Hello and welcome to the Speak Life podcast. My name is Thomas Thoroughgood, media producer at Speak Life, and a very Merry Christmas to all our listeners, wherever you're listening from. Today we have a bit of a special episode looking back at the year of 2024. What's happened in the realm of politics? What's happened in the realm of entertainment? And what can we expect potentially from this current cultural moment going forwards? You will be hearing, of course, from Glenn Scrivener, our director and CEO. If you're new to the Speak Life Podcast, he has presented most of the episodes in the past year, reactions to the meaning crisis and current events from a Christian perspective. He's also conducted quite a few exciting interviews this past year, in particular with Aion Herseyar Lee. That's episode 520 of the Speak Life Podcast. If you haven't listened to that one, she was raised a Muslim, rejected that, and became quite a prominent atheist, and then she wrote that article for Unheard at the end of 2023, Why I Am Now a Christian. And so Glenn had an opportunity to talk to her about her journey towards faith and how she encountered Jesus in a very dark time in her life. Her story is emblematic of a journey that quite a few people have been going on this past year. This sense of a longing for something rich, something deep, something theological. Glenn has been reflecting on those sorts of ideas a lot, and you will hear that come across in this conversation. He is joined by Nate Morganlock, who is the creative director at Speak Life. Nate and our colleague Eleanor have been creating content for the Reform Mythologist YouTube channel, getting into the realm of entertainment, gaming, and film and TV. How is the meaning crisis expressed in our storytelling? And how do those stories point in some small way to the greatest story? So in this conversation, Glenn and Nate have joined forces to look back at 2024 as a whole. What has shifted in the culture? So there's lots to cover in today's episode, but before we dive into that, I have a very brief and very exciting announcement, people. So 321, our online evangelism course, it has been upgraded with powerful new features designed to bolster your evangelism and deepen your confidence in Jesus. And the most exciting feature you need to check out right now is the brand new Church Finder. This is a tool built into the 321 course, which links your church with seekers in your area, whether you're hosting a 321 course or not. You can register your church to be included on the map by getting in touch today. Details are on the 321 website, 321course.com. Although bear in mind the team are out of office on their Christmas breaks at the moment, and you probably are too. But after that, when you come back, do let us know if you'd like to register your church to be included on the map. The more the merrier. So go to 321course.com, check out the new Churchfinder and the other awesome new upgrades, and let us know what you make of them. If you have any suggestions of what we should improve next time, let us know. 321 relies solely on the generous feedback and financial support of partners like you. So from all of the Speak Life team, thank you very much. Okay, over to Glenn and Nate.
SPEAKER_03Hello, this is Speak Life. We like to see all things through the lens of Jesus. My name's Glenn, and from the Reformed Mythologist channel, it's Nate Morganlock. Hello. Hello, how are you? What even is a Reformed Mythologist?
SPEAKER_01Well, uh basically it's just someone who's a Christian who is deeply interested in stories and storytelling. So if you want to find out more about that, you can go over to the Reformed Mythologist channel. We will probably reference a couple of the videos and a couple of the things that you can find over there during this conversation. But yeah, essentially, I'm a Reformed Christian who is obsessed with stories and storytelling.
SPEAKER_03Great. So people should definitely check out the Reformed Mythologist channel, give that a sub. You will not be disappointed. In this video, we're going to think about the cultural fracturings that are have happened in 2024 and that seem to be continuing to happen in politics, in entertainment, and in the church. So what are we going to talk about in politics?
SPEAKER_01So in politics, I think it'd be good to know from you what you think has been really key in this year and any particular standout moments of 2024 which are likely to have long-term repercussions.
SPEAKER_03So many, but let's think about three elections. Let's think about Trump 2024, let's think about the general election in the UK in 2024, and let's think about the assisted dying bill that was just uh the f the second reading was just voted through uh in the Commons, and I guess we might be on track for assisted suicide in the UK. What did the vote for that signify? Um but first of all, we've got to talk about Trump, don't we? Of course we do. I mean, he is the time person of the year. It was not Giselle Pellico, which a lot of people uh were sort of agitating for. So she was the one who waived anonymity in this rape trial in France. So Dominique Pellico sort of arranged for was it like a hundred men to have sex with his wife while she was drugged? And she waived anonymity and she said, It is not for me to bear the shame, it is for him to bear the shame. So she kind of owned the name Pellico, and she and she it was even known by her married name, which I thought was just stunningly brave. She didn't so she divorced him as soon as she found out that this is what was going on, but she maintained the Pellico name for the sake of all her grandchildren who have the Pellico name. And she she said, That is powerful. I want them to have the pride of saying I'm descended from Giselle Pellico, rather than the shame of saying I'm descended from Dominique Pellico. That's redemptive. Yeah. It's really redemptive, and the shame the shame does not attach to her, the shame attaches to him and all the other abusers. It was just such a such a powerful movement of of Yeah, bearing bearing what bearing the shame that does not belong to her and then insisting that it belongs to the man who it does belong to. There's there's something beautifully gospel-like in that. Anyway, so she was not the person of the year. Donald Trump was. So you can you can see the controversy over that. Yeah. Yeah, yeah. But he he tweeted out uh after after time made him the person of the year, which is earlier in December, um, a little tweet that said, How it started, and it's got his mugshot from uh Georgia in August of 2023. Him looking very Donald Trump. Yeah. Defiant. Defiant. Do you think he was posing in the mirror before that was that was taken? I don't think he does anything but pose in the thing. That's what he that's what he's there for. And surely that was the end of the Trump train.
SPEAKER_01Like Yeah, and arguably, I mean I did what was the exact what was the exact reason for that mugshot? Say again.
SPEAKER_03So in Georgia, um he was there was racketeering charges, which I'm I'm I'm not sure I I don't think those have either been tried either or have stuck. Okay. But um yeah, the charge the charges against him were for racketeering and other another charges in the state of Georgia.
SPEAKER_01I mean, for most people who you know pay a little bit of attention, I think the last image they'll uh connect with Donald Trump and what they thought was the death knell of Donald Trump would have been the QAnon shaman in the Capitol Hill building. January 6th with January 6th Epiphany, with his great big horns and his painted face and his fur and his sort of stripped to the waist. And basically, okay, that's got to be the end, because you just can't do that. That's not a thing that you can do in Western society. You know, Donald Trump's contested the election and all this sort of stuff. Therefore, goodbye, and for many people, good riddance. And yet, 2024, he's now the 47th president of the well, by the end of January he'll be the 47th president of the United States.
SPEAKER_03The free press, uh E Eli uh Eli Lake wrote this um f fascinating and fantastic summary of uh where we're up to. Donald Trump ended his first term in disgrace, hit with a second impeachment after his supporters stormed the Capitol January 6th, 2021. The 2022 midterm candidates that he endorsed, Herschel Walker, Mehmet A-Oz, and Kari Lake, all went down in flames in 2023. He was declared guilty of sexually assaulting the writer E. Gene Carroll in a civil case. This past May, he was convicted in a Manhattan court of 34 felony counts for improperly reporting hush money payments. Overall, he has faced 116 indictment indictments. Even now, the New York State Attorney General is trying to punish the Trump organization with nearly 500 million uh dollars in fines, claiming that he unlawfully inflated the value of his properties, and yet here he is, America's 47th president. So, what what does that tell us about the state of politics and and the culture?
SPEAKER_01I mean Paulid says who was he up against? And you know, he they they couldn't decide, and then they did decide, and then that didn't work. I mean it was Um and I think you can actually look at the election campaign, and I mean it's a you know ridiculous thing to think, oh what would have happened if it'd just been evoked before the months of of campaigning. But during the campaign, the Trump um kind of movement, the MAGA movement, had a number of iconic moments and images which you know the the Democrats didn't have at all. So the three I want to sort of pick out as being kind of defining images. I mean, the first one has got to be him uh after the assassination attempt in uh is it Lansing, Pennsylvania, I think, somewhere like that. Um and just that shot. I mean, it could have been, you know, it it couldn't have been designed any better with the American flag kind of rippling behind it.
SPEAKER_03No, we're not we're not conspiracy theorists, we're not saying it's a stage.
SPEAKER_01But yeah but you know, blood across his cheek, his fist pumped up, and then these agents, none of whom you can see their eyes because they've got their shades on, and it's just a brilliant image. And the events of that day, whatever anyone thinks has happened, are incredible. The the fact that that wasn't the only thing, and almost was forgotten about within a few weeks of it happening, that as campaign moments go, you've got a you know, I mean, talk about an ear miss, you know, if the head isn't turned at the particular moment, yeah, that's going through the skull.
SPEAKER_03So for Trump. Tragically, the firefighter died at that. But yeah, what a what a s and and you say about you know news cycles do move on, don't they? Like, like when Joe Cox was murdered within days of the Brexit vote, she was in fact murdered, and the vote went the other way to to what she would have wanted. So it it is interesting that sort of news cycles do move on, and it it wasn't a done deal. Like the fact that he survived that did not mean okay, it's a shoe-in now that he's gonna win in November.
SPEAKER_01But then yeah, I just think there was something there was something about the icon, I the icons of of MAGA and the the the strength of the brand that I think couldn't have been dealt with in a first term. Yeah. So the fact that you finish with the QAnon Shaman, there is there is more mythology, there's more story, there's more you know amazing pieces of media to come out of this movement. And of course the the campaign gave us those. Um the other just for clarity, this is not a MAGA hat that you're wearing. No, it's not, it's just not a red baseball cap. It's just you know, it's not faded MAGA, it's not neither is it hyper MAGA. I'm not saying it's not a parody of MAGA, it's just a red baseball cap. Um yeah, let's just be clear. In fact, it has a little little badge on it. I don't know if you can see that beside, is it? Which is the came up to the lemonade store. Yeah, the duck song. Yeah. Have you got any grapes? So that's a slightly trollish thing. The whole thing is trollish, really. Maybe it is. So there's so there's the image of Yeah, go on. So this image of the thing, and I think one one of the things that uh the right certainly did in the build-up to the election was to understand the power of imagery and the power of symbols. Yeah. And you can actually say, oh well, of course, that was exactly what the Nazis did, and you know, the swastika was such a strong icon and you know, all this sort of stuff. But it's true, people respond to those sort of symbols. Yeah. And the American flag is one of those truly kind of deeply meaningful things. Sacred. Yeah, and you know, you you sing to it in the national anthem, right, and that then becomes the deep thing that is being tapped into, and the alternative is managerial. It's plans. It's not inspiring, it's got no blob. It's flat.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. You know, by Biden is incapacitated, cannot do the job, and just his number two kind of pops up very hard.
SPEAKER_01Having not won an election to get to that position in a way.
SPEAKER_03So how is that inspiring? Um you know, it could be the first black woman president, first woman president, and all that all that kind of stuff. So the the there is that kind of symbology going on, possibly.
SPEAKER_01But I suppose that was where you're thinking, okay, so that kind of um voting by identity, I mean, 2008 was when that you know, first black president happens. Yeah. We're in 2024. We've had a lot of water under the bridge since you still haven't had a female president, though. Well, this is true, but um just in terms of concern for the you know the the individual qualities, as in the what's the word? Unchangeable characteristics, immutable characteristics of the of the the the candidate. I think that's that conversation has been happening for decades now, and it feels as though people aren't interested in that so much. Certainly they weren't interested in voting for Camel Harris.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and isn't that interesting if we're thinking about a cultural moment that that Trump is kind of portrayed very boldly and persistently as as Hitler. You know, here is Orange Hitler, and and certainly sort of CNN and MSNBC and and and those sorts of places were presenting him in those sorts of terms, and even his running mate, J.D. Vance, back in 2016 in a private message, kind of just sort of wonders aloud. He might be Hitler, I don't know, but um and and so there's there's that kind of hanging around in the air, um, but none of that seems to stick to Teflon Trump. Um and people people are just kind of like they sh it was a collective shrug of the shoulders, and 52% voted for him. You rightly say um yeah, it it was a two-horse race, and and they were not just voting for Trump, yeah. It was very much a vote against Kamala and the Democrats. But it was also uh an election in which people switched from so you got Joe Rogan, who was a big Bernie bro, Bernie Sanders 2016 all the way, and I think he's quite representative of a lot of a lot of people in America who would have voted Bernie Sanders in 2016 and they vote Donald Trump in 2024. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01What explains that? Well, I again I don't think it's to do with politics, and I don't think it's to do with economic theory, I don't think it's to do with the details. I think it's to do with the mythos that's being presented to you.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And you know, early when 2016 it was all this gonna be drain the swamp kind of stuff. And this time it's still make America great again. That's still the the simplicity of the idea that there is there was something about the Trump campaign that had adventure that had a spirit of entrepreneurship. So the fact that Elon Musk is involved and he's a guy who wants to colonize Mars, and the the Rocket Man is there with you know this kind of art of the deal guy, it's all very positive.
SPEAKER_03Trusting ambition. Yeah, it is.
SPEAKER_01It's like and so much of the the kind of the vision. Um, there was a brilliant little edit. I mean, it was a slightly kind of uh again trollish thing of um just you know, oh we're back, right? That one of those kind of videos, and it's you know, it's a load of like F-16 fighter jets, and it's a load of like eagles flying down to swoop over stuff, and it's people like as as gladiators. And one of the images you've got there is Caspar David Friedrich's Wanderer Above the Sea of Fog, which is one of my favourite paintings from uh 1818, and it's this guy standing on top of the mountain looking out into the distance. It's the spirit of adventure, yeah, it's the heroic position, and that is what America seems to have got behind is the idea that oh, we're just we're sick of this kind of looking around to check if everyone's okay, how's everyone feeling? Yeah, we're now voting for you know, go to Mars. We're voting for take us into a new stage of American life.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, speaking of compelling images, on the 4th of July, Kamala HQ tweets out this screen grab from The Handmaid's Tale, and it's this picture of the Washington Monument made to look like a cross, and it looks like a Nazi rally. This is the future if Trump gets in. If that's the whole messaging, what's fascinating is that within what five months of that, the entire electorate just goes, yeah, but no. And and is kind of and and kind of shrugs off the associations of Nazism. And that has been the worst epithet that you can ever throw at somebody for the last 80 years. For eight decades, we have had this kind of World War II mythology in which Hitler is the great moral exemplar. For 1900 years, Jesus was the great moral exemplar. What would Jesus do? Do that. For the last 80 years, Hitler has been the great moral exemplar. What did he do? Yeah. Do the opposite. And the worst thing you can be called in an online dispute, and every online dispute will eventually lead to a comparison with the Nazis. And it feels like we're kind of post-that mythology. You know, the post-Christian post-Christian mythology is the World War II mythology. Are we now post-Christian? Yeah. That none none none of that kind of works anymore because I think a lot of people are just cynical about the epithets that are thrown. Yeah. And that perhaps beneath the the Nazi tar is there's there's no substance. It's just a ploy. And you can be called a Nazi now, you can be called Hitler, and you can still be president of the United States.
SPEAKER_01Um it's incredible. And I think one of the things that's connected to it is this idea of optimism that um the project that's been taking place in terms of social justice and all that kind of those concerns for the you know the plights of the those who've been kind of cast aside or been overlooked or whatever it might be. That that has been we've been hyper-aware of that for some time and it can be labelled as woke and it can be you know it can be misused and it can be distorted and all that sort of stuff. But the issue is that it doesn't give anyone any hope that anything's actually going to improve. If the systems are broken, it's just it's just it's oh look at this, it's terrible, this is terrible, this is terrible, okay. Okay, these things are terrible. Has anyone got any idea of how we might move forward? And one of the things about this kind of make America great again is that it's it has the idea that America could be great. Now, whether you think it was great previously, or is this you know Yeah, the again bit might be Are we trying to go back to a you know a uh an imagined past, or is there actually something about this country that could be kind of super positive and and Western civilization that could be positive? Now, what direction that actually ends up going, yeah, what vision for the future any of these people have actually got is a big question. Yeah, but the point was it's got hope and optimism underneath it. Yes, and that's what Obama had in 2008, yes, but Biden hasn't had that, Harris hasn't had that, there's been no sense that there's genuinely anything positive and optimistic about their movements, yeah.
SPEAKER_03And that's why something like the McDonald's uh image has had massive cut through.
SPEAKER_01There's there's and and the McDonald's image, so so Trump, you know, uh gets this image of himself like waving out of the drive thru of a McDonald's. Again, it was in Pennsylvania, which is obviously a massive swing state. And it's it's just and just look at the colours, it's like His crisp white shirt, the kind of you know cherry red tie, he's got this golden kind of um uh apron with into kind of dark blue, and it just and he's obviously got his orange face and his golden hair, right? But the point is it's it's really strong, it's high contrast, it's saturated colours, but it's bold and it says, here is something. And that was what McDonald's is about, right? No one's going to McDonald's for like anything subtle. You're going because you want the hit of the calories, and you're happy to pay a small amount for doing it, and it's convenient, and it worked for you. Yeah, yeah. It's not concerned about you know social issues. I mean, they might pretend that since you know uh kind of supersize me documentary and all that kind of stuff. But the point is, this is optimistic. It's bright, it's bold, it says, here we are, and I think that's what Trump tapped into, and that's why he won't.
SPEAKER_03It's bright, it's optimistic, it's also disposable, and it's cheap, and it's capitalistic, and it's got a lot of dollar signs attached to it. So So you know, Obama is this like messianic figure. We are the ones we've been waiting for, was like one of one of his sort of uh sort of mottos. Um and and that was a kind of a vote for a juster America. Um it's it's di it's a different kind of hope to say you'll you'll get your McDonald's a little bit cheaper and you know tallow fries, I think, was what people are looking for. Let's go.
SPEAKER_01Although RFK wants to um Well the Make America Healthy again thing, you know, that's a that is again, they are odd badfellas, but it's very odd bad fellows.
SPEAKER_03So yeah, RFK coming in, Elon Musk coming in, who on culture war issues is kind of anti-woke and anti-gender ideology. But is he a conservative? He's not really a conservative at all. He you know he's a transhumanist, like he he wants to blast off into a post-human future. Um so like this is a really weird kind of uh alliance.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And who knows how long it'll be able to hold together. You know, one of the things that's marked Trump's previous presidency is just how disposable his staff are and how disposable his key people are, and he's willing to drop them. And that's because he's not like he's not interested in an ideology, he's not interested in kind of like taking things, you know. Again, the the the Hitler stuff I don't think actually lands at all because Hitler wrote Where's his Mein Kampf?
SPEAKER_03Where is Trump's mind camp?
SPEAKER_01It's just the concern is to win, and he will do whatever is necessary in order to win.
SPEAKER_03His Mein Kampf is the art of the deal.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, right. It's just make it happen, yeah, make it work and and be successful. Yeah. Um, but that's where yeah, it'd be very interesting then to see how sustainable that coalition or that alliance of very alpha individuals is capable of being through 2025.
SPEAKER_03And should we think about the UK election? Um in fact, let's let's look at two votes kind of together. And what one was the general election, in which there was a landslide victory for Labour. Um they got 34% of the votes and 63% of the seats. Um so they're going to be in power for for a very long time, um, not least because the Conservative Party were utterly trounced. Um they lost what 125 seats or or was it even more?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, and it is interesting, just you know, the way that we go for first past the post in this third.
SPEAKER_03250 seats. They lost 250 seats, yeah.
SPEAKER_01Which we know well, but I mean look that was from 2019, right? So that was the Boris Johnson election, Johnson against um uh Corbyn. Yeah, and that was the big one just before the kind of make make Brexit happen sort of thing. But a lot of stuff's happened since 2019, right? There's a bit a few significant events that have taken place and they delayed and they delayed and they delayed, and then eventually on yeah, July the 4th, yeah, the election happened. And the the nation voted overwhelmingly reluctantly for Keir Starmer and Labour.
SPEAKER_03It was a vote against the Tories rather, much of an endorsement of Labour, and they've been a um a record-breakingly unpopular government for the first six months. Yeah. Um Reform UK, which is Nigel Farage's party, like I say, got 14% of the vote share and only 1% of the seats share, because that's part of the first part of the post thing. But they got four million votes. Um interestingly, Elon Musk is now being named as like a major donor from overseas, and again, a libertarian tech bro, post-humanist. Yep. Um, which goes together with the other votes that I want to draw attention to in the UK in November. Kim Leadbeater from Labour uh as a new MP, she came in and she was sponsoring a bill for assisted dying, um, which I I think more correctly is assisted suicide, physician assisted suicide in the UK. And uh that bill passed, but it revealed some very different fractures in the political landscape. Because you would have Nigel Farage from um reform, he he is more conservatively minded, and so he voted against assisted suicide. But Richard Tice, who is very prominent within Reform UK, um, was quite an enthusiastic supporter of assisted suicide because of his libertarian concerns. But then you've got Nigel Farage voting for, uh voting against assisted dying alongside Diane Abbott of Labour, very much a person of the left. Um and and then you have you know people like uh Angela Rayner on Labour's side of things who who are voting, you know, with uh the Nigel Farage, uh with the Richard Tyses of this world. And so what you've got in terms of fracturing is is not really left-right, but you've got a quite libertarian individualism going together with some ident identity politics on the left. Yeah. So you've got the the right-wing individualist and the left-wing individualist who will vote for choice and vote for assisted dying. And then you've got those on the on the right who are more into well, we need to conserve as a society and hang together as a culture. And you've got the Diane Abbots of the world, um, who are old school lefties who are, let's all be in this together, and for the sake of the weak and the marginalized, let's say thou shalt not kill. Um, and so it just goes to show that there's that left and right is is one of the less important divides when it comes to politics. I think Brexit revealed that there's a there's a divide between nationalist and globalist, those who are the somewheres, those who the anywheres. I think this vote shows that there's the individual concern versus the societal concern. And I think it shows that actually religion um has much to say into politics because you know those who swore an oath um on the Bible um in the new intake of MPs uh overwhelmingly voted against assisted dying. Those who decided not to take an oath on the on the Bible overwhelmingly voted for assisted suicide. And so you've got all these different so let left and right is is much less of a concern.
SPEAKER_01Now, would of those three elections, Trump, uh the UK general election, and this assisted suicide bill, which of those three do you think is the most significant?
SPEAKER_03When history looks back on in 2024, do you think I think undoubtedly that the the Trump election, I think undoubtedly will we look back. When when you just see all the things, all the kitchen sink that's hurled at um Donald Trump, much of it quite rightly, um, and a collective shrug of the shoulders. Yeah. I I think that's a real signal that we've we've moved on from a we've moved on even from a post-Christian paradigm to a post-post-Christian paradigm, I think.
SPEAKER_01But in terms of the assisted dying bill, that one being you know, there have been ones in Canada and there's other countries in the world where it's sort of it's already happened. Yeah. That feels like a real that is a a threshold moment where it's very difficult to put that thing back.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. If it goes through in in the spring, and you know, there there's some hope that Kim Leadbeater is is really overplaying her hand. So that the committee that's going to look into this, she's packed with um supporters of her bill. I think increasingly, day by day, um, we we are seeing how what she was arguing for on the floor of the house um was for the principle of mercy killing, and that her law itself would not help any of the people she raised. She she's she told eleven um very harrowing stories about people who had terrible end-of-life care. Yeah. Um and the solution to that terrible end-of-life care was not let's increase palliative care. The solution to that was for her to argue for the principle of mercy killing. And and so, like, I'm I'm afraid I'm gonna use this language. I do think she was speaking out two sides of her mouth in that debate. Like, I do think she was saying, on the one hand, this is a very safe bill, there are all sorts of safeguards around it, it'll have to go to the high court, it'll have to come back, there'll have to be two people, both those people who sign off and have to know the what like she was getting details of her own bill wrong about it, but she was trying to say, so many safeguards, so many safeguards, so many safeguards, and you're like, if you think there are so many safeguards, then none of those 11 people whose stories you told would have been helped by those safeguards. Right. You are not arguing for those safeguards, you are arguing for the principle of mercy killing. And you're right that if in spring, if in the spring the the lower and the upper house uh of the UK Commons vote for of uh UK Parliament, vote for this, we we are switching from a paradigm of the sanctity of life and everybody has it 100% to quality of life and everybody's put on a sliding scale. I think I think that is that is a massive shift away from the sanctity of life, which actually upholds the equality of all people in this culture. Um so that that would be a big shift if it if it does happen in the spring.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, but it's there's still still some time to go before it kind of becomes possible for doctors to I think it's still all to play for and all to pray for, definitely.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So we're thinking about politics and we've thought about some votes uh in the US and in the UK. Um, but this year, how has entertainment seen this same these same kind of culture war elements at play?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, I mean, in some ways, politics is the entertainment. That's what you're watching. You know, what do you I'm on season five of Donald Trump or whatever? But um no, I think in terms of entertainment, what have been the key things within 2024? Uh I mean, Taylor Swift done quite a bit this year, she's been a busy lady. The era's tour, I think, is the most profitable tour of all time. Yeah, uh, it's not quite the most well attended, but it's probably second on that list or something. But just in terms of that kind of uh phenomenon, um the year side with Oppenheimer kind of winning the Oscars, so best picture amongst others. Um that was quite significant. Uh Oasis reunited, you know. Maybe there is hope for the future if Liam and Noel can get on with each other well enough to do a tour.
SPEAKER_03They're such optimists, aren't they?
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so many dispositions. That's it, cheery. Um, but I think what's been interesting for me, particularly in the reform mythologist stuff that we've done, has been uh looking at the world of video games, and that's not something I'm particularly knowledgeable about, but a lot of people said, Look, you really gotta look at this because this is a really fascinating example of a shift within this kind of uh culture war thing. Uh so three video games, um, two of which seem to be very similar, uh, and then one which is a bit of an outlier. So there's a game called Helldivers 2, not played it, but as apparently it's very similar to the setup for Starship Troopers. Okay. So you've got this kind of galactic kind of military mic that's gonna go and take out the evil giant bugs. Okay, big insects, lots of lots of shooting and stuff, and that um has been received as a kind of we're back, you know. It's like it's unapologetically violent and fun to play, and the guys get to go together and just say stupid like um action movie lines to each other and all that sort of stuff, and that game was uh very similar to a game called uh Space Marine 2, which I believe is built on the Warhammer universe, so 40k is a kind of particular kind of storyline in uh Warhammer, which is those little painted figures, but there's a video game, and this one again is just a bunch of Space Marines unapologetically getting their big guns and going taking out the bad guys, and those were both kind of received with great appreciation from large sections of the gaming community who feel as though we've been scared of the too long, right? Yes, um and then the game that actually I've got most I guess you made made a video on and we put it on the Reform Mythologist was uh one again, I'd not heard of it, not played it, but uh called Dragon Age the Vale God. Okay. So this was I think the third in a series of games, and uh is a kind of deep fantasy, so you can play as a kind of all sorts of mythical creatures and stuff, but you're on a little quest and it's all kind of borrowing heavily from from Dungeons and Dragons and and Tolkien and whatever. And in this game, there was a uh there is a character, female character who comes out as non-binary in in a cutscene early in the game. Okay. Later in the game, another character in a cutscene misgenders this character, saying she when she's supposed to apparently say day. And rather than the game just kind of go, oh well, that happened, and you know, whatever, that character who did the misgendering, then oh s I've done it. So she stands up, she walks over to an area in the room with a bit of space, and she pulls a barve. A barve. A barve. So this is ten push-ups. Okay, alright. So she does ten push-ups because it wouldn't be right for her just to say sorry because that's too easy. Right. And it wouldn't be right for her to really try and say sorry, because then she'd be stealing the spotlight and centering herself. Centering herself when she wasn't the offended party. So what she did was she went and did some a small bit of physical female um press-ups or male press-ups. Well, there is there is some debate about the quality of her form on these these press-ups. Right. So people have questioned that and whether she actually does 10. But the issue is that in order to kind of be put right, you then perform an act of penance. And if you're really going down that whole identity kind of you know, um concern for the marginalized and overlooked, yes, needing to be able to do ten push-ups. Right. That is pretty able. Like not most people, if you walk down the street and say to them, Can you do 10 push-ups right now? They could not do it.
SPEAKER_03And and again, female push-ups tend to be with the knees down on the floor.
SPEAKER_01Well, these aren't with the knees on the ground, but but yeah, the point the point was that you just basically non-binary push-ups. So this game, this little clip from this game was then, you know, just went viral as everyone kind of mocked it and just said, Oh, it's a terrible little But it's been interesting to see that the weight, as it were, of the movement has been towards a kind of based, we're back, you're allowed to play fun games and just enjoy them without being lectured. Yeah. And yeah, that whole kind of dynamic seems to have now shifted in some way. Yeah. Which you could say this is the video game manifestation of what is happening in the realm of politics.
SPEAKER_03Which is very much like the woke so-called. And I think we are now at the stage where we don't have to put an asterisk next to woke every time we say it. Because I ha I have always sort of said I I've always resisted saying woke because it there's a venerable tradition to it on the left, especially in black communities, and this is this is about you know racial oppression back in you know, circa 2010 and and the the negative now use of the word woke as a pejorative, um, you know, that that can be offensive to certain parts of the black community and all that kind of stuff. But I I think now the word woke has now been so identified with identity politics. Yeah. Um that's okay, that's the last time I'll put an asterisk next to it. But I think the the woke so-called and the anti-woke who are kind of against it. I I I often speak about the mask wearing and the mask tearing. And when when the woke so-called overplay their hands in in terms of I just want to look out for you know marginalized communities when when actually so much of that is just about virtue signaling. I'm not saying it's necessarily about virtue. Oh, so mask wearing as in mask wearing, as in being virtue signaling.
SPEAKER_01Rather than like a mask for a COVID thing. No, yeah, yeah, forget COVID. Yeah, we're forgetting. Yeah, we're forgetting COVID. Okay.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. But just that's weird.
SPEAKER_01As soon as I hear the word mask, I'm like, oh, this is we all shrink back.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. But the mask in terms of a mask of virtue. Okay. Right. Okay. And and so that is not to say that every time you want to um spotlight racial injustice or gender imbalances, that that means it's woke nonsense. But it is to say that that hand has been overplayed so consistently that there is the danger. The danger on the left is of wok of mask wearing. Right. I think the danger on the right is of mask tearing. Okay. So that every time anyone, you know, like like if we put a trigger warning on a video, you can count down the seconds before someone in the comments will just say woke nonsense. Woke dosh. Right. Um because trigger warnings have been attached to not just descriptions of sexual violence, they've been attached to vi you know ideas that make me uncomfortable politically. Yeah. Like in that sense, trigger and and and that's a real shame because trigger warning then becomes totally like devalued, and it's a mask. And so what happens every time you use trigger warning, even in its intended sense, it gets torn down by the mask terrors, right? And so it it is there something to that with the computer game example? Because there is a there is a sense of, oh, we're so back, you know, right. Let's just dive into hell and you know, shoot the alien insects and you know, cockroaches uh for the flames. Um and at that stage, if it's just the mask tearing because I'm sick of Gamergate like telling me I'm a bad person, yeah. Now I I just want to be brutal, I just want to be violent. Right. Yeah. Now we now we we don't have masks anymore. Do we have virtue anymore? Right? There's the virtue signaling, and then I hate the virtue signaling, all right, but what do you got now positively?
SPEAKER_01Well, and that is, I think, is the major thing is that what is because this this kind of period of social justice warring and culture warring, and the it feels as though this has been going on for far too long, and there hasn't yet been in the the the cultural kind of conversation, where is the place in which something alternative, genuinely alternative, genuinely optimistic, genuinely like this is something we could actually live by? Yes. It's not just like constantly angry and aggressive, and it's not just constantly condescending and scolding. Yeah, it's not just critique, it's not just deconstruction, it's actually somewhere we can be.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_01And I think that's that's where it's actually quite interesting from a Christian point of view to think, okay, so what are the ways in for the church to say, Right, yeah, right. We're sick of it, aren't you? Right? Of course. You actually want some help with this, you're looking for an option. Completely.
SPEAKER_03And like Tom Holland has said on this very channel, um, you know, looking into the future, into his crystal ball, you know, he he sees three futures. One of them is progressivism sheds its Christian foundations and just cuts loose from anything Jesus-y and blasts off into the stratosphere and into oblivion goes the hyper woke, right? And then the the lashback against that is the anti-woke. And that is those who believe in nature, you know, and and strength and domination and vitality and all those sorts of things that the woke are so worried are gonna happen. And and they are they are the only ones who are going to save us from the handmaid's tale. Like it's like only Kamala can save you from that Aryan rally that's going to happen at the Washington Monument. Um and at and at that point, like an entire electorate has just said, Yeah, but nah. Yeah. Like um, you are not the answer to this. But then there are some, you know, scary figures on the right, and there are some scary figures who are just tearing down the masks and have no virtue to replace that with. Those are the first two options. Third option, Christian Revival. Yeah. And Tom Holland says, This is this is the one. I pick options. What I think we're going to see in 2024 and increasingly in 2025 is all of the above. Okay. And I think all of the above is the world that we're living in, in which we'll, you know, um there will continue to be the mask wearing, there will continue to be the mask tearing, and praise God, there are people who are looking for something solid and are refugees from this culture war and finding it on the rock of Christ, we pray.
SPEAKER_01And when they find it, what is it going to look like? What kind of Christianity is it going to be? Because I think particularly in the conversation around you know the re-enchantment of the West, and um your friend Justin Briley has sort of talked about this with various people, Martin Shaw or Paul Kingsnorth, or you spoke to Rod Dre the other day about kind of his ideas of what what's kind of out there. Jonathan Peugeot. What do you notice about all four of them? Well, these are all Eastern Orthodox, and these are all people who've embraced a tradition which is tradition with a capital T. It's like really well, maybe the whole thing's in block capitals. I mean, it's so it's so irrelevant, it's so non-contemporary. Yeah, it's so CS lewis thing, yeah. And that sense that uh the Christianity that people might be landing in when they retreat back from this this kind of culture warring might not be reformed, might not be even necessarily Catholic, but it's like the biggest movement seems to be in the Orthodox.
SPEAKER_03The New York Post on the 3rd of December um ran with this headline: Young men leaving traditional churches for masculine orthodox Christianity in droves. Uh they've got some statistics down here. Uh they reckon that compared to 2019, so they're even comparing it to pre-COVID levels, um, they think conversions to orthodoxy, and they take conversions very, very seriously. Like it's hard, isn't it? You don't just tick a box on an altar. You don't just you know, prayer prayer and do an altar call. Um they are up 78%, 78% increase in converts in 2022 compared with pre-pandemic levels. And we're now in 2024, we're about to go into 2025, and uh those numbers show no sign of uh going in the other direction. Uh and what what do you notice about you know, here's Father Josiah Trenham? Um he is a serious man, right? And it reminds me of Philip Larkin's poem about church going, and it sort of finishes with that stanza it's a serious house built on serious earth. And in 54, I think he wrote that poem. He was worried about what was going to happen to the church and what are they gonna turn these churches into when the you know, when the last worshipper switches the lights out, what would we have lost? We would have lost a serious house on serious earth. Um, and I think that's different to Donald Trump serving McDonald's at the drive-thru. You know, as hopeful as that image is, um, that's not gonna sustain it. That is fast food. You know, it gives you a kick.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um, these guys are into fasting and proper fasting over 40 days, and it's communal and it's liturgical and it's embodied and it's challenging and it's ancient and it's weird. Um, but for all that, that's actually not a barrier to people trying out these kinds of traditional churches, as it's actually a bridge to it.
SPEAKER_01And that particularly young men, which is obviously emphasized in the article, looking for something to do. Yeah. It's a very active involvement, and that evangelicalism um feels far too easy, far too straightforward. And the activism, which is sort of part of that kind of evangelical kind of what's the quadrilateral with the evangelism. Biblicism, crucicentrism, activism, conversionism. Conversionism. But so the activism, I suppose, has got that kind of idea of of uh going out to do the ministry and and reaching out, but certainly the activities that people are looking to participate in within more traditional churches are way more demanding.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And require a level of taking yourself seriously that you know pot potentially versions of Christianity or denominations or stripes of Christianity that the West has thought would be the connection point haven't maybe been in the same way.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. It's interesting. When when I teach church and mission, so um I I I help out with the Union School of Theology, um, used to be uh Wales Evangelical School of Theology. Um in that course, I kind of I I'll see if I can get the phrase right. I I I say that to have a proper mission theology, you you need to think that the church is the mission strategy for the world. And therefore, the church is the church on mission. And what evangelicals tend to mean by that is church is nothing if it's not on mission, right? Church is um church on mission is church, right? Um and so evangelicals tend to think, okay, um everything is now about evangelism. Everything, you know, every um application to a sermon is, you know, who have you told about Jesus at the water cooler and that kind of stuff. And and everything, you know, is boiled down to a lowest common denominator, because if you want to be seeker friendly, then you need to explain everything. Everything is explained. And you know, it's it's the illustration of outside the cathedral, the it's the evangelical that has the sort of the thumbnail sketch of the cathedral, showing you how it works. Um whereas the more traditional Christian, including the Orthodox, um they they are more like yanking you into the cathedral in all its ancient weirdness and just saying, take it in. And for for them, um church is church on mission. Like to to be church is to be missionary. And so let's be church, let's let's properly be church. And it's it and and I think I think there's truth to both ways of looking at that. That as we devote ourselves to being the church, we are being missional because we are the priesthood. So says one one one Peter too. And so but the what the Orthodox are intent on is let's make sure that the church is properly the church and doing what the church does. And the evangelical hears that and they just hear Field of Dreams with Kevin Costner. If you build it, they will come.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03And we all fold our arms and we go, no, they won't come if you just build it. And the New York Post is here to tell you that they're coming. This church is just doing its thing, and people are showing up. And I'm I'm seeing that happen in evangelical churches and Anglican churches and all in New Frontiers churches.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. But does that mean that the the next few years, maybe not 2025, but certainly the next few years after that, that the conversations we're gonna be having are not gonna be necessarily, hey, it's a cultural conversation, how do you do cultural apologetics? How are you engaging with what's happening on X, Y, or Z? X, Y, or Z. Um YouTube or whatever Zoom. Um but that the conversation is actually gonna become a theological conversation, it's gonna be an ecclesiological conversation. Okay, what does this what do the scriptures actually teach about who God is, yeah, about what he's done, about the nature of of Christ, about the nature of the church, about all that sort of stuff. And so weirdly, the time is coming for you know, all these maybe my some of my old Presbyterian friends, they'll be like, oh, I'm up, I'm up to the city.
SPEAKER_03You are creeds and so back. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_01You've got to get back in there because it's gonna be, you know, we're gonna be debating the Filioque court once again.
SPEAKER_03We're gonna be debating because of orthodoxy.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. So it's so suddenly a bunch of stuff that has seen to be absolutely irrelevant, yeah, because this is just kind of Ivory Tower theology debate. Suddenly you've got a whole bunch of people there who want to know what is true, yeah, and who are you know looking for compelling arguments.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and and one of the people who is in Trenham's church, um, they they interview him in the New York Post uh article, and and he says there's more than a hundred people in classes waiting to be baptized. So that these are the baptisans, yeah, and they are in classes, and they're doing what the church has done for centuries, which is to catechise, to teach, to school people in the basics of the faith. That's been true going right back to the to even the second century in Rome. If you wanted to get baptized on Easter Sunday, and that's when they would generally do it, well, spend all of Lent and literally like three hours a day in Lent, like a hundred and I think it adds up to like 146 hours of schooling before they'll ever baptize you. And we know what the curriculum was, they summarized it. It's called the Apostles' Creed. Yeah, yeah. Right? And so this is this like the idea that Nikki Gumble invented the Alpha Course is a bit laughable. Like, because what what was the Alpha Course in its origins? It was here is a beginner's class for those who go to Holy Trinity Prompton. Yeah, yeah. Let's ground you in the basics. And it's exploded as an evangelistic tool. Well, fantastic, but I I don't think Nikki Gumbel invented that. I I think we have always needed to school those who are just wanting to lean in, yeah, and they're very interested, they're in the court of the Gentiles, you don't yet admit them to communion, they're not yet a member of the church, but they they want something deep and rich and old and theological. Yeah. And so I think I think the the place of the course properly understood is is back as well. Um I I think the demise of the course um was was proclaimed um uh a little bit ahead of time. Okay. And that that actually, you know, something like 321 that we do here at Speak Life is well, that's only four weeks. You need to you need to then move on to the next thing and the next thing. But it's it's framed around the creed and it's framed around getting people back to the deep, rich, um not silly, not dumbed down theology. And one of the new features on 321course.com is our new church finder so that people can not only binge uh all the videos, but they can find a place where 321 is being uh run and it's being run in about 350 or 350 courses are being run around the place in about 300 churches.
SPEAKER_01I was hoping to stop at 321, but you know and then jump to 3210 and then you know just work along that system.
SPEAKER_03But people can check out the Church Finder there, and we've we've got a little chatbot Pathfinder who does he doesn't answer all your theological questions, but he does help you navigate through the material and find what you need. Um he's quite fun, he's a cute, he's a cute kid, Pathfinder. So check check him out if you haven't already. And we're gonna need a lot more of that as as people kind of lean in, they're they're seeking uh a refuge from the meaning crisis. And what what they're gonna need is something embodied and rich and deep and theological. And we need to we need to be ready for these guys, and and I think getting getting them into the church or getting them into these sorts of you know classes for the for the those wanting wanting to seek baptism, getting them there is not really where we'll need to expend a lot of our effort. We don't need the breadcrumb trail to the front door of church. They're showing up in church. Who knows what their theology is, who who knows what kind of messes and and and pastoral situations they're in. Yeah, but it's about walking with them in the thick, rich, deep, weird, old theological traditions that the church has always proclaimed. That's that's what evangelism is going to look like.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah. And that yeah, the future for evangelicalism could be could be the most interesting thing about the you know the next you know um the next few years. As because I do think, you know, there there is a there is an ecumenicalism, there is a kind of an open, like what do we all agree on, kind of thing, like let's just try to you know recognize that because hey, we're small in number, kind of thing. But particularly as people are coming in asking serious questions, we're gonna need to stand on some pretty solid ground, and we're gonna need to be sure on our theological convictions, yes, and this is where cruising confessions and and a deep rich biblical theology is gonna need to come come and shine.
SPEAKER_03And this is not to say don't be Protestant. Um so Gavin Outland um has a wonderful channel called Truth Unites, um, everyone following us should definitely be following um Truth Unites. Uh, he actually uh won the the best book in one of the best books awards uh for TGC this this year with the book called What It Means to Be Protestant: The Case for an Always Reforming Church. Um so he he's a Baptist and yet he is constantly making content about look, even within your Baptist traditions, there are all sorts of ways of being creedal. Yeah. You could you could say the creed, you could at least sing the creed, can't you? And you know, here are some prayers that you can kind of bring into even the the lowest church evangelical setting.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Um and I'm constantly you know talking to other Anglicans who are very baptistic in the way they think about worship and and and much more low church. And I think a lot of evangelicals have a default allergy to liturgy and a default allergy to sacraments, thinking that this is a missional move. Yeah. Whereas like get getting rid of a weekly communion is is not a missional move, actually. Yeah, yeah. Um when people when people come to our church, they they see a church that is very ancient, well, in its design, it's it's 150 odd years old. Um, they're they're expecting something that's a little bit churchy. Yeah. And trying to strip back the churchy, even if you think you're doing it for missional reasons, that's that's the that's the last thing you should do if you're missional. Yeah. And actually, Gavin Altman's got some great stuff about how, as churches, no, no matter where you fit in, you know, Orthodoxy, Protestantism, um, there are all sorts of ways that we can be crunchy, that we can be sacramental, that we can be liturgical, that we can be deep, that we can have a connection with the past. We really need to press into that.
SPEAKER_01And that if many of the people in the congregation have come through a theology-like version of Christianity, well, you know, let's get catechise them too, right? You know, let's actually use this as an opportunity to deepen everyone's faith. Right. Yeah, because yeah, the time is people want serious answers to serious questions.
SPEAKER_03In a serious house built on serious earth. So people should all do 3-2-1, basically. They should just go to 321course.com and check out God's threeness. So we talk about Trinity and the world's two-ness. We talk about the two atoms, Adam and Christ, and then we talk about our oneness, being one with Jesus. It goes deep, but um I think these are the sorts of these have always been the answers the church has given to times of great cultural crisis. And we're we we are not the first people in the year 2024 to be going through moments of cultural crisis. The the church is uh an ancient serious house built on serious earth and has always been given giving these answers. And I think we will find more and more that Trinity, Adam and Christ, Union with Christ actually have the answers to what this culture is is craving. Amen. Amen. Well, happy Christmas, Nate Morgan, right? Happy Christmas, Glenn Scribbler. Yeah, and uh to you guys, I hope you have a really great 12 days of Christmas. Remember, it's not over until 12th night, 5th of January.
SPEAKER_01Yes. Well, we're very glad you were here. And as Glenn said, we'll catch you on the next one. See you then. Bye.
SPEAKER_00Well, there we go, the final episode of the Speak Life Podcast of 2024. Thanks so much for listening. I know there are a lot of podcasts out there, and it can be hard to keep up with all of them. Um, so you sometimes have to be quite selective in what you listen to. So if you have chosen to listen to the Speak Life Podcast at all this year, we are so grateful. And uh, without you guys listening, we would be talking to ourselves. So thank you, and do subscribe to the Speak Life Podcast on your podcatcher of choice if you haven't done so already. Then you'll be among the first to know whenever we drop a new episode, and there's plenty coming in the new year. If you want to get in touch with the podcast, you can email thomas at speaklife.org.uk. Thanks so much for listening. Merry Christmas and a happy new year from all of us at Speak Life. Goodbye.