Hello and welcome to the Speak Life podcast. Thomas Thurrygood again here, intern at Speak Life, recording this intro on a lovely sunny day on the south coast. I'm actually down to my t-shirt today, and I was having a bit of a laugh this morning with my colleagues Matthew and Emily because it's actually the same t-shirt that Zach Efron wears in High School Musical 2 for the song You Are the Music in Me. Don't ask me why I know so much about that. Glenn Scrivener is back from his writing week and he will be presenting this week's edition of the podcast on his own. The topic is Matt Hancock and the story surrounding him. Paul Feesey, who normally co-presents this podcast, is still away. His daughter Libby is still very unwell, so do please keep praying for them. Glenn will provide some more extensive updates about the situation in a few moments. Probably worth mentioning actually that these episodes are also available on YouTube. You can get the visuals that accompany these conversations. So they go out live at 2 pm on Mondays. And the comments that Glenn will read out during this episode, those are the live YouTube comments. So just to let you know, if you would like to watch these episodes rather than listen to them, they are available on YouTube. But I'm a big fan of podcasts as well. You can listen to them while you're doing other things. So whatever works for you. Perhaps if there's an episode you're particularly interested in, you might want to check out the visuals as well. Do subscribe on your podcatcher of choice. You probably have already. And things like comments and reviews, uh ratings, telling your friends really, really help us get seen and heard by more people. So without further ado, I will hand over to Glenn Scrivener.
SPEAKER_00My name is Glenn Scrivener, and uh we've already got Mr. Green in the chat. Hello from Houston, Texas. And uh Wendy Lomont has said hello, Houston. Good morning from DC. So we've got uh we've got a couple of Americans in the audience, and they are very welcome. Um, especially as we are going to chat about some uh UK politics. And uh just when you thought it was US politics that uh grabbed all the glitz and the glamour headlines. No. Uh Matt Hancock, the health secretary of uh the United Kingdom, he has provided us with uh our scandal for this week. And we're gonna ask the question, uh, what is it that he did wrong? Don't worry, we'll catch you up on all that's happened in the halls of power here in Westminster in the UK. Uh, I'm from Australia originally, and uh I'm living here in the UK, and we're broadcasting from the south coast of England. And usually I'm here with my co-host, Paul Feasy, and uh those who have been watching will know that two weeks ago, uh Paul's uh daughter Libby got very, very ill. In fact, during our um recording of uh our live cast a fortnight ago, uh Libby was very unwell, and his mother was was calling, and they originally thought it was pneumonia. Um she's now been taken to uh a children's hospital in uh London, Evelina, where she is being taken care of there. But she's had many um uh emergency surgeries, including open heart surgery, and they've been constantly trying to drain her chest cavity of fluid. Uh they think they're narrowing it down to what it is um that is Libby's problem, but um apparently it's such a rare condition. There are only seven other patients in the literature who have uh Libby's condition or have come to people's attention as having this kind of condition. Um she's been incredibly unwell, but um uh there have been thousands of people praying all over the world. And uh we thank you very much for those who've been praying um through Speak Life and and through coming to know about uh this topic here at Speak Life. And um she turned a bit of a corner on Tuesday of last week. It was really touch and go and um very, very scary for Paul and Becca. Um but she is a fighter and she uh she pulled through Tuesday night and um she's being taken off more and more of the machines and more of more of the medication, and uh she still needs our prayers. Uh we still need to figure out uh exactly what's going on and and how to best treat it. So please uh keep Libby Feasy in your prayers, keep Paul and Becca Feasy and uh Melody and Clara are their other two daughters, and uh yeah, just a huge burden for them to be going through at the moment. So uh Paul, if you're listening and Becca, we are praying for you guys, and we will continue to pray for you and uh get well soon, Libby Feasy. Well, in the news here in the UK, um nobody's been talking about anything else, really, apart from Matt Hancock, who is the health secretary, um, who has been fronting any number of press conferences that have been giving the daily death toll from COVID and giving the health messages about hands, face, space, and really beating the drum of social distancing. Well, the Sun newspaper on Friday morning had an image taken from CCTV footage of Matt Hancock in his office with an aide, uh, Gina. I'm gonna get her name wrong, Coladino, is that right? Um, where is it? Gina Colidangelo. Um, and they were kissing, and he had his hand on her bum, and um there they were. Both of them married. Um, both of them have uh three children, three small children of their own. They had been friends back in university days, and Matt Hancock had brought Gina on to staff in the recent past, and um and an affair has developed. I say an affair, I should say adultery has developed. As of uh Saturday night, Matt Hancock resigns from um uh being the health secretary. And uh he announces also that even 15 hours before the um uh the revelations on Friday that uh he had ended things with his wife and he would move in with uh Gina. And so, as one journalist said, uh he suspects that this is the first time that a minister has resigned to spend more time with somebody else's family. So, what is it that is wrong? Uh why don't we ask Matt Hancock himself uh to tell us that what it is that he thinks was wrong? Let's have a look at his revelation.
SPEAKER_01I've been to see the Prime Minister to resign as Secretary of State for Health and Social Care. I understand the enormous sacrifices that everybody in this country has made, that you have made. And those of us who make these rules have got to stick by them, and that's why I've got to resign. I want to thank people for their incredible sacrifices and what they've done. Everybody working in the NHS, across social care, everyone involved in the in the vaccine program, and frankly, everybody in this country who has risen to the challenges that we've seen over this past 18 months. I'm very proud of what we've done to protect the NHS at the peak, to deliver that vaccine rollout, probably one of the fastest in the world. And I look forward to supporting the government and the prime minister from the backbenches to make sure that we can get out of this pandemic, we're so close to the end, and then build back better so that this country can fulfill its potential, which is so great. And I will do that with all of my heart.
SPEAKER_00So, what is Matt Hancock guilty of? Uh hypocrisy, adultery, anything? Um, well, if you ask Matt Hancock, um you really want to press the question anything? You're guilty of anything. Um sorry seems to be the hardest word, doesn't it? And uh there were there was no actual apology there. There was an admission, I guess, of wrongdoing. Um but you know, so quick to get in there with you know what a great job he's done in rolling out the vaccinations and uh all that sort of thing. And you just think where where where is the sorrow? Where is the oh my goodness, I got this so wrong, and I'm so sorry. Um obviously there is deja vu um here in the UK because a year ago there was Dominic Cummings, who was the uh Prime Minister's chief aide and sort of press secretary, his spin doctor, and Dominic Cummings uh was caught driving all the way up to the north of the country and um took a took a ride to Barnard Castle and and all of that kind of stuff. And Dominic Cummings uh again, when he held a press conference, the word sorry just was not there. It does not seem to be in his vernacular, it certainly does not seem to be in Matt Hancock's vernacular. And so what is the offense? What is the offense? Well, hypocrisy um is definitely there. Um and like I totally get it that a man who has been telling us and lecturing us that we need hands, face, space, that we need to enforce social distancing, uh, a man who has presided over a regime in which you cannot be at the bedside of your loved one as they take their last breath, a man who has presided over regimes in which you cannot attend your grandma's funeral, or even you know, even closer loved ones than that, you cannot attend their funeral um because of social distancing, because of the threat of COVID-19. And there he is, there he is, swapping the mouth of Gina and and she likewise, and you just think, um, what a hypocrite. And the the hypocrisy was compounded uh when you think that literally the day before this revelation broke, um, it's it's hard to believe, but on Matt Hancock's Instagram feed was this advertisement. I work alongside some brilliant women. If you're a woman who wants to get involved in politics, swipe up. Can you believe, can you believe that that was on his Instagram feed the day before um this breaks? And and actually that would have been the day that he told his wife that he was leaving her. On the day he tells his wife he's leaving her, his Instagram feed says, I work with some brilliant women, join me. What is Matt Hancock's crime here? It's definitely hypocrisy, is there. And I totally get the hypocrisy thing. It's a very Christian thing to notice the sin of hypocrisy. It seems like Jesus kind of coined the phrase before Jesus, um, the word Hippocrates would um conjure up images of the masked actor in the Greek tragedy and comedy. The actors would step to the front of the stage and you would know if it was a comedy because they would be wearing a comedy kind of a mask, and you would know it was a tragedy because they wore a tragedy kind of a mask. And it's this word for masked actors. Jesus comes onto the stage and he points to the holiest-looking people on planet earth and he says, actors, a lot of them hypocrites. They are whitewashed tombs, they are broods of vipers. And this is extraordinary stuff. This is blistering stuff. He's saying to Jewish people who are the ones who really took God seriously. But he'd said to the the Hebrews of Hebrews, he said about the Pharisees that these ones who had the strictest of all moral codes, these guys were just actors, they're just fakers. They do not practice what they preach. He says that in Matthew chapter 23, and that has stuck, and that has absolutely shaped our our values today. We now take it for granted that leaders should not lord it over us, but they should serve. Because Jesus says in Mark chapter 10, you know the rulers of the Gentiles, how they lord it over you. But whoever would be greatest among you must be your servant, for even the Son of Man did not come to be served, but to serve and to give his life as a ransom for many. In the Old King James translation, it's even the Son of Man did not come to be ministered unto, but to minister and to give his life as a ransom for many. And that word minister is now what we call people like Matt Hancock. He is a minister, he is a servant because Jesus Christ and him alone, he has taught us that our rulers must serve, and that Matt Hancock's boss is, in fact, Boris Johnson, the Prime Minister. Right? The Prime Minister is the one first in the queue to minister to you, right? The first in the queue to serve you. What an extraordinary thing. You know, when Jesus was born, Caesar Augustus was on the throne, and and he was called son of God and savior. The god that Caesar Augustus was son of was Julius Caesar. And Julius Caesar's you know great feats were things like uh the Celtic genocide, where he killed a million Gauls and enslaved a further million Gauls. And even if those figures are inflated, they are inflated as a boast. They are not a blemish on his record, they are part of his greatness. Indeed, they are part of his godness. Julius Caesar is a god because he kills so many people. Because he does what great men do, they do what is necessary. Julius Caesar was God. Caesar Augustus, Octavian, he was the adopted son of Julius Caesar, and so he was the son of God. A son of God, anyway, a son of the gods. And uh Caesar Augustus, I mean, he killed three hundred senators and two thousand more aristocrats in order to secure his throne. Those were his deeds of greatness. The rulers of old called themselves gods. Our rulers call themselves servants. Wow. Right? What what a revolution. What an incredible revolution. How is such a revolution possible? It is simply because uh it is simply because of Jesus Christ. You know, he and his revolution have rolled on down through uh down through the years. And so these days it is, you know, it is easy to go for the hypocrisy line in terms of um this is what the crime of Matt Hancock is. And I totally understand that. Um he is a hypocrite, and it's incredibly Christian to point out his hypocrisy. But there are other sins going on here, and it's striking what we don't notice when it comes to the sins of Matt Hancock. Um Digital Gnosis, hello Nathan, how are you doing? He says, I don't think we can really say that this hypocrisy thing is because of Jesus. Plenty of popes and kings were despots by the same name. They were absolutely despots, they were terrible, despotic tyrants of popes and kings. But then what do you what do you call a pope who is meant to be called the servant of servants? That's one of the titles of uh the Pontifex Maximus. One of the one of the great titles of the Pope is that he is the servant of all servants. So um what what do you call a pope who turns out to be a tyrant? You call him a total hypocrite. But what do you call um Julius Caesar when he slaughters a million Gauls and enslaves a million more? You you you you call that business as usual, right? This is what was expected. And so, like the the argument is not that the character of those within Christian civilization is any better than the character of those within the ancient world. It's not that their character um is at all better, um, and sometimes it can be worse. Um but the point is what standard do we hold them to? And I do think um when when Julius Caesar um uh effects the Celtic genocide, that is what that is what those sorts of rulers do. Um were a cre were and Emperor Charlemagne, I mean he he had a a body count, right? Um he expanded his empire by bloodshed and made it into the holy Roman Empire. And what's interesting about Emperor Charlemagne is that um many of his deeds can be compared to the deeds of A Caesar Augustus, for instance. But when they're telling those stories, they have to tell those stories differently because Charlemagne is meant to be different, it's meant to be a holy Roman Empire and he he falls far short. Um got a couple of uh comments. People saying the audio is fine, the video quality is really bad, as others have been have been saying, it's blurry and sepier backgrounds, but we are figuring it out. So thank you for sticking with us, guys. Um so the hypocrisy thing is a thing. Um but there are other sins that are going on. Um but what I found interesting is that even a bishop like um David Walker, the Bishop of Manchester, um fails to be able to mention any other wrongdoing when he is asked about what was wrong with him.
SPEAKER_02That's that controversial at that level, is it? And I and I think perhaps had it simply been had it not been the health secretary, then maybe the matter should have been left entirely private, something for the families to sort of out between themselves. I think what is of concern is of course when somebody who's telling the rest of us how we have to behave during the pandemic, then is video very blatantly behaving in an extremely different way. And what he's got right and what Mr. Cummings got wrong uh with a bunch of castles in the past year is that actually if the rest of us are going to keep the rules, then the people who make the rules have to be seen to be keeping them as well. So I think I'm more worried about this about the fact he failed to keep the social distancing than about the fact that he was a middle-aged bloke having a bit of a flu.
SPEAKER_00Well, so I mean it's extraordinary that a bishop um just just w what was what was the phrase? Um, you know, uh um uh having a bit of a squeeze on the side or whatever whatever his phrase was. Um this this is extraordinary from a bishop. Um and and you can understand why he doesn't want to um draw attention to the adultery because that just sounds prudish and puritanical, right? Um you know, it sound it sounds prudish and puritanical. It sounds like um you are the pearl-clutching, pressy um you know, Puritans of old to call out adultery. And yet, um I I I really don't think um a bit of a fling, says Amanda Kay. Yeah, that's what it's being called. A bit a bit of a fling. From a bishop. Um Matt and his wife made vows before God and a congregation and clergy, and you know, this is this is what it comes to. The real issue is apparently um just the hypocrisy. And you know, I uh here here are two things I want to um draw attention to. Here are two ways to deny that it's all about the gospel. Because th this I think is what is going on in people's thinking. Um we want to say it's all about the gospel, let's let's not go let's not get embroiled in morality and politics. But there are two ways to deny that it's all about the gospel. The first way is to say it's about politics and morality, and it's not about Jesus. So, you know, you you could bang a drum constantly again and again and just talk about morality, just talk about politics, and you never get to Jesus, okay? And that would be that would be a mistake. Here's another way, though, to deny that it's all about the gospel. You could say that politics and morality are not about Jesus when they absolutely are. Politics and morality as everything in the cosmos is about Jesus as well. It is the you know, the hypocrisy of a Matt Hancock is relevant, it's totally relevant, and Jesus has taught us all about the evils of hypocrisy. But adultery is all also relevant. It's there in the Ten Commandments, it's there in the teaching of Jesus. And John the Baptist, as a preacher of the gospel, as the great shining light who who witnesses to Jesus, um He was actually locked up and he was beheaded because he was saying to Herod, You should not have your brother's wife. Okay. Um, and that was that was his his crime. His crime was um calling out adultery, and this is why he was executed. And you wonder whether people, you know, around John the Baptist were saying, Oh, John, just stick just stick to the Jesus thing, right? Just stick to the gospel. And and I totally, I totally get that. You know, Christ is absolutely central. But if Christ is so central, he's also central to this picture of the gospel that he's given to the world. And this picture of the gospel that is given to the world is committed, faithful love till death us do part. And that is a proclamation of Jesus out to the world. And when that is violated, that is also a sin. And people want to say at that point, ah, but you know, it's the public-private divide, and who who cares what Mancock Mat Matt Hancock, you know, gets up to in the privacy of his own, you know, life. The real issue is that he did it, you know, with a taxpayer-funded aid in taxpayer-funded offices, um, on the clock. And that's that's what the real issue is. Um, but again, if if it is all about Jesus and all about the gospel, I I don't think um I don't think Jesus is a nine-to-five, you know, thing. And I think integrity uh doesn't end when you clock off and head home. Um if someone is not faithful to a vow that they make before God and others, why would I trust them in vows that they make in the rest of life? And of course that that can sound incredibly moralistic. But why does that sound more moralistic than having a go at Matt Hancock for his hypocrisy? Here's one reason. One reason is because it's less costly to point the finger at our leaders as regards their hypocrisy than it is to point our fingers at them as regards their adultery. Because we don't have their level of power, and so the three fingers are not pointing back at us in quite the same way. I have not abused the office of Health Secretary of the United Kingdom, and so I can have a go at the person who has. Whereas I'm married, and therefore, if I point the finger at Matt Hancock for his um marital wrongdoing, then the three fingers very much are pointing back at me. Do you see? It's it's a to have a go at someone for hypocrisy is is something uh that costs less for those who don't have power, right? And so that's that's one reason why we're we're not so keen on going down the the route of of um talking about Hampcock or raising the issue of adultery. And a massive issue is that we don't want to appear like pearl cut clutching prudes. We just we just don't. The trouble is the accusation that you're being a pearl clutching prude will come at you from uh whoever. Like it doesn't matter what the crime is, if if a person on the other side doesn't think that it's as bad as you say it is, then they'll always accuse you of being a prude anyway. Right? I mean, if Matt Hancock um had uttered a racial slur, um then quite rightly, you know, uh he would be out in two seconds flat, right? Someone on the other side might say, they might, you know, it's hard to imagine, but they might say, it's just a word, get over it, right? And Matt Hancock, you know, uttered it to his postman in in the privacy of his own home. And so he is not, you know, he's not guilty in this in this same way. Stop being so prudish about words. Um, you know, Nietzsche thought that Christians were incredibly prudish about standing up for the weak and the low and the botched. He thought he like he he called Christians prudish um for um for wanting to lift up and protect the rights of the weak and the marginalized. And he said, that's that's just prudish. You don't want that. Like everyone who's opposed to your morality will call you a prude. That's just that's just kind of the way the way things are, right? Um what I really appreciated, um, I don't know if people caught this, was uh in the Daily Mail, um, Sarah Hill wrote this. Sarah Hill is the wife of Michael Gove, and she really got under the skin of the psychology of what's going on with adultery. And I I found I found this really fascinating. She said uh ministers are surrounded by people telling them how brilliant they are. Their departments treat them like feudal barons. Their every whim is treated as lore. No one ever says no to them. They certainly don't get asked to unload the dishwasher. And after a while, it changes them. It becomes increasingly difficult for anything to compete with the adrenaline of power. How can anyone be expected to put the bins out when they've just got home from a day saving the world? Domestic life can seem dull and dispiriting by comparison. And here I think Sarah Hill is is bringing together um the these two things that um Sarah Vine, sorry, not Sarah Hill, Sarah Vine. Um these these two things, um the hypocrisy issue and the adultery issue, the uh there's an abuse of power, and there's someone there's somebody boasting far too much in themselves and trusting far too much in themselves. And uh and and she really nails it. She says both Martha Hancock, um, that is Matt Hancock's wife, and Francis Osborne, so the former Chancellor of the Exchequer, um, he actually left his wife for an aide as well. And the Prime Minister um left his wife for his current wife. So there is there is this culture going on, and she puts her finger on it. Both Martha Hancock and Francis Osborne are highly intelligent, attractive women. So why, you might ask, would they find themselves thrown over? I think the answer is simple, she says. These women are still more or less the same person they were when they got married, but their politician men are not. Climbing that far up Westminster's greasy pole changes a person, and when someone changes they require something new from a partner. Namely someone who is as much a courtesan as a companion, one who understands their brilliance and crucially is personally invested in it. Not someone who thinks it's all a monumental nuisance and wishes they would get a proper job that doesn't involve people poking cameras in your face and commenting on your poor choice of footwear. The problem with the wife who has known you since way before you were king of the world is that she sees through your facade. She knows your fears and your insecurities. She knows that deep down inside you are not the master of the universe you purport to be, and some people don't like to be reminded of that. Others, like Cameron, find it grounding. She actually mentions David Cameron and he and Samantha seem to have a good marriage, and they seem to have date nights, and they seem to he seem to block out time for her and ask her opinion on things, and he found a different way of valuing his his married relationship even while he was Prime Minister. Um Sarah Vine finishes. In the end, there are two types of politicians, those who can walk away from power and those who can't, and who will compromise everything for the sake of it. Hancock, I think, made his choice clear until the clamor for him to resign became too clo too loud to ignore. Was it worth it? Only time will tell. Um, just brilliantly um psychologically realistic and insightful. And I think it brings together these two issues of, you know, of the abuse of power in the office that you hold and the way in which you treat your nearest and dearest. And actually the way in which you treat your nearest and dearest is very tightly related to the way you treat the world and your view of the whole world. And if you are not grounded in a relationship of mutual commitment and service that marriage trains you in, then are you suited to being the great leader out there? So I I think Sarah Vine brings those two things together, and it and it is not one or the other, it's it's actually both. It's a it's a it's a failure in both. And and actually, you know, we we were looking as uh at a as a staff team this morning at um the way Jesus welcomed the children and loved the children and said, Do not hinder them, for to such belongs the kingdom of heaven. And you might think Jesus really was saving the world. Jesus um really was the king, and yet he did not feel distracted by uh the little people um running around. And in fact, he told us that we need to be more like them, he he made time for them. And if our leaders are too busy being great to love their nearest and dearest, then they start to tilt towards the Julius Caesar model and not the Jesus Christ model, and that's important. I want to know that, and it's a shortcoming, and and therefore, how you treat your spouse and how you treat your constituents, um, they are deeply related, and there just isn't this this firewall between your pro your your public life and your private life. Wendy Lomont saying she's 100% right, uh Amanda Kay, I think she nailed it. Um Nathan, Digital Gnosis says, I think we should look at why we have these economic and political hierarchies which promote narcissists to the top. Yeah. Yeah, exact yeah. It's so interesting in in the Old Testament, you know, there there were prophets who um almost never, like Elijah and Elisha and those sorts of people, they were they were almost never part of the schools of the prophets. They were the these official schools of the prophets. And almost if you wanted that job for yourself, you were sort of overlooked by God, because God was always raising up the outsider to the system. And of course, the ultimate outsider to the system is Jesus coming up outside the schools of the rabbis. He's a guy who wields a hammer for 30 years, and it's almost it is almost a sense of if you want the job of ruler of the world, or if you want the job of uh being able to pontificate on things, um, then you're disqualified. Um yeah, what what what is this system? Um and but but again, if we if we want servants um rather than those who go for worldly glory, um we are we are wanting something that is that is profoundly Christian, I think. Um and Nathan says, I don't think the evangelical view of marriage combats this narcissistic men lord it over their wives with toxic gender role narratives. Yeah, that can be that could definitely be the case. Lording it over others is is definitely a bad thing. Jesus uses that exact language in Mark chapter 10. And um, yeah, who is it who teaches us that we should not lord it over others? But um I guess Nathan might be um drawing attention to Ephesians chapter 5, for instance, where it says, Husbands love your wives and give yourself up for them like Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her. Um there is definitely that language of headship, head and body kind of stuff that you need to wrestle with in the scriptures. Um and if that's all you read from Ephesians 5, then you could take that as as as license to lord it over. Um if you see that as um the head is the first to um to go into battle. So so in um Joel it says the Lord thunders at the head of his armies. So the Lord is head in that he is the one who takes on, you know, takes on the battles first and bears the brunt of that. And I you know, so I I think you know, headship for me means um prayer, right? I I'm the first one who needs to be deep in prayer for my family. Um now, you know, we have an alleged reaction to any notion of of hierarchy, right? Any any notion of head and body. Um again, that's that's a kind of a hyper-protestant thing that that we have you know inherited from the from the Jesus Revolution. Is there a way of wielding any kind of authority in a way that is servant leadership? And I would say, yeah. Um, as Wendy says, it's not toxic if it's a self-sacrificial love. It's not toxic if it's a self-sacrificial love. So uh D quite rightly has said, you don't need to believe in God to be against cheating on your wife. Um that that is that is a that is true. Um, there are lots of different conceptions of marriage, um, and the Christian conception is not the only conception, but I do think that every conception of marriage and the family um is theological to some degree or another. We have inherited the idea that marriage is um for life, you know, even post-gay marriage, the West still has a sense that a marriage is between two people and only two people who commit themselves to one another um for life, right? And it's not a civil partnership, there's a sexual element to it. So if even with gay marriage coming in, we still have this very bounded sense of what a marriage is. Um now, is that the majority view of what marriage is around the world and down through history? Absolutely not. And and different religions have brought um different conceptions of what marriage is, and even different cultures within religious traditions have um very different tolerances to adultery, for instance. Um, so it's it's absolutely true um that you don't need to believe in God to be against cheating on your wife, but um the idea that a marriage is well let's let's let's do Jesus, you know. In in Matthew chapter 19, Jesus stands up before his listeners and he says, In the beginning God made the male and female, therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two should become one flesh. Therefore, what God has joined together, let no one separate. And the Jews who heard him were gasping. Let alone if there was a Roman soldier overhearing, let alone if any of the nations heard what Jesus is saying. This is you know, it's so shocking that that Peter, the chief spokesman for for Jesus, says, if this is the way it is, then it's better if a man and a wife don't get married. And Jesus says, Ah, yes, so you're going for the uh the eunuch option, right? Okay, Peter, Peter, Peter. Um, instead of being joined together in holy matrimony till death us to part, instead of that, you want to go for singleness. Okay, that is what sexual morality is going to be in the New Testament sense. That is shocking. That is so different, and it and it is absolutely ground in theological commitments, and it's totally different to other conceptions of sexuality and marriage that other religions have. So, can a secular person be outraged at adultery? Yeah, totally, totally, totally. But I do think we need to do the historical homework and figure out that it is Jesus that has given us our sense of this particular configuration of sex and marriage. Um, Philip Benjamin says about the Bishop of Manchester, his comments are extraordinary. Will the Anglicans watching this program call for his resignation? I certainly want to call for a retraction of this comment. I've been I've been um checking his Twitter since then, and uh perhaps people can check. I have I haven't checked since about midday uh to see if he's made any further comments, but um certainly as of midday today, he hadn't retracted his comments um uh about that, which is which is pretty extraordinary. Now, I I've I've talked about um uh ways in which we should say it's all about the gospel. And uh you you you can deny that it's all about the gospel by saying it's about politics, morality, and not about Jesus. Um so that would be to enter into the culture wars and just you know just talk about morality and politics the whole time. Well, no, let's let's be Jesus people. But there's another way of denying that it's all about the gospel, and that's to say the politics and morality are not about Jesus, and they are. And and actually, what I'm calling Matt Hancock to, and what what what I think we should all be held to, is not some neutral standard, um, some kind of vanilla non-religious um morality. Because I I actually don't think there is such a thing. I think I think all conceptions of ultimate value are theological. And so I, you know, I I am calling Matt Hancock and and everyone who is married, certainly who gets up in a church and and and makes vows before God. Yeah, I I would hold them to be faithful to a Christian account of marriage, and I think that's good. And let me finish by saying why why I think that's good. Um I've been reading um a book by Kyle Harper at the moment called From Shame to Sin. And he talks about the sexual revolution. But when we think of the sexual revolution, we think of the 60s, and by that we mean the 1960s. Kyle Harper takes us back to the 60s, i.e. the 80 60s. He takes us back to the first century and he talks about the sexual revolution that that happened. And when Jesus got up and he preached his message, um he was taming rampant patriarchal male domination. And the the best tool we've ever seen historically for fighting rampant patriarchal male domination religion is the marriage that Jesus spoke about. And so this is something else that I'd I'd say in answer to what Nathan put in the chat. Um when Jesus says to a whole bunch of men, and and you know, Peter is right there, and he's a bloke, he's a fisherman, he speaks his mind, and he's married, and Jesus says, Peter, you are tied to your wife, and you are tied to the offspring that you have with your wife for life, there is no getting out of this thing. When he says that to Peter, and when Peter says, Oh gosh, it's it would be better not to be married, what is Jesus doing? Jesus is curbing and channeling male sexuality in the most drastic way, and yet it has proved to be a great liberation. It proved to be a great liberation for women, it has proved to be the impetus by which our civilization has been civilized. Um, another great book um I I finished is um Joseph Heinrich talking about uh the weirdest people in the world, and he's talking about how you know Christianity has artily shaped the world that we live in. He says, largely because of its marriage and family program. And the marriage and family program that we've inherited from Jesus has curbed and channeled male sexuality, and it needed to do that because in the Roman world there were 25 words for prostitute. The word for urinate in Latin is the same as the word for ejaculate, and and the understanding was for a freeborn Roman citizen male, he could use women, children, slaves like urinals. Okay. It was a terrifying world, the ancient world. It was a world in which the father of the family, the Patafamilius, had absolute power of life and death over his wife and children and slaves, and he had a sexual right to all of their bodies. And Jesus says no. And the Jesus revolution comes in and Totally transforms things. And from within this revolution, we've started to get the notion that you know what consent really matters. Right? Consent really matters because it's it's taken a long time in coming. Okay? It has taken a long time in coming. But uh what happens is immediately the New Testament says that this Greek word pornea is any kind of sexual activity outside marriage between a man and a woman. Anything outside of that is just like don't even think about it. And literally, Jesus says in Matthew chapter 5, don't even think about it. Okay, this is the most stringent curb and channeling of male sexuality that there has ever been. And at the same time, that has been for the liberation and help of women. You know, um Rodney Stark wrote The Rise of Christianity, and then later he wrote the The Triumph of Christianity, and he writes, look, in the first three centuries of the Roman Empire, Christianity was overwhelmingly flocked to by women over men. And he says, when you understand the difference, you understand why. And he's he says, you know, after he studied things, he's he says, I don't know why every woman didn't become a Christian. Um given you know what was what was going on. And it's a good thing, right? It's a good thing because here is this cosmic romance that is being given to the world, okay? Heaven and earth, God and humanity, Christ and the church, together as one forever, to be fruitful and multiplying. And to enact that either by being a virgin and pointing to the goodness of the ultimate marriage and saying nothing compares to it, or the alternative to being a virgin, being married and enacting those roles of of husband and wife in the cosmic romance. That is a proclamation of the good news about Jesus, and it is the civilizing influence on this world that has no parallels. So I mean, someone like I mean, Joseph Heinrich is not a Christian when he writes about why you know wet Westerners are the weirdest people in the world and why it's Christianity in the marriage and family program that is that has built the modern world. He's not a Christian. Karl Harper, I don't think, is a Christian when he writes about the terrifyingly alien world of sexuality in the pre-Christian um Roman culture. Um and yet the sexual revolution that really counts, and I would say the sexual revolution that has done far more to liberate uh than the one of the 1960s, um, is one that's still worth prizing. And it's it's still worth being unabashed about, even if people call you prudes. You know, people are gonna call you prudes, okay? You know, like I say, if Matt if Matt Hancock said a naughty word, or if you know, if Matt if Matt Hancock said the wrong thing or expressed the wrong idea, he might lose his job as well. And people who disagreed with his sacking would say, you're just being prudish, you're just being puritanical. That's that is the accusation that gets hurled all the time. Doesn't matter. You can't avoid being called a pearl-clutching puritan. You can't. So why not why not risk being called a pearl-clutching puritan in defense of the most liberating, civilizing relationship and commitment that the West has ever seen. Um lots of comments going on in the chat. Uh Wendy Lomont, yes, Christianity changed the world for women for the better, a thousand percent better. Um Digital Gnosis says so many evangelicals trapped in miserable marriages, which they view as their cross to bear. I mean, a miserable a miserable marriage is really, really difficult. Um but at that stage there are no there are no perfect options, right? Are there? Um a miserable divorce um can also be difficult. And I'm not saying there are no grounds for divorce. I mean the Bible absolutely um speaks of different grounds that there are that there might be for divorce, but to have a vow and to to have an institution where written into it is the language of the love song, the language of I'll be there for you, right? I would do anything for love, but I won't do that. Um the language of the love song of of forever um is actually a romant romantic vision. And um, are there such things as miserable marriages? Yes. Are there such things as miserable divorces? Yes. Is life messy? Yes. Um I I would agree though, actually, Nathan, when you when you say if you feel like your marriage is a cross to bear, that's that's really difficult. Having having counseled lots of people through difficult stages in their lives and in their marriages, if it starts to be a cross to bear, um then yeah, that's that's difficult. But you know, as a as a friend of mine kind of says he would he was counseling a couple and um and the man said to the to him, the pastor, I just don't love her anymore. And he said back to her, then start. Right? Um I thought I thought that was that was profound, right? We we tend to think of love as an emotion, and when I'm in when I'm experiencing the emotion of love, then I'm committed to the degree that I'm in that, you know, then I that I have those pheromones kicking around my bloodstream. Um that is not a stable basis for love. And so when the husband said, I don't love my wife anymore, the pastor says, then start. Start again. And Dietrich Bonhoeffer, he he wrote this wedding um sermon for his sister who was getting married, and he was hoping to be able to get out of prison for this, you know, wedding. And as it as it turned out, um he wrote the sermon as a as a letter to his wife, and and he ended up being hanged by uh the Nazis. But but this this letter, this sermon um said, Um, up until now, your love has been the foundation of your marriage. And what he means by that, the the the feelings that you have for the other person, they might bring you to the point of getting married. Your love has been the foundation for your marriage. So your feelings have brought you to the point of making the commitment. But then he says, from now on, let your marriage be the foundation of your love. And I I think there's something pro very profound about that. Your feelings get you get you into church, they get they get you to the service, they get you to having the wedding. But then it's then it's the institution. It's the thing, it's the covenant, it's the commitment then that is the foundation for your love. And you know, interestingly, as as I've been, you know, reading about you know the Roman Empire and marriages, it it's not as though like there was it was it was mainly arranged marriages. There wasn't this idea of love marriages. We've I mean in the Christianized West, we've we've come to have the idea that you choose your spouse and consent is all important. Well, it's part of the Jesus revolution. Um, but it's not the case that in cultures with arranged marriages that they are loveless marriages. And and actually the the goal, whether whether it's in a traditional culture around the world today or whether it's back in the first century in the Roman world, um, there were love marriages. And and the idea was the commitment came first and the love followed. And I totally see why getting trapped in a marriage with someone who you simply do not love, um, why that is a very frightening prospect. It's so frightening that Jesus says, Hey, look, if marriage is not for you, there's this better thing called singleness. Go for your life. Um, I totally see how getting trapped in a loveless marriage can feel um can feel terrible, but the alternative is to boil down all our relationships to the strength of our present tense feelings. And there's a very good reason why the marriage service, certainly in the Book of Common Prayer and in the English tradition, um the the vows are not I do. Right? Um the vows in the Book of Common Prayer are I will, right? You make a promise for better, for worse, for richer for poorer, because you're like of course you do love your wife on the day you get married to her, she looks a million dollars, of course. Right. I was at a wedding, and the groom gave this speech, and he thought he was being romantic. I thought he sounded threatening. He said, he he addressed his wife in this speech, and he and he said her name was not Laura, but he said, you know, Laura, I got just looking at you today. If you look like this, if you continue to look like this, I I know that I will never have uh a problem loving you for the rest of my life. If you continue to look to that's right, if you continue to look um in our marriage the way you look today, then I will have no problem loving you for the rest of my life. And people were sighing like in the room, they went, oh, isn't that lovely? Like that sounds like a threat to me. Um, I do think for better, for worse, for richer for poorer, that is um that is the pathway um to real romance. To real romance. But other views are available. And um, so lively chat going on. Thank you guys so much for continuing to to chat there. I think we might leave it there. Um, do uh hit like and subscribe to the YouTube channel. We've got videos coming out every week. Uh we've got uh another clip from our reset series and uh an interview that I did with Jonathan Peugeot that's coming out uh very soon. 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SPEAKER_03Well, there we go. Thank you so much for listening. As always, any comments or questions can be emailed to info at speaklife.org.uk. Thank you so much for joining us today and keep speaking life. I'm going to continue wearing my high school musical t-shirt as long as the weather holds out. Goodbye.