The Theology Pugcast

In today's show Chris and the guys put "niceness" into the Aristotle Virtue Analyzer to see if it makes the grade. They determined that it depends on the political economy you find yourself in. If it is a consumerist global fantasy-land --well, it's a virtue. But is that a place that human beings really want to live--it means no history, no transcendence, and no depth. It's all here and now and on...

In today's show Glenn explains how some evangelicals have managed to climb onto the critical theory bandwagon. He begins with a quick overview of the modernist-fundamentalist controversy of the late 19th and early 20th century, he then shows how this created a void that critical theory has recently filled. Tom and Chris along with Glenn point out the Marxist roots of critical theory, underscoring...

In today's show Tom returns to the theme of intellectual faithfulness in a church that has lost any sense of what that means. Glenn and Chris jump in with their thoughts.  

In today's show the Pugsters interview Dr. Benjamin Merkle, President of New Saint Andrews College. The show was recorded before an enthusiastic audience and at a different venue than the venerable Corner Pug. In this show the Pugcast invades the renowned Willimantic Brewing Company--one of the best brewpubs in Connecticut.  Dr. Merkle provides great insight into the philosophy and methods of...

Jokes about the uselessness of a liberal arts education are cliche--they also evidence the absence of a liberal arts education. The whole point of a liberal arts education is the study of things that are good in themselves, not good as a means to enjoying something else. Arts of that sort are servile--they serve a higher good.  Today Chris introduces listeners to the book, Leisure: The Basis...

Today we welcome to the show a friend of Glenn Sunshine: Francis Jabba, Disciple Making Coordinator for New Harvest Global Ministries in 16 African countries. Reports of the spectacular growth of Christianity in Africa are well known. What is less known is how it is happening. Glenn has visited Africa and has reported on the growth of the church in the book he co-wrote with Jerry Trousdale, The Ki...

In today's episode Tom asks the rhetorical question, "Who sets the agenda for the Christian faith?" Winsome market-oriented church growth types demonstrate through their methods that they believe people should do that.  But maybe people don't actually know what is in their best interests. Tom traces out how autonomy and "authenticity" have come to shape much of evangelicalism in our time. Chr...

Perhaps the most controversial character in all of Tolkien's writing is Tom Bombadil. People seem to either love him or hate him.  But regardless how you feel about him, most people can't figure out why he's even in the Lord of the Rings. What's the point of the man in the blue jacket and the yellow boots? Certainly Peter Jackson thought he was expendable. He isn't even in the film version of...

Glenn introduces consumer-choice as a kind of worldview in today's show.  Consumer choice is a fine thing when it comes to fast-food and designer clothing, but where does it end? Should we get to choose everything? Is consumer choice the apogee of freedom, or in some paradoxical way its denial and a form of slavery? Glenn dares to say that people shouldn't get to chose certain things--their f...

In today's show, Tom outlines the coup against theology in academe.  Believe it or not, once upon a time theology ran the show. We can still see that in the pomp and circumstance at many college graduations--the theology faculty lead the way, followed by philosophy, then the other disciplines. Here's another fact--those disciplines back in the day were actually branches of theology, working o...

In some theologies it seems like God is so sovereign there is nothing left for anyone else to do. Secondary causation and creaturely agency appear to be defined right out of existence. While this leaves people wondering about their agency, it also leaves angels with nothing to do. So, in today's show Chris raises the question, what are angels for? In the course of the conversation things gravitate...

Just because someone is wrong about one thing, doesn't mean he's wrong about everything. And just because someone is right about many things, doesn't mean he's right about everything. Since the days of the Church Fathers Christians have had mixed feelings when it comes to Plato. It today's show Glenn returns to the theme of Platonism and what is indispensable in it. Perhaps we can even think about...

In today's show Tom raises the specter of propaganda--the form of communication seen in books like 1984 and totalitarian states, and increasingly the contemporary western world.  It was inevitable considering the fact that our elites no longer believe in metaphysics. Something must be said, but what if truth isn't an option? Propaganda is what you get in the name of truth. One of the thinkers...

In today's show Chris introduces a subject that he's written a lot about: productive property. Sometimes it is called "real property"--but whatever the name, we're not talking about your tooth brush here. Where talking about what the Founding Fathers had in mind when they limited the franchise to holders of property. They believed that productive property is essential for liberty. It still is. Chr...

In today's episode Glenn introduces listeners to "transhumanism"--a philosophy and engineering project concerned with transcending the given limits of human nature. Transhumanists view the body solely as a machine, and the mind is somehow both dependent upon it, yet utterly distinct. (This should remind listeners a little of Descartes.) But what transhumanism actually is--for all its mechanistic n...

In today's episode Chris begins with a simple truth: since modern welfare states are not the Kingdom of God they will end someday. This leads to a discussion of disincentives for having children in welfare states and why that spells their demise in the long run. Naturally debt is used to keep the state going in the near term, but this only make the eventual collapse that much more devastating. Sin...

In today's episode Glenn discusses an important distinction that is lost on most people today--the difference between liberty and license. The Founding Fathers of the United States understood the difference, and they did their best to structure American government in order to preserve liberty and inhibit license. We've come a long way, baby.  Is there any hope for responsible freedom, or are...

In today's show, Tom introduces listeners to the Barmen Declaration of 1934. He then helps listeners understand what genuine resistance to the Nazis looked like at the time, and how many German churches had been coopted by cultural trends.  In our ideological age, cut off from both nature and nature's God, totalitarianisms emerge to fill in the empty spaces in our heads and hearts. Classical...

Today's show begins with Chris's memories of three LGBT networks that existed in evangelical institutions. These are not hearsay stories, the people involved remain nameless, but Chris knew them personally. Most troubling was the way these networks recruited new members and initiated them. In each case theology was twisted to provide justification for what was occurring. The stories provide a basi...

Chris is in Dallas, and Glenn is on the road, and Tom feels too lonely to record a show. So, we dig into Chris's personal vault of recorded stuff this week for a conversation with Aaron Renn, publisher of the Masculinist. Chris and Aaron are joined by David Talcott, professor of philosophy at King's College in New York City, Sam Perez, a pastor in Jersey City, and Nate Towers of Fellowship Deaconr...

In today's show Glenn provides an introduction to Protestant Resistance Theory. You may have wondered, are Christians the doormats of human history? Do we always turn the other cheek? Do you ever run out of cheeks? Is punching back ever justified, not just in self-defense, but in armed resistance against tyranny? Well, you're not the first person to wonder. Glenn provides an overview of how Christ...

In today's show Chris introduces listeners to two of his favorite writers--Matthew Crawford, author of Shop Class as Soulcraft, and Eric Hoffer, author of The True Believer. Both men could be described as "blue collar intellectuals" because they actually are (or were) blue collar men. Crawford is a motorcycle mechanic and Hoffer was a stevedore (a dockworker). But even though they're blue collar,...

In today's show Tom returns to the theme on technology but this time with an eye toward responding to Glenn's thoughts on enchantment. Is it possible to have the best of both--or must we choose between a world of creature comforts made possible by technology, or an uncomfortable but meaningful world? Fittingly, the guys had to choose between air-conditioning and optimal conditions for re...

In today's show Glenn begins with a marvelous series of word studies ranging all the way from "enchantment" to "cosmology". His point is that our language is full of words that reflect a time when the world was full of meaning and words were spells that drew on those meanings. Undoubtedly, the very fact that we've lost the original meanings of words like "spell" and "magic" just reinforces the poi...

In today's show Chris raises the subject of C. S. Lewis and metaphysics. The evidence is overwhelming that C. S. Lewis was a Platonist--there are passages throughout his fiction in particular that demonstrate it. Tom and Glenn note that it shouldn't surprise us since Lewis was steeped in the classical sources, as well as Medieval and Renaissance works--think of Augustine, or Boethius--both fountai...