Two Pour Spirits
Two Pour Spirits is where signature cocktails meet spirited conversations for the sake of the Church and the common good.
It is co-hosted by Rev. Dr. Kyle David Bennett, and Dr. Chris Cimorelli, Co-Founders of Project : Neighbor.
Project : Neighbor ecumenically educates, equips, and empowers the Church to image her Creator and love all creatures, including her enemies, in public places with particular practices. From soil to sky, crib to casket.
Visit https://www.projectneighbor.org/ to learn more.
Two Pour Spirits
How to Be a More Hopeful Neighbor: Be a Better Colleague
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Do you hate it when they leave splattered marinara sauce in the microwave? Do you hesitate to pass the ball to them because you don’t believe they’ll make the shot? How many times did you draft that email response to make it cordial? From whence did you get these collegiality cues? You don't have to court them or be their companions in order to have camaraderie and cooperate with them, ya know.
In this fifteenth episode of season four, on common grace in culture, Chris and Kyle continue their discussion of the British spy TV series, Slow Horses. Here they focus on working Christianly with others: avoid rivalry and seek communion. The rival says, “This is my river and it’s not wide enough for me and your reputation.” The Christian says, "You need to read more Aquinas."
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Welcome to another episode of Two Pour Spirits!
Where signature cocktails meet spirited conversations for the sake of the Church and the common good.
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Two Pour Spirits is a podcast of Project : Neighbor.
Project : Neighbor ecumenically educates, equips, and empowers the Church to image her Creator and love all creatures, including her enemies, in public places with particular practices. From soil to sky, crib to casket.
Project : Neighbor is co-directed by Rev. Dr. Kyle David Bennett and Dr. Christopher Cimorelli.
https://www.projectneighbor.org/ | https://x.com/proneighbor |
Hello, friends, and welcome to the podcast Two Poor Spirits, a conversation about cocktails, communion, and the church. I'm Chris Simarelli. And I'm Kyle Bennett. And we are the co-founders of Project Neighbor, a theological think tank and spiritual training ground for the church and for the common good. We think theologically about everything from soil to sky, and disciple believers from crib to casket. We draw widely from the Catholic Christian tradition, are ecumenically oriented, and practically minded. We hope that you enjoy the conversation and camaraderie of two poor spirits, and make no apologies for the background noises that mark our fellowship, the clinking of ice and sloshing of liquid among them. Let's build up together. Visit projectneighor.org to learn more.
SPEAKER_01Do you hate it when they leave splattered marinara sauce and shared microwave? Do you hesitate to pass the ball to them because you don't believe they'll make the shot? How many times did you draft that email response to make it sound more cordial? In this 14th episode of season four on Common Grace and Culture, Chris and I will continue our discussion of the British spy TV series Slow Horses. In this episode, we'll be exploring the themes of collegiality and rivalry. Chris, my friend, your mixing ingenuity and technique rivals none. And your potions are the best of colleagues to my palate. Always good to be mixing, sipping, and pontificating with you, brother. Speaking of potions, you got to tell our listeners about this magical concoction that you've materialized in our glasses.
SPEAKER_04Kyle, my brother, it is always a pleasure and a privilege when you say that my mixing rivals none. That can be taken in a very positive or a negative light. Positive. But yeah, in this case, we are doing a riff on one of the ones we've done at least two or three times before. We've featured something called Devil's Punch in past episodes. And this one we kind of riffed on and reformulated thinking about you know St. Paul and striving and the competition of early communities. And so we're calling this one Devil's Prize.
SPEAKER_01I like it.
SPEAKER_04So just to kind of give an overview of it, we started off with a large tumbler that also, well, we put in some thyme into the bottom of that tumbler, and then a large cube, and then we also had some barrel-aged vanilla bitters from El Wapo. Alright, so that's in the glass. And then in the shaker, we put the elements. Now, in in past iterations, the the main base was uh rum. And we've used at different times Diplomatico and Appleton. This time we used Appleton. Um but the base, the larger volume was actually bourbon this time. So we started off with one and a half ounces of maker's mark cask strength bourbon, an ounce of the Appleton rum, and then a half ounce. So this is for each each of our glasses, half ounce of the Day of the Lord spiced cointreau. Right. And then to that, we we did also added two ounces of mango pineapple juice. That's in the shaker, shook it up for about 20 seconds until it was frosty, and then poured that into uh the large tumbler and finished it off. We split between the two tumblers one can of Q ginger beer, and that is Devil's Prize. What do you think?
SPEAKER_01It's worth a billion dollars. Deep calls to deep. Uh it is incredibly refreshing. And we are on the cusp, the precipice of spring. And this is perfect for transitioning out of winter into spring. Uh also a delightful and delectable drink for the summer. I really find the flavors complicated and complex. You got the time, the herb. And I'd say that's sh that's strong for for how little you put in there.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_01It's quite strong.
SPEAKER_04In past iterations, we had basil or tie basil.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01I think I think the mango might accentuate the herb. Like I I wonder if there's uh collegiality and collaboration happening between the mango and the the time. Um, but I that's really refreshing. The mango is really refreshing. And the Day of the Lord and the ginger beer always tag team. Right. I mean, that's that's impeccable. I I love that flavor and that taste. But that the the two of those conjoined like this very citrus, refreshing flavor. Um, but also the spice and the herb. I mean, yeah, I mean, it it also fall, like this would be a great October drink.
SPEAKER_04You know, when the weather starts to turn.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, the devil's prize um at Oktoberfest. Um, yeah, I I find it very refreshing, I find it very flavorful, and I find it uh um dangerous like the devil.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and I and I think that um I I have to give you credit because we were I didn't have my normal allotment of basil. I've been I've been growing basil for months in the winter, but the plant that I'm growing is is reaching the end, and so I'm not comfortable. It's been a rough winter. It's been really rough and cold. Uh, and I don't have Thai basil at the moment, so you thought of t of uh time. And actually, I really I really like it.
SPEAKER_01I do too.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Thanks for making it.
SPEAKER_04You got it, brother.
SPEAKER_01Fantastic show, provocative, stimulating. Um, there's quite a few theological themes that we've already covered. And uh I thought it would be uh I I think the show brings to the surface questions about collegiality and rivalry. And so I wanted to think through some of those things. Um, you know, what is collegiality, what is rivalry, uh, and how does how does the show prompt and provoke us to think Christianly about collegiality and rivalry? Now let's start with collegiality. I was thinking about this and and uh you know, looking up etymologically, sorry, I got time stuck in my time, but uh collegiality, a certain kind of cooperation. Um, and we were noting earlier in in both of our reflections on this that etymologically, collegiality begins with the Latin, the Latin verb lego, uh, which is to pluck and choose. And you you were noting, I mean, just chime in, interrupt me. You were noting the ways in which uh it's related to reading. Um, and I think there's some provocative trajectories we could take there, like colleagues know how to read the situation together, they know how to read the employee handbook, they know how to work together and whatnot. Uh, but it it took me even deeper to the notion of lex, which is law. And that's provocative for me because it it does, it is suggestive of the fact that colleagues have to know what the what the norm is, they have to know what the rule is, they have to know what the objectives are, what the mission is, they have to know the law. And if they don't know the law, and they don't work with the same law, they can't cooperate well. And so, um, you know, I I don't typically think of when I think of being collegial, I don't think of the notion of sharing the same law, sharing the same rules, knowing that both of us are on the same mission. We might need to complete some tasks, we might need to do some things to make sure they get done. But I think digging that deep in the word to understand that it means there is a law and order to things, and colleagues are those who can cooperate in pursuing that law and that order. Um, and it's more than just tasks and objectives. Do you have any thoughts?
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and and I uh you've already indicated it, but looking at like cut connections between collegiality and something like collegium and this kind of Latin root possibly of ligare, um, it has to do with like community partnering up, being with and choosing. But to what you've been saying, I think there's something really profound there. If you're going to an even deeper sense of like some sort of a law, I'm thinking about slow horses, I'm thinking about Jackson Lamb. He is this kind of rock against which others break themselves. Yeah. And he's constantly reminding them of the law of Slauhaus.
SPEAKER_01That's a good point.
SPEAKER_04Which is you've messed up. This is how it is now. And if we're gonna do our job, you've got to get this right. And so he's reminding them of what this is. But on this, uh on like the other sense, etymologically, of of some sort of choice and being with others in a community, the funny thing about Sloughhouse is no one that's there other than Jackson Lamb has chosen to be there.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And so they feel like this is some sort of unfortunate thing, they're unlucky, it's unfair, I want to get out of here. And so it's very hard for them to cooperate effectively and well because there's something fundamentally wrong. They haven't chosen it, they think it's not right, and yet Lamb is trying to kind of deliver the law. Yeah. And and to some extent, they're going to be able to realize that at some point.
SPEAKER_01That's that's a great, that's a great observation. It also brings me to the realization that Jackson is also the one who breaks the law more than everybody else. He does, right? So, like, on the one hand, he has a sense of the law, and in another sense, he is a law unto himself.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Um, and it seems like that that he is different than his inferiors. I wouldn't even say they're colleagues. In some sense, they are, but in another sense, the way that he looks at them with disdain, they're not his colleagues and he's their superior. But like he understands the law, yeah, and and yet he is the one who breaks the law most of everybody, you know, the drinking, the smoking, the sleeping at the job, the holes in the socks, the flatulence. Like, I mean, he he's wild. He's the he's this um um not miscreant, but but he's um he's a misfit.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_01Even even though he uh he understands the law so well that he rebels against it, against it, and he's a misfit. And you know, I I think there is something that happens in this show that's quite interesting. They do they do eventually start to work together and work well.
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_01Um, and some of them are actually trying to follow the code, they're trying to obey the law, so to speak. And and not not just dealing with, on the one hand, I think on a superficial level, they're trying to come to terms with each other's personalities to be able to work with them. But eventually, there is a syncing up of here's the right thing to do, here's what we ought to do, no matter what MI5 thinks of us. And so they start to all buy into a code and a rule and a law, and they come together. And so I I think there is something there that's suggestive of the show that colleagues are those who understand they're on mission and what they're supposed to be doing, and out of that comes collegiality, out of that perhaps before that, out of that be out of that comes camaraderie, and then there's collegiality or cooperation. But it starts with these all these rogue characters and all these rogue agents who aren't working together, who aren't on mission with each other, and it's chaos and it's hectic. But but that is an inter very interesting observation that Jackson is the one who knows the law and doesn't obey it.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and and to that point, like I think we've talked about this in other episodes of Two Poor Spirits, but like the importance of a rule, yeah, and how that can make a community function, whether it's an intentional community, whether it's a family. Uh, and so it it's not surprising that that that that might be a key to understanding collegiality. And I think anybody who's been a part of, or or really anybody who's worked jobs before, you can tell the difference between a job in which the the employees and the colleagues like really do share in a mission and want to cooperate toward an end, versus something where it's just, you know, I'm only here for a short time, I'm out for myself. Uh there's a different spirit there, and I think we're gonna uncover in our conversation here that there are some, yeah, like it's never simple with slow horses. Like, yeah, um, Jackson Lamb is a certain character that he understands the rule and he kind of enforces it or at least holds it on to the inferiors, but um the the characters need to kind of get past their desire to get back into the good graces of MI5. They need, in some sense, to just focus on the job and the uh and the mission, as my cat uh totally bombs our casting session.
SPEAKER_01Gizmo has no idea what the law is, right?
SPEAKER_04He doesn't. You're in trouble, Gizmo. But to to that point, like all of these people feel like they've been wrong, they want to get back, they want to recover their careers, but actually there's work to be done, and they need to figure that out. Yeah. And I think they're they do it imperfectly, yeah, because their motivations are never quite pure. Yeah. They're always trying to do both in a sense.
SPEAKER_01So you have this law dimension and which which suggests it's objective. Um, that there is a there is uh a law, there is rules, there are codes, and everybody ought to know them so that they can be on mission and fulfill the objectives and um the real task. But there's there's kind of a subjective side too that that is called into question for me, like, okay, how much and I mentioned camaraderie uh a few moments ago. It does, it does make me wonder, like, to what extent do you to what to what degree do you do you need to have intimacy with colleagues to fulfill the mission, to be on task, to complete the objectives? Like there is a law, and objectively you can know here's what I'm supposed to do, and I'm doing it, and we're on mission together. But it does, it does, it does bring to the forefront the question of to what degree should you have uh do you have to be friends with your colleagues? Do they have to be companions, if we could use that term? Do they have to be companions on some kind of journey that you're all enduring? Uh, you know, they're all in Sloughhouse and they all lament how it sucks. They wish they weren't there, and there's some camaraderie there. Uh, and and eventually there is some intimacy there. But I suppose my question when we're thinking about collegiality and we're thinking as Christians about how to work well with others. Now, insert into this this question. Sorry, just parenthetical. Insert into this uh question and equation, some of our colleagues are not Christians and some are. Or we work in a Christian organization and we have a Christian mission, or we work in a quote-unquote secular organization, and the mission isn't necessarily Christian. To what degree uh after we've realized that there is a law and there's a choosing to obey the law and be on mission, that uh how intimate do we have to be with our colleagues in order to be effective, in order to pursue that mission? And so it raises for me the question of like, do your colleagues have to be your friends in order to cooperate with them? And as it's uh displayed in the show, there is some courtship, there is some love, there are some, you know, love affairs in the show, and it raises the question like, does courtship ruin collegiality? Is it possible to get too intimate with with co-workers, with colleagues, that you no longer are able to complete the mission or the tasks or the objectives? And so on the one hand, I'm thinking of this question of collegiality requires law. Does collegiality avo is it necessary for collegiality to avoid certain levels and layers of intimacy? Don't become friends with your colleagues, don't court your colleagues, or else the mission is uh um diverted. Do you have any thoughts about this?
SPEAKER_04I do, and you know, I I apologize to our listeners if they've been listening to my cat running riot over our audio equipment here. Um but yeah, you bring up a lot. And I'm I'm gonna kind of I'll just try to speak from the heart a little bit here. I think invariably when you strive with people to try to achieve goals, in some sense, there's always the potential for friendship or kind of a familiarity. And kind of a growth in that relationship and possible intimacy in a non-romantic sense. Um, so I do think that's something to keep in mind here. But in Slow Horses, this really comes to the fore. I mean, in season one, you've got River Cartwright, the main character, and he it seems like he has affection for the only competent agent that's there, is Sid Baker. And he's and she gets injured, which is like sad. So there's some sort of intimacy there, but then there are a couple of other characters as well. There's Min, who's kind of this goofy, you know, agent, and then um he's he's with Louisa, who's seems like a pretty capable agent for Slawhouse, but thinking about their relationship, working together, trying to complete missions together, they start to develop a rapport and then a relationship. And there's something that happens there with the two of them, where you know, Min is actually quite a complex character. He has a family that that's broken apart, you know, his marriage has fallen apart, he's got a couple of kids. He's trying to recover his career to kind of show his family, you know, that he's yeah, to impress them with his career and his abilities, but he's also really committed to Louisa. But you see in his kind of his his um the way that he carries himself and performs his job, there are times where he gets a little bit loose with the rules, yeah, you know, and what's expected of him by Lamb and others and by the service, where all of a sudden, like, he'll start doing things just like other characters to try to show that they are, you know, capable agents that are professionals and they should be in MI5 regular. But you almost get the sense that like there's a comfort level from intimacy that leads to a lack of duty. You know, and and that's kind of problematic where your intimacy or your relationships that you kind of indulge or participate in might lead to a loss of your commitment to the rule that is required for your communal success. Um, so that's with Min and Louisa. Uh, and I think we also see it with some other characters as well. So I don't I don't know if that's getting like beyond what you were talking about, but it just seems like it's important to have a shared mission. There's something about working with others together for uh in pursuit of a common goal, and you're gonna grow naturally through all of that, but then there are some possible transgressions or crossing of boundaries, right? That might be problematic.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Yeah, I'm I I I am trying to get at I'm not trying to belab belabor it, but I am trying to get at that there is there is um there's there there must be a checking of there must be a checking of intimacy when it's not just you know it it the the professional can be sullied by the personal.
SPEAKER_04Yes, yeah.
SPEAKER_01And that's evident in this show, like um you as you noted, you can have characters who show off because of their significant other, and it leads to unforced errors and mistakes.
SPEAKER_04Dumb things, right?
SPEAKER_01And so so it does raise the question of like when when the personal begins to overtake the professional, that there's not only infractions and transgressions of the law, there's also a diversion and a destruction, even of the law or of the mission. And then it becomes your counteracting everything that everybody else is pursuing. It can be a very selfish, it can be negative neighboring in a very selfish way of living in society in terms of vocation and occupation. So I just I I wanted to note that. I I also um just to throw it out there, I also wonder to what degree, this is not a Christian show, obviously, there's no Christian characters in there. But it it did raise for me some questions of like, what paradigm and what um what paradigm am I bringing to my interpretation of this show? Much of it is a Christian paradigm, in which I think of the body of Christ and the church working together. Like I want to think about, even though, even though it's not a Christian organization, I work in a church, I've worked in Christian colleges. It's assumed that everybody has a is on Christian mission and they understand the Christian law, if you will. And our understanding of the way that things should work could be applied, uh, you know, could be applied from Paul's reflections on the body of Christ and the arm cannot say to the leg or the eye to the ear, I don't need you, and we're we all have our particular part to play. And um I think there's some cases like within the show that brings to the surface like you can't have that mindset because they're not Christians and they don't have they're they're they don't they don't know the law, they don't want to follow the law. And so it it it your your way of looking at even having a job and doing a job is very different than theirs. And I mean that translates to some people just don't want to be on mission, they just want to get a paycheck, and some people don't want to be on mission, they just want to stand out, and some people are on mission. I I can think of like businesses, uh, they are on mission, but their goal is to like help people instead of production and marketing and these sorts of things. So it's like different philosophies of that law and and being obeying that law and then the personal benefits or the personal orientation that you have. So there's kind of with both of the questions, with both of the sides, I guess what I'm getting at is like there's a conflict that the show brings to the surface, and the conflict is profession, professional, the profional and the personal. And the show brings to the surface in terms of vocation and occupation, like there are plenty of times in which the two of those come into conflict. And um you've got to check your intimacy, and you've got you've got to check your buy-in to the law. I think rivalry is also a theme that emerges throughout this um throughout this show. And what I found fascinating, you know, both of these terms, collegiality and rivalry, are both have Latin origins. And rivalry is quite fascinating. It derives from this sense that one who uses a stream or a river in common with another. Like you and I can imagine just, you know, two people, two people bathing in the same river. Like, get out of my river, man. Uh, two people walking in the same river. This is my stream, this is my place, this is my my clean spot, and you're you're tainting it, you're sullying it, you're walking in it. And I hooked, I couldn't help but make the connection that the main character, besides Jackson Lamb, the main character, his name is River. And there's a rivalry, which I think you can speak to uh more eloquently than I can, but there's a rivalry that he has with another character. Um, but rivalry, going back to what we just said about collegiality, rivalry become things become very personal. It's no longer professional. And there's a lot, there's there's such intimacy and intensity there. Um, and so if collegiality is, uh if if some problems with collegiality are you can get too close and intimate with people, that the law is forgotten and uh the mission falls apart and people aren't working together, in rivalry, it ceases to become about the mission, so to speak, and it ceases to become about the law. It's incredibly personal. And and I would say the term that comes to my mind immediately in thinking about rivalry is domination. I just want to destroy my enemy. I want to destroy those who are in my stream, my river. I want them out. And so it's not even about the stream, it's not about the river, it's not about where we're going or what we're doing. It's I want to destroy and dominate that individual or that what whatever that might be that's in my area, in my place.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that that's helpful, Kyle. Um, yeah, it is fascinating to think that like rivalry has to do with like a flow and a river, and the main character's name is River. Um, and and this this idea of the flowing river is fascinating, as you noted, because it seems like with a rivalry, it is kind of a fierce um battle, so to speak, where you have at least a couple of protagonists going after some sort of object. So it's either you're trying to attain something that is limited that you can't share, right? So you've got to somehow set yourself apart and attain the object, or you're specifically competing for the same ground and you need to dominate, as you said, uh your adversary. Right. And so it's very, very conflictual. And I think in this in Slow Horses, we have numerous characters that we could look to, whether it's like at the level of Jackson Lamb, but when it comes to River Cartwright, um, there's a really, really humorous character called James Spider Webb. And um yeah, Spider is tell tells you a lot about his personality. He's he's still in MI5. He was in the same class as River Cartwright. You get the sense that River was a better protege or student, but that he messed up and and Spider Web is still there, kind of taking the steps of a career. Um, and so Webb seems to be threatened by any potential success of River, but yet River is envious of where Webb is. Yeah. Yeah. Um, and so he he's constantly comparing himself to this other character who's in a in a better standing than he is. And so you get this kind of rivalry, competition for standing and some sort of accolades throughout the whole thing. And I think most people can kind of empathize here, whether it's from like experiences in sports or competition uh in the workplace, like I'm sure we can all reflect on our experiences and come up with uh experiences of rivalry or you know, maybe unnecessary rivalry too.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. You mentioned uh competition, and I I do think that there is an important distinction between rivalry and dis and competition. Um we think of competition in terms of sports and activities, and somebody wins a prize, uh, somebody wins an award, uh, a title. But rivalry is far more personal and destructive, it seems to me. I'm mindful of you know, Thomas Aquinas in his convers in his his discussion of envy talks about how rivalry is trying to um you know overcome take away the reputation of another to gain a reputation. Uh so he ties it to vainglory and envy. Um, and so the the the rival is somebody who wants is so focused on again, not the mission of winning necessarily. They're focused on the mission of domination and making the other person look bad and their reputation to be diminished. And so rivalry takes on a far more nefarious and diabolical approach than competition. You could be very virtuous in your competition. I want to play against Michael Jordan, I want to beat him, but I'm never gonna beat him, you know. But I want to compete with him because he's gonna make me better. Like that's an entire different entirely different spiritual attitude and posture than you know, I want to make Larry Bird look like an idiot and terrible, you know, and he never should have been the basketball player, you know, perceived as the greatest basketball player as he has, you know. Um, I do think you have to be rivals. I'm not a rival to Michael Jordan or Larry Bird, but you know, I I I do I'm not an NBA player, but you could have NBA players who deliberately want to be rivals to destroy the reputation of others. And I think competition uh you know can be healthy even with even within a workplace environment uh for a Christian. But rivalry is it seems to me, even though we use it colloquially, like the Steelers against the Bengals or the um the Ravens or the Celtics versus the Bulls and the Lakers, like we use that colloquially to mean that they're rivals, but I'm thinking more perniciously of you you see somebody who has a reputation and people look at them favorably, and you want to grab their leg and pull them down, or you want to trip them, so to speak, and you want to be in that place, and the mission is not to do the right thing, make make a um a qu uh a quality product to be on mission, your goal is to tear them down, and it seems to me like that is the essence of rivalry.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's great, Kyle. I mean, I I started to look at um the roots of competition, and you look at this kind of idea of like the the the calm part of it being together and the the petere, like the the striving. So striving together, right? And so it seems like later in history, whereas you might have had this idea of striving together, it became more like synonymous with um rivalry, which I think to your point, there's a there's an important distinction here, right? So and I was thinking about like the Pauline letters, and all of these people, like, well, I was baptized by Paul, or I was baptized by this guy, and like, no, like we're baptized into Christ, and we're striving together towards the ultimate goal, right? Yeah, and how easy it is to lose sight of that. So I think there's like a real moment here to think about when we're we're kind of tempted uh to get really individualistic about these goals. And I think the characters and slow horses are always tempted by this. Sure. Because as much as they start to become intimate and work together and start to do the work that they can do in their situation, there's always that temptation of like, how do I set myself apart so I can get back into the good graces of the organization? And a lot of times it leads to their downfall and their suffering. So maybe we need to think about like I'm not an island, and that I mean, even if you take sports like golf and tennis.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, I know, I know. No, and and you're you're thinking about like, but but all of those amazing athletes that individually accomplish so much, there are often like a couple of coaches that are involved, like whether it's a swing coach or or you know, in tennis, a coach that's helping you with your serve. Um, there are communities involved. Right. And you're striving together towards a goal. Now it might be to beat this person, but it really should be about like excellence and trying to pursue something and achieve the best that you can. And I think that that might help us kind of reframe here an unhealthy type of rivalry, domination, versus some sort of like healthier competition where we're striving together towards a goal. Now, sometimes the goals are limited and we need to compete against others. Now we we know God loves all, so it's hard to negotiate that. But I think maybe we should take some time to reflect on um rivalry and competition and see if there are ways in which we can uh you know fight against the kind of norm of our times and uh the logic of the world where it's it's really focused so much on rivalry and not on striving together towards a common end.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. If I can make a few remarks here uh before we conclude, I I think as as we're, you know, this is a symposium of sorts in which we're reflecting on themes and uh coming to insights through our dialogue. I would say at the heart of some of these issues is individualism and an individualistic understanding of vocation, calling, occupation, profession. I'm there to do my job, I'm there to get a paycheck, I'm there uh in it in this this can all be understood virtuously. That's what I'm there for. I'm there to do my job, get a paycheck, uh, do the right thing, do it well, etc. And there's no there's no appreciation or pull or uh reach for communion. And that's a problem that you are part of a team both behind you, those who have trained you, as well as those who are alongside of you who are doing the same thing you're doing or are in the same building as you, and those who will come after you, who will take up that same mantle uh in that same business or in that same organization and whatnot. So we can be very individualistic in our thinking, and and there is the caution of okay, reach for communion, but also as the show ra brings to the surface gauge the intimacy like not just romantically, but but f in a friendly way. Like if you become if you become such close friends now on the one hand the mission could be excelled, but on another hand, on the other hand, the mission could be forgotten. And so if the calling and the vocation and the profession is at the forefront, you gotta check those things. I also think there's something here about uh which we've already hinted at and already discussed in previous episodes, but there's something here about vainglory and ambition and standing out. We are in a culture of YouTube and social media and um creating apps and coding and selling things and become big becoming billionaires and we stand out. We want to stand out, we want to be superstars, we want to be icons um instead of we want to know the law. Obey the law, be obedient, be committed, um, you know, be consistent. And so there's something here too that that emerges for me about reputation and vainglory that uh is brought to the surface by this show that as Christians we should be collegial. And we should be collegial to the people who have trained us and taught us, the people who are alongside us working uh with us, and the people who are ahead of us that we're gonna pass the baton to. And uh we should we shouldn't have a rival mindset to stand out, to be noticed, to tear down others' reputations, or strict or exclusively to build up our own. It's it's not about our reputation. It's about doing our job well. And there are there are scenes and times of redemption in the show that are beautiful and wonderful. If you do the right thing, if you do the if you if you do things well, the reward is greater than your reputation.
SPEAKER_04I I think that's well said, Kyle. And I I know for many people that are listening out there, you're not in a a Christian workplace necessarily, but that doesn't mean that God is absent. The creator is providing the the the breath of life for all of us, and so anything that is good that comes out of our work and our collective labor really can be attributed to him. And so we have this kind of choice before us of how we're going to conduct ourselves. And I think it's an important choice to think about where I can build up and work with others. Yeah, striving together and maybe developing some sort of intimacy and friendship, but also keeping the prize in mind. Now, I may not share that completely with every other person that I work with, like the same way I visualize that goal, but you know, when you have the right kind of mindset and orientation and and endpoints in mind, like you can do great things. And if you're kind of threatened by this ambition that we talked about in previous episodes, this kind of individualism, you know, I know that people have to do what they think is right for the them and their families, but um, if there's a way that kind of the spirit can speak to you and you can build up and be a you know, a member, a colleague of others, I think that's a a witness in its own sense to the world that is desperately needed and so often is is kind of overlooked. But in a show like this, you see kind of the split commitments of the characters. And for a Christian who's kind of discerning and trying to learn from this, you can gain a lot about how do I act in the workplace? You know, am I am I only shining a light on what I do? Or am I happy to kind of share credit with others in the pursuit of our common goals? Because I know that the good that comes out of this is somehow a reflection of that which is good. These are questions that I think we can take with us. And a show like Slow Horses really highlights uh for all of us.
SPEAKER_01Well, Chris, as always, this has been stimulating and titillating. In our next episode, we'll continue these mesmerizing ruminations on the Netflix series Slow Horses. Specifically, we'll be looking at the fear of every teenager, boredom, and we'll discuss what makes for a good boss. Until next time, watch some highlight reels of Michael Jordan dunking on Celtics players. Smile at your coworkers, make the devil's punch, and pursue the devil's prize. And lastly, clean out the microwave for Pete's sake. Thanks as always for listening to two poor spirits.
