Dr. Carolyn Weber UNCUT: Surprised by Oxford and by Jesus

It's the Season 4 finale, and what better way to end than with the UNCUT version of the most downloaded episode of the season! Getting a full ride to the University of Oxford was amazing - then she discovered Jesus. Listen as author and literature professor Dr. Carolyn Weber shares her journey from agnostic to Christian and what she learned along the way.

Transcript

 K: Hey, y'all, for my season 4 finale, I wanted to bring y'all our most popular episode of season 4, but the uncut version, um, partly because it was our most popular episode of the season, and partly because I'm interviewing Dr. Carolyn Weber, author of my favorite memoir ever, and this conversation is just so rich and really feels like what I want future episodes of the podcast to be like.

If you didn't watch my season 5 trailer last week, I revealed that starting January 1st, "Oh My Word" is gonna focus on interviewing Christian writers and talking about their books and other books and how God shows up in words and stories. And so, what better way to end season 4 and get y'all excited for season 5 than to give y'all the uncut version of my interview with this fabulous author. And we absolutely talk about how God shows up in words and stories.

So I hope y'all will enjoy the uncut edition of my interview with Dr. Carolyn Weber.

 K: Hey everybody, and welcome to Oh My Word with Katie, the show where we share stories of real life Christianity, the good, the bad, and the oh my word, from believers who've been there. I'm your host, Katie Ginn, and I think these stories will leave you with some hope, some humor, and maybe some practical life hacks.

So today I am absolutely thrilled to be interviewing Dr. Carolyn Weber, author of one of my favorite books of all time, "Surprised by Oxford," her memoir of how she went from agnostic to Christian while studying at the University of Oxford in Oxford, England. This ain't Ole Miss, y'all. This is THE University of Oxford.

And so I'm really excited for her to share her story today. She has a master's and a doctorate from Oxford, she served on the Oxford faculty, and was the first female dean of St. Peter's College, Oxford, which was a pretty big deal. Dr. Weber currently lives with her husband and kids in the Nashville area and is a professor of literature at New College Franklin in Franklin, Tennessee.

"Surprised by Oxford" was made into a movie two years ago, which is also excellent. I've seen it. And she has also written "Sex and the City of God" and "Holy is the Day: Living in the Gift of the Present." Dr. Weber, thank you so much for being on the show today. 

C: Oh, thank you so much for having me, Katie. It's a real delight.

K: Yeah. Um, and I do want to acknowledge before we really get into your story, I know that as we record this, you did lose your mother fairly recently, a few months ago. Um, so I really appreciate you taking the time in the midst of what has to be a hard season to do this today. How are you doing? 

C: Oh, that was so kind of you to remember that. I am, um, I miss her terribly. I miss her terribly, but I'm blessed to have had an amazing mom. And you know, I think no matter when we use our lose our parents, no matter the age, it's hard. But she loved words, loved stories, um, loved the Lord later in her life. So this is a real delight to be here with you. She would enjoy it too. Thank you. 

K: Yeah. And I thought I remembered you either on a podcast I listened to with you, or maybe in the book itself, you talking about that she did become a Christian later on. 

C: Mm-hmm. So yes, both my parents did, actually. Mm-hmm. 

K: So awesome. So I wanna get into this story, 'cause it's kind of crazy. You get a full ride scholarship to Oxford to study Romantic literature, and while you're there you become a Christian, which probably is not what you expected to happen. 

C: No, not at all. Oh my word is right. Yeah. 

K: So, you know, you're originally from Canada. 

C: Mm-hmm. 

K: You grew up with two loving parents. You're obviously very smart, very literary. Um, was there any one thing that made you decide, OK, I'm an agnostic? 

C: Hmm. Well, that's always a great question because I think in many ways, many people don't think anything, really. You know, we're not always told to think about our position on God or religion in general. But I had kind of been somewhat loosely Catholic, as a child, coming from European immigrant parents, and was very close to my grandmother. When she passed, that sort of going to church and everything, you know, dissipated from my life, which I think it does for many others too, and didn't really think much about it.

My mom had been raised Catholic. She fell away from it eventually too, Katie, because while my parents, um, I loved them dearly, and my home was very loving in many ways it was also very broken, and my parents ended up having a divorce later. My father was in and out of our lives. He had a mental breakdown and had lost his work.

Uh, it was, my mom was basically a single mom raising us. So I think in many ways, as I started to think about God, perhaps even philosophically and with studies, I really wasn't that compelled by an eternal Father, you know, when my earthly father hadn't been that dependable. I really went through some hard times with him in those years. 

But also, I mean, it seemed to me a fabrication or something not really relevant to my life, and I think also like many North Americans, I mean, coming from a mid-sized town in Canada, I didn't really know that many Christians. I only knew of Jesus, for example, from the media or television, which isn't really often a great source. TV evangelists, that kind of thing.

So, you know, in a way it was in a category of sort of not really relevant, even perhaps caricature. I don't think a thinking person could possibly have faith or, you know, and a God would be anything that could be dependable or knowable or relevant. 

K: Mm-hmm. And I love, I think it's in the prologue of your book, you talk about your undergrad studies in Canada, and you knew one evangelical Christian, one of your professors, and you wrote this essay about John Donne's "Batter my heart, three-person'd God."

C: Yeah.

K: Which is the most beautiful poem for a believer. But you as an unbeliever read it and thought, oh, this is rape imagery, and you know, this is anti-woman or something.

Like, how do you, I mean, what would you say to that person now reading that poem? Like what would you say to your young self? 

C: Oh gosh, that's another great question. Um, I think not to be so hasty in our assumptions.

K: Mm-hmm.

C: And to be, um, open as we're reading things. Again, to be open to the question and the invitation that poetry poses, that God poses to our hearts.

Uh, I think at the time - I was at a secular institution, it actually had roots in religious beginnings like most actually educational institutions do, uh, but at that point it had moved very far from that - so my undergraduate was very, very secular. And, uh, so I also didn't really have much of a Christian intellectual tradition I was bringing to what I was reading.

It is really a shame, even just intellectually, to read metaphysical poets, for example, without cracking open a Bible. You know, like in a way there's kind of, how do we read some of these authors that were clearly Christians themselves or immersed in the faith, and not have any sense of a biblical understanding?

But again, I was a product of my culture that way. The Bible was no longer part of mainstream education. Um, wasn't even aware of the allusions in that to a great extent. So I think, uh, it probably made sense that I would jump to that interpretation, but particularly would be jumping that to that interpretation, believing in myself, being self-sufficient, needing to pull myself up by my bootstraps, needing to be able to, um, make my own way.

All those things that really our world holds in high regard and affirms and are necessary in many ways, but not actually revealing our dependence on God or on any kind of concept like grace. 

K: Yeah, for sure. So you, what led you to apply for the scholarship to Oxford, and what year was that?

C: Oh gosh, old.

K: There's a reason I'm asking, I'll get to it in a second. 

C: Oh. I mean, that must have been in like early '90s, I think, because I did not think of applying, I didn't anticipate going to Oxford. I thought it was an amazing place. I'd actually had the opportunity to study there on a small Shakespeare scholarship, uh, as an undergraduate, but it wasn't like a plan I had for my life or anything like that. Actually winning the Commonwealth Scholarship, it's kind of like the equivalent of a Rhodes, it's a really big scholarship in Canada, probably one of the biggest among the Commonwealth countries.

So it was, um, my mom actually was really supportive of that. She worked for the provost and the provost's office, um, at that point as a secretary. She had researched some of this, so had a couple of my professors, and I had one professor in particular who was very, very supportive of that, had done some of the groundwork without me even knowing. So I had sort of felt pushed along in a loving way, but didn't really think it would happen.

Um, and then received the scholarship. So that's, uh, it was more of a, it was definitely a surprise upon surprise. 

K: Yeah. Wow. Okay. So you get to Oxford, and there's so many details that I wish we had time to go into with the luggage and the not knowing where you are and oh, I'm here, and all these things.

C: Mm-hmm. 

K: And you're there, and you wind up being part of this awesome, wonderfully open, like, diverse community of people. With unbelievers, believers, I think there were one or two guys who were either in seminary or they were already ministers somewhere. And so it's this great, like, melting pot of people that you were friends with.

And I remember, you know, when you started to consider Christianity, yeah the non-Christians teased you a little bit, but then also, like, you were like having all these debates with yourself, and one of your non-Christian friends said something, and you said, "Well you don't believe in anything. Why are you trying to argue with me?"

And they said, "Well at least I'm not trying to come up with reasons not to, like you are." 

C: Mm-hmm. 

K: And so it's like they even encouraged you in weird ways, even though they weren't believers either. 

C: Mm-hmm. 

K: And then you converted and they came to your baptism and brought you presents. And I'm like, it seems like a foreign, like another planet to me.

So my question is, being that it was the '90s, how much of it was, OK, this is before social media? How much of this do you think was, this is Oxford, this is just the way Oxford is? And like, is it possible today to have that kind of community, or have we just sailed into the abyss? 

C: Oh, that's a great question.

Absolutely. Where I currently teach at New College Franklin in Franklin, Tennessee, has that community.

K: Mm. Yeah.

C: Uh, and I think it is because it is intentionally, um, created and fostered with a very different set of priorities and a love for God and Christ at the center, but also a great love for questioning and learning and the history of ideas.

And Oxford by no means is perfect. No place is, but it does have a wonderful, uh, attitude towards having conversation, you know, and when I arrived, you know, Katie, it was interesting because I was very poor, had worked many jobs. My family, my father was in a lot of debt. He was, there were a lot of, as I mentioned, he had lost his business. Um, my mom was trying to help us survive, and I know it was like to go to school very, very hungry. And so when I won this scholarship, it was the most money I'd ever seen in my life. That was actually probably, it was almost like I didn't have a choice. I kind of went in some ways reluctantly because I was homesick.

But when I arrived I was so amazed. Eventually, as I started looking at, I was studying world religions for my masters at the time, and as a backdrop to some work I was doing, and I was amazed at meeting these Christians from all over the world who believed the same thing and who believed in the same Christ, from all walks of life, all different races, all different. I mean, it blew me away, partly because on this Commonwealth scholarship I was also with, I was with very affluent people and people from very poor countries or areas, all stripes and everything. And um, and some people, some of these, believed the same God. So that was really intriguing.

They also seemed to have something that I wanted to have, something I couldn't quite put my finger on.

But even, uh, I think, I think the community at Oxford also created a space around that. I think about the community where I teach now at New College, there is purposeful fellowship, but there's also, um, there's genuine care. You're not anonymous. You take personal responsibility for your work. I think at Oxford there is that built into the tutorial system. You don't just, you know, hand in something on a pile and you're never spoken to you. You can't hide behind the anonymity of social media or, uh, plagiarize a paper.

You know, your professor works closely with you. You have a genuine joy and interest and earnestness in your learning. I have that where I'm at now as well.

Uh, perhaps I think social media, of course has made things more problematic in many ways in that sense. But, um, probably the early '90s has something to do with just being more present.

But there was, um, regardless, my Christian and non-Christian friends, there is a lot of, um, there was a lot of, uh, social interaction.

K: Mm-hmm.

C: And at Oxford what's interesting is, it's not a huge anonymous campus either. It's actually all these smaller colleges. It's, you know, 30-some-odd colleges that make up Oxford University.

So each college has its own library and its own pub and its own, you know, and its own porter who knows everything that's going on in your life. And, you know, you have your own little community. And then you also have a larger university. So collegiate life is really, um, it's really in many ways pretty intimate and pretty familiar, and you know people quite well and there's a lot of care for each other.

And my professors I found had great care for me too. It's almost as though they've, you know, they've handpicked you to work with, they take a great care and responsibility with you, but they also, um, later, having that role myself, I realized that you have this, um, this love and responsibility and duty in that, that you feel towards these students too, that, um, you know, it's oftentimes a lifelong relationship of great respect and admiration both ways. 

K: Yeah. And talk a little bit more about the tutorial system. For people who haven't seen the movie or read the book and are not familiar. It's very small groups that you meet with, with your professor.

C: Mm-hmm.

K: And is this for any graduate level course, or even undergrad at Oxford? 

C: I can't speak to the undergraduate firsthand experience since I attended graduate work there. Um, but I do know it's based on the Oxbridge system, which is the idea of the, of tutorials being at the heart of it.

So you're in very small groups. So for example, in my MPhil tutorials, they might be between three and five people. And you meet with the professor. The odd time there was a larger one with like, Professor Wordsworth, um, Jonathan Wordsworth. Uh, that might be like 15 because it might be a more popular topic, or it might be a group, and we would still meet in his rooms or his office and have tea or sherry or you know, whatever.

Um, so it's based on the Socratic method, which is the idea of asking many questions and deductive reasoning to get to the idea, central idea or truth of a topic. And so there's lots of conversation, dialogue, discussion. You have to have read the work. Again, be responsible for it, responsible for your ideas, you can't hide behind anything. So it's really quite terrifying, but it's also really invigorating, and you also end up knowing the work, and the idea is really thoroughly, which is exciting. It's definitely not, um, where you're gonna sit there half asleep. 

K: Yeah. Yeah, man. And like to contrast that with some university environments that I shall not name, where, you know, again, you're handing in this thing, a lot of times online, and these days you've used AI to help you complete, and that's a whole new territory that we probably don't have time to get into. 

C: That's a other podcast. But it is fascinating how it's developed, but it's very different from what universities were originally made to be. How they first originated as well. 

K: Yeah. And it's so cool that you said your, the tutorials were kind of based on the Socratic method of asking questions, and it's so cool that God would lead you to a place like that to draw you to Him. 

C: Absolutely. 

K: Which is maybe not what people would expect. At least not in the Bible Belt. People would not expect that. 

C: Oh, interesting. Hmm. 

K: Yeah. We tend to downplay our questions and doubts here in the South. You know, we like to be nice. 

C: Well, as a Canadian, um, with a green card, I do have an affinity for niceness. Yeah, I understand that politeness. And I love the South. I think people are fantastic and warm and very kind. And there's a beautiful, beautiful culture here that I greatly admire. And there is something to be said for making people feel comfortable, right? But you're right, there's different stripes.

I guess what was wonderful about Oxford is there is this conversation base, and it's actually even something, like I said, at New College in Franklin, Tennessee, too, where we have that in our classroom. So it's part of that model, that Socratic method that's not only asking intellectual questions and um, and giving you the freedom to explore all sorts of range, doubt and faith and all sorts of questions and issues, but there is a genuine, um, you know, civility, you know, as well.

K: Right. I love that. And so you're having these conversations not only in your tutorials or in the pubs with your friend group, but with a student, a fellow student that you refer to in the book as tall, dark, and handsome, or TDH for short.

Um, I don't even remember his real name. And TDH was a Christian who engaged you in some really cool, really contentious sometimes conversations about faith and was sharing his faith with you and, and you were pushing back a lot. So, when y'all started talking and you started considering things, what would you say was your biggest objection or the thing that just made you bow up the most against Christianity, and then how did God answer that?

C: Oh, wow. Well, I mean, I think at first, I remember one of the very first things he asked me was simply, who is God to you? Which no one had actually really asked me that before. And I think many of us can live our lives and not really think about either being asked that question or asking it of someone else.

So it was an excellent question because it was not off-putting, like it was just sort of, um, it gets you thinking about, well, really who is He? And is there, uh, you know, what does it mean then to go from there to something like a personal God? Uh, and that kind of stopped me in my tracks. You know, I think I was a perfect example again of a North American student that had worked many jobs, is so busy. You know, North Americans, we're so, we're on this, running on this opiate of busyness all the time.

And especially students, you know, I think there's so much pressure on them to, you know, earn their tuition, to work, to pay for, you know, living, all these things, while they're studying. I just kind of hit the glass hard, you know, and had never really had - well, that, if we're gonna talk about Socrates, you know, that famous line he has of, "The unexamined life is not worth living."

You know, oftentimes we're kept busy and distracted so we don't examine it. And, um, you know, we could be TikTok'd to death now. So there's a way in which, you know, someone even simply asking a very profound question, but a relevant one, uh, I think opened that door. And then after that, I think, I mean there were many things that I grappled with the Christian faith about, a lot of intellectual, I was probably more of an intellectual issue person.

But there are really viable answers for all those things, and it's actually a very comprehensive Christian faith. And there's a lot of historical evidence for Jesus having been here and all those kind of things. So you start to tick those boxes, or you look at things, or you look at the great intellectual history around Christianity and Christian thinkers that I couldn't dismiss.

There were so many that I really greatly respected, alive and dead. I thought, well, this is, you know, inconvenient. And then as I read the Bible too, cover to cover just as a story, it was very compelling. I just thought, oh wow, this is, wow. Gonna have to maybe pay some attention here and figure out what I think.

It's not as easy to put down as I thought it was. So, um, I think there were lots of hiccups along the way, but ultimately for me it was more of a leap of the heart, um, eventually. And I really resonated with someone like Sheldon Vanauken, and I ended up reading "A Severe Mercy," which is a beautiful book. I highly recommend it. Really fascinating book. Um, that's actually how I was introduced more seriously to C.S. Lewis, because he had known him at Oxford and has some of his letters in there. And he describes his faith journey very similarly. He grappled with it intellectually in that as well, but most people talk about faith being a leap, and he talked about it more as being a falling back, kind of. He couldn't deny who Jesus was. Uh, it was sort of, um, a sense of negatives almost. And in a way, that's sort of what I ended up having was that. I really realized that it was ultimately not just an intellectual decision. 

K: Yeah. And God really drew you to Himself through that. And I was remembering that you picked up the Bible to read it just as literature 'cause you hadn't done that before. And I mean, did you have a, were there any particular parts of scripture that stood out to you in a literary way or just in, just in any way? What grabbed you the most? 

C: Oh my gosh. The whole thing. You can't make this stuff up. It was literally, hands down, the most incredible piece of creative nonfiction I'd ever read.

K: Mm, yeah.

C: I thought, wow. I mean, I remember getting to just the first few chapters of Genesis and thinking, okay, that explains sin and suffering and crime and cancer and everything being broken right down to its very core through all creation, and that fragmentation. I just, I just thought, wow, I had never actually realized how much sense that makes. And then the template of all the prophecies and the fact that there was something for everyone in it, and parts of myself and everyone in it, and parts of everyone I knew in it. And, um, that on one hand I couldn't ever make this stuff up.

It was, you know, um, as Goethe said, I had not the imagination for reality, you know, it was just - but it was so believable and human in many ways too. It wasn't this radically bizarre book, in some ways. Of course there's historical elements, there's troubling elements, there's all of those things, but that makes it, I think, even more human.

And um, and there's mystical elements and rational elements. Um, lots of stories of failure and shortcomings that are very real. So I just, the more I read, the more fascinated I became, and the more I realized that really how powerful the Christ story was, that all the stories I had ever read were, I realized were pointing me to this story.

K: Yeah. Yeah. Which is crazy. And like, to read the Bible as literature, like if anybody's listening or watching and you have not just read the Gospel of John or the book of Isaiah, like, pick it up, because - and even in funny ways sometimes, like I was reading a book by Harrison Scott Key where he says he read the book cover to cover, which he had read the Bible before, but he was reading it, going through a tough time in his life, and he came to the book of Isaiah and he was like, it sounded like it was written by a depressed Middle Earth elf king. And I was like, oh, no wonder I love Isaiah. 

C: Well, look what Tolkien was reading. 

K: Exactly, exactly. Um, so yeah, the Bible is amazing literature. 

C: Mm-hmm. 

K: So tell me about, 'cause you do describe, and not everybody has this, not everybody has a moment, so to speak, when they convert. 

C: Mm-hmm. Everybody's different. Mm-hmm. 

K: Yeah. Um, but you seemed to, to have one in Oxford that you describe in the book. So tell me briefly about that moment. And then what was the biggest change you noticed in yourself afterwards? 

C: Hmm. Because you're right. I think for everyone it's different, right? And um, and sometimes you grew up with a base and it's a re-awareness. Other times it's a completely radical conversion.

I think I had been percolating for a while, but really a turning point for me I remember very distinctly was, um, the, for Valentine's Day, because I had gone out to a dance and a party and everybody was drinking and, you know, and everything else. And, um, it wasn't so much about being prudish. I was used to that, you know, you are as student and how we grew up. But, um, I don't know. I think it, I think the city of God and the city of man had never been clearer.

And, um, and what I mean by that is Augustine's notion of, you know, there's the city of of God and the eternal and living in Christ and living in God and for the abundant life, and then there's the city of man in which we live for, um, temporal things and things that can never fully satisfy. And they're two very different passports with two very different ends. And we're called to live in peace, but they may, there's all the difference between them. And, uh, and so I just realized like that was, I wanted the city of God.

And uh, and it was actually reading John again, sitting in my dorm room by myself. Um, kind of, I mean with like, I think that's why Ecclesiastes, right, bears rereading and rereading and rereading, that book, that all is vanity. I mean, that book is a perfect example of trying everything and nothing will fully satisfy because like Augustine says, you know, we have this longing until it's fulfilled in God, because our hearts are created to seek Him that way and to be filled by only Him. And so reading John, it just kind of came up in 3D, kind of like these two cities as well, that, especially the beginning of John. And maybe because I am a person that loves words. And that was a love language for me. We all have our different love languages the Lord speaks to us in. But, uh, that really jumped outta the page at me and I realized then that - I was praying the lowliest prayer I think there is that, you know, Lord help me in my unbelief, which is also in the Bible.

K: Mm-hmm.

C: Um, so there's something for everybody in there. And that was what I was praying. And that's when I did feel very much a shift. 

K: So then after that night, what was the first difference you noticed in yourself from the way you were living before, or, well, since you had been percolating for a while, it may not have been as dramatic of a shift, but ...

C: I tried to explain in the book for post-conversion, maybe for some of us, is a bit like a honeymoon period. You know, you're like, wow, this is great. It's like, you know when, when Dorothy opens the door from black and white to like the color in "The Wizard of Oz"? My mom was a little girl when that came out in the '30s, you know, and she's like, I can remember everybody gasping, you know, in the theater, that that was the first time everything seemed to be in color.

Um, I can remember very vividly how it felt, being amazed by this grace and actually that kind of dropping fully into my reality. And yet being a newer Christian in which there's still this whole life of living into that. Um, but that kind of honeymoon period of it being really amazing, which it is.

It's just, I think for some, for some people, how our conversions might go is like, wow, this just clicks and I, and um, God's grace is incredible and you just wanna sing it from the rooftops, and all of a sudden the guy with the placard on the corner doesn't seem so crazy anymore. But, um, but then living into that, like having to go back to friends and family that don't believe it, or who are antagonistic, or who are, uh, cynical or, and or to also have a profession like one in academia where you can be very isolated for having had any kind of faith, especially Christian faith.

K: Mm-hmm.

C: Um, and so there's, there was that sort of having to live into that. 

K: Yeah. The honeymoon eventually ended. 

C: Yes. It does and it doesn't though, you know what I mean? Like that, that sort of, you know, can't be unbaptized sort of thing. 

K: Yeah. That's so cool. And then you were, you were baptized, as I mentioned, in a body of water. Tell me about that. 

C: In the river, yeah! They would have baptism services at St. Ebbe's at times that would be in the River Isis at the time, at Oxford. And it was June. I remember it being very cold. And then you'd have a pint after at The Trout, so. The Perch or wherever we were at. So you would just have a pint after. And it was really joyous. I mean, it looks like you're completely crazy to people who are not followers of Jesus, which you are, you're being dunked in a freezing cold river in June, in England. But I can still remember it clear as day. And I think, I do wanna remember one of my friends who was not a Christian and who thought I was completely off my rocker, but still came because she's like, that's, like, it must be something, you know, for you to be so off your rocker. 

K: Yeah. You're not on drugs, so ... 

C: And I think when people, that's the amazing thing and how God works through love so much and why love is so powerful is that's what draws us. That is what overcomes fear and draws us all together, believers and unbelievers, right, is um, you know, the example of Christ shining through those who believe in Him. But also those who love us, even as unbelievers are, um, you know, are intimating that as well. 

K: Yeah. Whether they know it or not. That's so cool. Um, so you had gone to Oxford to study Romantic literature and write about Romantic literature. You're still teaching literature today are still in academia. So from the outside looking in, it's like, well, hmm, Jesus didn't necessarily, like, redirect her career path as like maybe transform it? I don't know. That's just the way it looks like to me. But how does your career look different today than maybe what you would've imagined before you knew Christ?

C: Oh, that's also a good question. You ask good questions. Um, you know, that's funny because I, in His great grace and mercy, I had always wanted to be a teacher, and I'd always wanted to be a teacher of literature. And I'm grateful that I am that. I love that. I'm so grateful and blessed to be able to do that. So in that sense, that trajectory didn't change, but everything changed in terms of, um, you know, what our lives really mean and who our Lord is and where our only hope really is.

And it does, um, where all stories point and, um, and the purpose of all that we do, to enjoy Him and glorify Him forever really is a powerful truth to live by. So I think in a sense, uh, I would've loved to have taught anyway, but it just gave it all purpose. I never would've anticipated teaching at so many different places, and some secular, some Christian, some seminary, some just partly from, um, moving, visiting professorships, things like that.

But partly because it's given me a different landscape and navigation of different faith conversations. Um, you know, within and without the faith too. 

K: Yeah. So then as you live out that calling to, you know, glorify God and enjoy Him forever, as we like to say, sometimes are there, you know - 'cause I talk about wanting to give people practical life hacks too - so, bringing it down to earth a little, are there things that help you do that day to day when the alarm clock goes off? Practical habits or spiritual habits, or even people in your life that help you live out your calling on a daily basis? 

C: Hmm. Well, I think that the tried and true biblical precepts are tried and true for a reason. So, many wise counselors, having fellowship. I do think I've said this before, but I do think fellowship is really different from friendship. You know, it's "The Fellowship of the Ring," not the friendship of the ring. And what I mean by cultivating fellowship is having, um, having brothers and sisters in Christ who you really, you know, it's different than just friendship.

You can have a really wonderful friend, but if you don't know Christ together, you can only ever go so far. And they can certainly be very loyal or there for you, and I'm not, again saying Christians are perfect, but you can dive high or low with a Christian. You can even meet a Christian who you've never met before and immediately ask for prayer.

You know, you can be friends in an elevator like immediately, so it's, and they don't think you're weird, you know. There's a different, um, there's no barrier in that sense. And so I think making sure we have those relationships, that we seek them, that we cultivate them, um, that we seek them out.

I so appreciate my Christian friends like that, who I know I can pray with, I can hold my heart accountable to, who I also know are my constants, who, and again as I said, not being perfect, but I think at least in Christ you can repent, and you know, we're called to repent. We're called to have restitution.

We're called to be reflective. We're called to bring our hearts before the Lord, before each other, that there's more space than just someone who's fairweather, you know, and so having that I think is really important.

Um, reading scripture, again, you sound really basic and you know, kind of stereotypical, but I used to kind of scoff at like morning scripture readers, 'cause I don't like the morning and I'm not a morning person and I need coffee before I can do anything. I hear these people read their devotionals in the morning, like that is just so nauseating. But I learned maybe since having children too and having a quiet time, um, it struck me to remember that, you know, you can't have a relationship with anyone you don't spend time with.

K: Mm-hmm.

C: And it's not that we have, it's works-based, or we have to spend, you know, achieve a certain amount with God, but that He really is there and wants to have a relationship with us. And to cultivate a quiet heart or stillness at times, um, to be able to develop prayer life and invest in that, to have time with Him is not, you know, perfunctory or a box to check or something we should feel guilty about or whatever. It's really of high importance. And even in our busy day, days, you know, where we're running and everything, um, especially in our culture, how can we have pockets to do that, a commute that we're intentional more about, or a few extra more minutes or whatever, a lunch hour or a prayer walk or, um, or, you know, even stepping out for a little bit, um, when we're busy with something else? How can we, um, that coupled with, I think I've learned a really great trick, uh, from some friends that I've admired, spiritual directors and things in which they have said, even just the practice of quiet immediate prayer.

And that wasn't something that I saw. Um, I think we constantly underestimate the power of God. Constantly, and the power that's available to us, and being able sometimes to, um, remember, I don't have to answer this question immediately. I can take a second to pray. I don't have to help this person immediately. I can take a second even internally to pray. I don't have to say a word. Um, that there is that life force within me as Jesus says, "You know the way." And to remember that, um, "Take this in remembrance of Me," I think is really powerful. 

K: Yeah, man. You don't have to answer the question immediately. You're stepping on my toes, Carolyn. I'm telling you. I wanna answer immediately. No, that's so good.

Um, so for the college students or grad students who may be listening, um, this episode's gonna release in September, so still toward the start of the fall semester. And you should all read this book sitting by a fire, drinking a cup of tea. 

C: I have my tea. 

K: For the Christian college student or grad student, do you have any general advice on how they can be inclusive of unbelievers on their campus and cultivate that diverse community and be a witness, without being unduly influenced in return, especially if they're like witnessing to an unbeliever that they're attracted to, which is definitely what TDH was doing with you? Like how, how do they navigate all that? 

C: Hmm. Um, that's hard. Except to just remember, I think that our hearts are, um, need to be protected, um, they need to be guarded and kept between us and God, and that only we each individually answer for our own heart. So I think cultivating that, there's nothing naive about cultivating purity, you know, or cultivating - that's not naive at all.

Um, so again, discerning, um, praying, having fellowship, thinking, how can I be in this world and not of it? And again, not in a trite way, but you know, if I'm creating conversation or friendship or simply being really, um, how can I be loving and present in a way that doesn't have, uh, a heavy proselytizing, you know, I'm gonna hit people over the head with the Bible, but really be, I think, loving and in tune with what they need, how to have conversation, how to ask questions.

We ask so few questions of people. You know, this is why I love your line of work and like what you're doing here, and why these kind of conversations are so important, but in day-to-day living, we ask so few questions. We presume, and we state, and we argue, and we step over, and we just don't ask people questions.

Um, oftentimes I think an antagonism towards the faith comes from a place of hurt or pain or trauma, um, or betrayal, that the threads need to be pulled apart because it's not Jesus Himself. Um, but it gets attributed to that, and we're throwing the baby out with the baptism water. But there's also times in which maybe someone hasn't even thought about it, or maybe there's something else they need first before they can go to that place of, um, you know, think about all the questions Jesus asks people. He usually meets them and asks them questions.

K: Mm-hmm. Yeah, and that's actually one of the first things that attracted me to my husband, who's working in the next room, is he was really good at asking the follow-up question in conversation, and I was like, well dang. At one point we had been out to dinner with a group of friends and we weren't dating or anything, but I said, Stephen, you'd be a good journalist. You ask a lot of good questions. And I think that was the first time he looked at me and was like, oh! But it's true.

Like that's something I've had to try to learn is like how to actually build that relationship and not just be like, "Here's the plan of salvation. Bye." You know?

C: Yeah. And to pray again for discernment because, you know, different strokes for different folks, and sometimes that is what someone needs to hear or wants to hear or, you know. So again, um, it's not up to us to save people. It's not up to us to have the truth perfectly entailed, and we don't even have that ourselves.

We are completely and utterly dependent on God's grace. So, um, how can we be instruments in that way and for ourselves as well? You know, I think that keeps us from, again, losing ourselves, um, in always going back and being rooted again in God's Word, in His love for us, in His unconditional and absolutely unfathomable and deep love for us.

K: Alright, Carolyn, we're gonna go into a little lightning round. A few quick questions at the end here. What, uh, and this, I know this might be like asking you to pick a favorite child, but today, as of, you know, April, whatever today is 2025, as we record, what is your favorite Romantic poem, and could you recite a few lines?

C: My heart leaps up when I behold / A rainbow in the sky: / So was it when my life began; / So is it now I am a man; / So be it when I shall grow old, / Or let me die!

Um, I think - Wordsworth, I love Wordsworth. Yeah. And, um, I, and the idea that my, days should be "bound each to each by piety." 

K: Hmm. And when you mentioned the professor Wordsworth earlier, is that, am I correct in that that's one of his great-grandchildren? 

C: Descendants, yes. Yes, yes. I was really blessed to be able to actually stay in Wordsworth Cottage when I was a student. It was crazy. 

K: Man. Alright. Um, are you currently working on any other books or writing projects that we can look forward to? 

C: Uh, yes I am. So I am, um, finishing up a volume of poetry, so hopefully that will be out soon.

And then I'm working on actually a study of questions, um, questions that I was thinking about in relation to scripture, as well as on some works, literary works that have really affected me and my faith as well, and on the, um, the power of reading and the importance of reading, especially in our day and age now.

K: Yeah. Okay. Are you buddies with Karen Swallow Prior? 

C: Mm-hmm. She's very dear person. Yeah. I love her work and her authenticity and she's very dear. 

K: Yeah, I, that made me think of her book "On Reading Well," and I've read enough of it, like, based on the books that she's talking about that I've read, I'm like, okay I've read this one, so I'll read this chapter of her book, and I've gotten to where she has a chapter on the book "Silence," and I'm like, whooo! I need to brace myself before I read that one, so. 

C: Yes. Yes, yes. 

Yeah. But, but I do agree with Lewis that, you know, when we read we can be a thousand men without leaving ourselves, you know, so there is, um, kind of that power of concentration as well, which I think is really threatened nowadays, that art of paying attention, you know, we're always scrolling, clicking, moving, shifting.

Um, but the satisfaction that comes from being immersed in a whole story, and the empathy and the journey that that allows us. 

K: Right. Finally, do you have a favorite scripture or a life verse, another of our little Bible Belt phrases, that maybe kind of sums up your story with Christ?

C: Oh, well, I'm, oh gosh, there's so many. Um, I think, again, going back to the beginning of John, I will always have a soft spot for the first chapter of John and the Word becoming flesh and being among us. I think because of my, as I said before, my love of words, but just that, and maybe this is also thinking about Lent and Easter and the incarnation.

I've been rereading on the incarnation again, which I do, like Lewis said, Easter every time. But, um, really the mystery and the amazing grace of God in all His power and being creation of all entering our, entering our bodies, like entering a human body, um, to suffer and die on our behalf. And, uh, and the immense love of that.

And so I think there's something about the first chapter of John, as well as John 14. Um, my mom, that was her favorite chapter. Um, I'm a big John person, but because I think he's so literary and so beautiful and metaphorical, but John 1 and John 14, really meaningful for me. 

K: Well, thank you so much, Dr. Carolyn Weber, for being on the show today. This was so much fun. Um, I don't know how I'm gonna even cut anything from this episode because it's all so awesome. 

C: Oh, well, Katie, thank you. You're the one with the wonderful questions. You and your husband are well matched. 

K: Well, thank you so much. 

C: Thank you. Thank you for having me. It's a delight.

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