It it was a it was a moment. It was a clarifying moment for me. Um, one of the reasons why I wrote this book was that moment in the in the debate. Um, recognizing that actually there's a way of talking to somebody about their theological beliefs where you don't have to do a calam cosmological argument about the existence of God or the ontological argument for God's existence. You don't have to prove a God external to the system. What you need to do is pay attention to what you already believe. And um Matt might not believe it, but if you can look at a human being who is not economically viable, not kind of useful to society from an evolutionary point of view, and yet you still see them as as having a sacred worth, right? If you can look at that person, then you are that's a that is a theological belief, right? You you are believing in the Amago Day, you are believing in the image of God in that sense, in a in a profound way, right? And what the Christian is saying about humans being made in God's image is that this is a moral reality. It's a moral reality that is as real as the ones and zeros. It is as real as two plus two equals four. It is it is a truth. It is not accessed in the same way that ones and zeros are accessed. It's not demonstrated in the same way that two plus two equals four is demonstrated. But it is a conviction from which you live your life. It is a presupposition, it's an assumption, it is a faith statement, and that does not mean that you are uncertain about it, but it's actually something deeper than certainty. It's something that you've grounded your life on and you build the rest of your life on. And it's thoroughly theological and I would say Christological. And what I want people to do with the air we breathe is I want people to pull at the thread of the beliefs that they already have because Jesus is on the other end of that thread. I'll put it this way and then we'll finish. For 2,000 years we have meditated on this image of Christ. There he is with the Roman spear shoved up into his side. He is weak, he is pathetic, he is marginal, he is a victim. Victim with a capital V. That's what a sacrifice is, a victim. And yet, Christians for 2,000 years have looked on that image and thought, there is the glory of God, there is the divinity of the transcendent one shining at full strength. You've never seen anything more divine than that bleeding sacrifice with his arms wide open to the world, who has come as man for man, for all people, no matter how weak and despised. And it has birthed an incredible revolution in the way that we've seen all things. Tom Holland's Seven Different Values, the seven different values from this book. You might say, What have the Christians ever done for us? But you can only say that if you think all these things go without saying. They don't go without saying. They are extraordinary, and they have had an extraordinary history that traces back to an extraordinary truth. God took flesh and died for you, and he has birthed a movement that has overtaken the world. Somehow this God has turned Godforsaken execution into world domination. It's the ultimate water into wine miracle. Do you believe? And maybe you think belief is all about believing in, you know, angels and pixie dust and fairies and things that are far away. It's it's not. It's it's how you navigate your life day by day. Um here's an image from Paul Hobbs. He's a friend of mine, he's an artist. He painted this picture of a man who was within days of dying, he had no family around him, he was in a particularly squalid hospital ward. He took a photo of the man to paint it, and the man insisted on standing. It was the last time he stood, and then he died. The artwork is called Nil by Mouth. Here is a man at the end of his life with zero value to society from an evolutionary standpoint, from an economic standpoint. He has zero value to society, but does he have value? And Paul Hobbes gave him a halo. He gave him a halo because he's saying this man is in God's image. There is a sacred value to this man that is far above what nature would say about him. And as soon as you believe in that which is above nature, that is a supernatural belief. And if you have come to see him have that sacred value, that supernatural value, it is because historically and existentially for two thousand years we've been meditating on that other image of that other person close to death, whose value in society's eyes was set at zero. That's why they crucified him. And yet the Bible says he is the image of the invisible God with a capital I. And our vision of every other human is an echo from that original source. The image of God makes us believe in humanity as in the little eye, image of God. Do you believe? Keep pulling at that thread until you see that crucified man. And when you say that crucified man is the ultimate, he's the source, he's it, you're saying he's Lord. And once you say Jesus is Lord, bad luck you're a Christian. That's the way it happens. That's how it sneaks up on you. When you look to Jesus and you think, ah, he is the lights that everything else is an emanation from. He is the original singer of the song, and I've heard the echo. Trace it back to its source and see who Jesus is. I think you'll see that he is Lord. Matt Delahunty is not convinced. Uh AC Grayling is not convinced, but many others are becoming convinced. They're becoming convinced that you can pull at the threads of some of these values and you can find substance on the other end. You can find Jesus. You can find a God that you can finally believe in. And I pray that you find that particular God. One way that you can do that is by doing our course 321. Why don't you go to 321cour.com and discover life according to Jesus? You start an account and within seconds you are in. It is completely free. We would love you to do it. You can do it in eight sessions individually, or you can binge it in a couple of hours. Just get a Christianity 101. Get a look at the original image of God, Jesus Christ, and see if your heart is won by him. That'll do for now. And why don't you subscribe to the channel so that we can see you again on the next one? Bye bye.